WGBH Forum Network; Marketing Your Film for Engagement and Impact; WGBH Lectures

Welcome and good afternoon I'm incisor. And I'm moderating this panel a very esteemed panel might add. So I wanted to reiterate why we're here today and what we're hoping to accomplish. You all know when you heard from Scott this yeah an interesting dialogue but there is a lot of film out there and the platforms are evolving I mean everything from television to theater. The Internet even bathrooms and elevators. And so what does this mean. It means that these evolving platforms are changing the language of film and they are making it more difficult and in many ways more competitive for your content to cut through the clutter and to have lasting meaning. And so we're going to we're today going to talk a little bit about what you have to do to make your film stick out and to accomplish some goals that are more than just having it see what we have today experts in documentary and narrative film marketing and. They're going to help us

understand how as Scott was talking about the evolving technology. What are some of the evolving goals of what your content and film can do. The passive standards that we still have to we have to accomplish which are eyeballs on screens and bombs in seats still going to do it. But that's not enough in today's world especially if you have mission and you have a sense of responsibility about what your film can and should accomplish. So we're going to explore in a deeper way how what are some of the active measures of audience education engagement and activation. You will essentially receive marketing run no one around film and will also learn a little bit more about why you should develop your content on multiple platforms. Less so how but why. To get maximum audience reach how you can leverage partnerships and community outreach more authentic and deep

penetration and how you can move audiences from awareness to understanding to action to catalyze positive social change. And then finally sort of the P.S. to resistance is you get an invaluable primer on how technology and media are changing our content and audience consumption of it. So that's a lot. And if we can just do the tip of the iceberg we've done a lot. Now we're going to introduce each of the panelists and this is essentially in order to which they're to my left. First is Alan Stanley she's the V.P. of communications for Nat Geo enterprises and ventures. She's been in communications for 25 years she worked at the National Gallery of Art and brought Lady Di to the United States as part of the next exhibit. And she's been in that National Geographic for 20 years working on projects blockbuster projects across all of their platforms which are going to hear about and in the last year she she's worked on three feature films for the National Geographic film division as well as some digital and

viral videos from the digital media area that you're going to see a little bit about today. To hide left is body of Wanda who is the V.P. of campaign development and operations at Participant Media. And you were probably no participant well for Inconvenient Truth Syriana runner and more current from she's going to talk about a star for now she is responsible for the creation and implementation of advocacy campaigns for participants films each of which has won and before she was a participant. She was the director of the artist for amnesty program for Amnesty International working with celebrities and social justice issues. Tony who left is Cynthia Lopez V.P. of American documentary which creates the esteemed PRV documentary series that airs on PBS. And in her in that capacity she is responsible for the development of programming content and distribution communications and marketing and strategic development of the organization that's a lot ahead of you.

Under her leadership the visibility of p o v has really increased a lot and she's developed some key strategic partnerships with interesting organizations like Netflix and ABC News. You can hear more about that. And then if you play the game which one isn't like the other it's it's the guy at the end. But this has nothing to do with gender. The first three are all folks who are working in entertainment or media or journalism or however you you want to define it. Scott is here I was in the ad agency world in a former life and Scott Scott's company. He's the managing director and director of strategy at mechanic which is a brand strategy company here in the Boston area. He helps his clients and he's going to help us today understand the world approach proliferating media channels and changing consumer behavior. Before mechanic Oh he was a planning director at Marlin which is an ad agency I used to work at but we didn't

work together and he began his career at Saatchi and Saatchi and worked on like you know a brand one a one stop Procter and Gamble that's the best training ground for marketing. Is anything the Procter and Gamble does. He's here because his clients aren't all entertainment. He has some he has many in consumer technology and it's always good to look at best practices across other disciplines to understand what's going on. One of the changes so that we can learn and apply them to what we do every day so I think that he will challenge assumptions that we have a little bit today. So that is it I am now going to throw to Alan who is going to start the party. Thank you. And and then I watched five minutes on the clock. Well so far three people have commented on my accent. So I hope everybody out there can understand me. I am from the hills. Sorry. I worked for National Geographic telep

National Geographic Society and I work and have for 20 years on National Geographic entertainment and ventures projects and in that capacity I cover public relations and communications and promotion for National Geographic films television channel. Music Radio. Most importantly at this point in our lives digital media. So what about to talk about every you know whenever I talk about this people come back to me and say you know what's easy for you because you've got all these platforms at your fingertips but it's not always easy. But I will talk a little bit about. My first topic looking for new platforms when you have a project when you have a film when you have a book when you have. A television program job one find out a

different platform for you to take advantage of. Whether you know in our case what you know frequently in my world anyway I'll start with a film or a television show and well they're looking for what does that have a book application does it have a magazine article in there or does it have a does it have any kind of news media application. Is there a news media partnership that you can reach out to so and not just within your own organization if there is one but. Don't be afraid to take your idea to a big media organization National Geographic. ABC News. You know it's it's they're all looking for ideas and just what Scott was saying earlier that frequently it's the outside innovator It's the outside person with a really fresh great idea. Cast your minds back to two years ago when National Geographic. Published or came out with a new story actually and this is where it all started with us in

this case about the Gospel of Judas and it was and continues to be written about today and is continually discussed among Coptic scholars. You know what does the Gospel of Judas mean what is it how is this translation different how is it of the how's the translation involved. But when we announced it it started you know as a research project and only you know a year after we had invested in this in this research did it become what it eventually did turn out to be which was a television show and several books and. Major website. So there you know it just we're looking for you know we National Geographic are looking for ideas that really do have applications against a lot of different media platforms and we're not alone. And I want to see this crowd you all know we all know how important digital media is. But one thing that we have

noticed over the past couple years is the fact that while a lot of people. Want to use the Internet. They want to exploit the incredible reach and the incredible opportunities that are that are available to to us now. The fact is that they don't really know. They don't really know how to use the Internet they don't really truly understand how to. What a digital consumers really looking for. You know Scott was talking about you know you were talking about one of the things that kids are doing is showing is looking at snippets or you know everybody in this business is trying to figure out what we are going to be looking at and what we are going to want from the internet. And I think it could be anything. I mean it's not one thing and you know we all know the technology is continually

changing so the trick is to find out what or figure out what you pick your audience are you trying to reach a 16 year old are you trying to reach a 35 year olds a very different audience and they're looking for different things on the Internet. So if you're trying to find you know back in the 1980s when we were all starting out and we were realizing how you could. Target your audience and slice it up a little bit more than the broadcast networks were letting us do when their cable television was giving us all kinds of you know threads to thread the needle and it was just great. But the Internet is doing the same thing that we are able to select our audience and really speak to them. So widgets you know we have we have been using to great success I might add widgets to drive audience back to both our digital media outlets but also directly to our television and most importantly our movies.

Well not most importantly everything you know. Books were using widgets to drive book sales and magazine sales a widget. That's not very good at explaining at all which is digital. Sort of almost like a microsite that is very specifically. Created around this very specific project and it goes and it goes directly to the consumer and so the consumer coming to the website. I mean it's it's it's you put your widget on Facebook and people come and get it and put it on their Facebook. It's something that you know we used extensively we had a movie coming out that came out this year called U2 3D and we used the U2 3D widget it was a way of getting. To the techno techno files and to the younger audience. And in the widget we also hid and you know what it was. So that if you really were using your with the widget that we were sending

you then you could find this little surprise and little bonus song on there that you could. So I didn't do a very good job because I'm not a technical person but although I do use widgets I do play around so. But get to know your technology and use the viral videos we've had that's a great success I'm going to show you a couple that we have used this year. I'm like a lot of. My colleagues I at National Geographic. We are about taking of these very. I think I share this with you all actually I would go so far as to say that we're taking these very complex issues and very complex stories and we are delivering them to consumers and entertaining fashion and ultimately getting people to come back to us because we are we are mindful that we need to entertain them. So the tone of

our presentation frequently it's hard hitting frequently. It is very entertaining. So I wanted to show you a couple of viral videos that we've had tremendous success with this year in terms of. Awareness of National Geographic and also driving people back to our website driving people back to our core project the first one we called this ball. We use it. It's an environmental message and we're just trying to tell people that the simple act of changing a light bulb can actually have the world of difference can actually make the world of difference. And then I think we'll go into the next one is we use Edward Norton to. Explain to people how easy it is to stop using plastic bags and how important it is and these two small things that we can do for the environment. I have an enormous impact if everybody gets together

does it. And I think we'll stop there. Asked Jack Black is actually on the Internet right now it's on kids National Geographic dot com It is really made for kids and it's a tie and it's a tie in to his current movie Kung Fu Panda. And there is an environmental message believe it or not in that one too but if you're interested I urge you to go to kids dot National Geographic dot com and you can take a look at it. But in the interest of time we'll just stick with this barb and bag the bag. I also want to before we do that I want to say that I have some assurance if anybody has ideas for National Geographic The brochure that says National Geographic television film a little bit outdated but please do take a look at it explains what we're looking for and it gives a website about how and some instructions about how to submit ideas and the other one is just purely promotional and I apologize for it but we do have a film festival for Indigenous filmmakers called all roads just want to. We're always about creating awareness

for our indigenous filmmaking program. We're very proud of it. So further ado here is our two environmental viral video. This ball and. The bag. Right. Off. This ball. This bag. This. The first is. Simply the man. Of the people. Was. There. Not to mention the Jewish. Jokes essentially. Lead. Him in. The place just like. This is. Taking on as he. Led. The X-Men. And. Was. Going to. Say. The solution is. To. See.

The end. How many. Times does it take to make it just and. I. Live. Listless. I. Would. Say it. Was. Because. Of. This. Being. That my child. In. This. Respect. Sometimes it's the small. Things that can really make a. Difference for the.

Consumer. Answer to a simple question paper. Plastic. About matter. Things become insidious. Making. Money and buy. Each year more than five. Hundred. People. Bostic bags are used worldwide. And because most bags never. Wholly by. Trade. The environment is loaded with tiny pieces even small particles can create major problems. Within large swaths of the Pacific Ocean. There are more tiny pieces of. Plastic. Than food. But there is good news. The list of countries and cities banning plastic bags is selling. And you can be part of the solution. So let's. Bag the bags. Seriously. The why oh please bring your own bags to the grocery store. One small step. That leads to big change. So I just wanted to point out that all of our celebrities and

stars volunteered their time because we were able to match cause with celebrity which always helps and I'm sorry that you couldn't see the very beautiful this fall campaign. It is available at National Geographic dot com so if you want to see a better more clear version of it go to National Geographic dot com and if you can't see it. E-mail me at you Stanley dot com and I'll e-mail it to you. Sorry the Stanley and dot org. I don't know where that dot com came from. Thank you all very much. Good afternoon. I'd like to thank first of all the filmmakers collaborative for the kind invitation to attend this conference. Scott during the keynote talk about Hollywood I'm one of those Hollywood people. But I'm working for a company that's very much in the vanguard in Hollywood and I'm hoping that as Scott pointed out when you sometimes have to drag Hollywood kicking and screaming to try something new I'm hoping that what Participant Media does will become the mainstream in Hollywood. So.

I know that and mention some of our films what participant media believes in is the power of media to inspire and compel change. And I'm just going to region essence what is our mission statement and then show you some examples about why I'm very proud to be working for this company having been at Amnesty International for six years shining a light on an issue as well as the potential to make a positive impact. Every aspect of our filmmaking process from greenlight to distribution to DVD legacy our films are framed in the context of social action and their potential to make a difference. In fact our success is not just box office ratings but on whether or not the movies that we make. Move the needle on activism. This is our double bottom line regardless of whether film is performing from a business standpoint. We remain committed to the issue and extending its message. The founder of our company was a co-founder of e-bay Jeff skull and he really believes that films should have a

message. So all of the movies that we make whether they're feature films whether documentaries have to have a social action campaign associated with it he will not make a movie for participant or invest in a movie unless we are able to launch a campaign that's a double bottom line. So any time that we are going to greenlight a project it's a pitch a treatment a script or decide to finance or co finance a film with the studio. It's my division that comes in and says OK we can launch a campaign that will support the work of the NGOs that will help educate the public. We can develop curriculum to can be given to educators and to students. If we can't guarantee that then Jeff will not invest in that film. Rather than a PowerPoint presentation which I do have is very long so I'm happy to show anybody afterwards what I wanted to do to really highlight how we have really been changing Hollywood in this perspective is by showing you examples of two films one is a feature film called The Visitor which is in theaters now and

it's actually doing very well in Boston so THANK YOU BOSTON. It is the poignant story of a friendship between an American college professor and a Syrian immigrant. But the issues that the Trojan horse in the message is that immigrants are being treated a certain way in this country and how they are being treated when they are put into detention is what is the underlying theme of this film and the social action campaign has been launched in tandem with this film which has helped drive box office because we went to the core base on the immigration and detention issues and were working with national organizations like the ACLU Amnesty International detention watch and the smaller religious local regional organizations that are focusing on the rights of immigrants in the treatment of individuals in detention. So where overture which is the distributor use a more traditional marketing what we participant did is that you know when we a participant is we went to those NGOs and said OK we've got money for this campaign. We want to promote your work. What we would like to do is use this

film to educate not only your members but help us educate the public. So we have a number of initiatives that we are funding including legal workshop trainings for attorneys for free so they can learn about post-9 11 detention and immigration law. We are finding testimonials of individuals have gone through the detention system and their families and attorneys which are all available online. So what we are doing to help drive box office but also to get the message out there which is what I really care about is using the power of these NGOs to educate. So in a minute I'll show you the visitor trailer. But the other example that I think is a very good one for legacy is our documentary Darfur now. As many of you I'm sure know there is a genocide in Darfur that is claimed the lives of over 400000 innocent people and left 2.5 million displaced in Darfur which is in the western region of Sudan. I was an ambassador national worked very closely on this issue so when I was assigned as executive on this documentary I knew that there were a coalition of NGOs that were not only mobilized

their members but students and the public across the board to go see this movie because this is a movie that does an excellent job of illuminating the issue and really mobilizing people to the average person can make a difference to try and end the genocide in Darfur. So in developing the campaign for that. I was blessed to have a large budget from just called to do this. And so we're working with a number of NGOs who are focusing on humanitarian relief who are focusing on advocacy efforts with international governments with our own U.S. Congress with the United Nations. We are working with Jewish world watch which is providing solar cookers and we're helping fund this provide solar cookers for women in the Chaldean camps so that they do not have to leave the safety of those refugee camps to look for firewood to cook for their families because when they do they are attacked kidnapped killed raped by John militias. And then the other one of the other initiatives again to promote the film of the campaign the issue that we co-founded a mission with Houston Rockets basketball player Tracy McGrady I don't know how many people I

mean Celtics landed by will be Celtics-Lakers I'm sure. But history Rockets star Tracy McGrady wanted to do something for the people of Darfur so he funded his own mission and we have participants sent John Prendergast and a colleague of his who are experts on the Horn of Africa and sent them with Tracy and Tracy's mission he was so affected by the suffering that he saw particularly of women and children that he came back and now was launching a campaign with the MBA and working with him where he and 11 other players are going to build schools in all 12 Chad in camps. And we showed Tracy this film to educate him. He went down to see himself. And now when I was being used to educate these other basketball players who are now stepping up in a very big way to help for eons. So these are just a number of the initiatives which as a legacy was released theatrically in November. Now it's on DVD and that DVD just started saying a chouse is selling very well. But we have also purchased a participant 5000 copies of the DVD to be bundled with Don

Cheadle's book not on our watch to be bundled with a curriculum about go for and give it for free to students across the country. So thanks. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to show you the trailer for the visitor the trailer for dark for now and then to the initials one of which is a PSA and the other short a trace émigrés mission because I'm hoping that what Hollywood will do when tackling these films that have these kind of political human rights environmental social justice messages that they will also be compelled to have campaigns like we do which will reach out to the public. Just like. You.

My name is with. A smile. To my. Feeling good thing I mean nothing to. Me. We don't want you. To leave the campaign. Trail we're staying tonight. Let me see. You Tonight. Thanks again for the snake. Something's going on. I'm sorry I'm. Sorry I. Do not want to. Speak to. Me. You know. Illinois.

Was arrested. Just. Joining us. We're not citizens. Islamists. Killed in the detention center. Eleven years. Serving the. Church trying. To kill. 11. A.

Who. Were these deliberate targeting of students. Who didn't. Get. Home why did. You learn about what's happened in the past what happened in Nazi Germany. Here we got a chance to make it right. You just fall flat on your face. Don't you know all the time the words has drawn to a close in action desperately needs to take its place. The lawnmower We get my mandate is to investigate and prosecute the worst crimes and done. My job is to provide food to save lives. It's part of my response to be just a human being. Of such genocide in Sudan and Darfur and I would start to hope that. What's going on over

there. It's absolutely critical to ensure that our taxpaying dollars are supporting and funding this genocide. Got anything else wrong. George Clooney he was going to be gone on a trip to China then to the EgyptAir ball today. Is that priorities do you think you need your bible not. For. The prosecution has gone through that. Mob hideaway. And he pushed the. Criminal responsibility for I measured crimes against humanity and war crimes. To every man you go to sending. Forces. To send thing they've done this. Before the stand for the. Genocide. The difference. The City. Facing those devils stepping up his companies out.

Yeah Mustang. Say let me go get a better. Chance with. Him. And. I'm mad. When I. Know. Staying I don't know much right now. Bill you're. Going to see you later you know or better yet see it nice to meet you and the Governor Susanna said we're going to commit genocide to keep power. So it's a very small percentage of the young there was basically gangbangers or militia guys and they could have been the torturers in the room it was. The women indiscriminately and they keep them in my stock. House. Maybe in America every day to help us this works. For the. First time. We were so good. Coming here. What's their. Bed with their trailer. Visit and. Is Back. On the streets in.

Baghdad. There's a. Place. That's one thing I mean when I. Lost it. Richard. Dawson here to tell us with a hazing. And you. Have to get through. This if you want to teach to work. It's all we need for a. High school. In Ohio. Writes akin to St. Nicholas. You push the child's books. Just imagine no risk of being asked. Not to join is not again this is. Now this is. Very. True. And shall. I say a good.

Tool to help these kids get an education to help them better themselves. Those who struggle. To struggle for their protection. You know we. Have bad ones. When I say we. Balance the mapping from bad to weapon yet. We have to I'm going to stand up on their own and do something about this when Tracy calls when the screw in the red light matters. That's when that so it's really. Good. Somebody. Is going to report back. And ask you. When But for. The good genocide. That moved on I want to put them in balance so I know about it then and I'm proud to tell about it I've done something about it. Thank you very much. Enough is enough. Since 2003 the concept of justice led to some of the worst human rights abuses. To. Be sent to mass to.

Keep. These raise your voice is. A security. Warning. To the conflict. Versus a. Person. To Talk To God. Says. You. Should. Talk. Thank you for being so patient and that was a little long but to just the so the examples of the marketing tools that help not only get people into the theaters but more important for me and while I'm damn Misty was to be able to come to a company that really believes that film can educate can inspire and more importantly help save lives. So thank you very much in their material in the back. And if anybody does want to see the PowerPoint afterwards I'm free. Thank you. Good afternoon I know it's been sort of a long day already. I wanted to just

ask how many of you know have watched the film in the last bit. So a lot of you know I won't go through sort of the generic what is and what do we do. I really wanted to focus a little bit one in terms of deciphering two missed. I don't know if you guys have read the article and the several little articles that we like to ignore but the reality is they're out there. Do we still need public television. And when the New York Times did that piece I was just I couldn't believe it because as a public television advocate and as someone who has dedicated a lot of our energy and time to really think about for the last I've been at He'll be for nine years almost time years to think about how to use media. To serve the public in a different way it really has been building strategic partnerships with filmmakers like you who have been doing this a very long time and there has been lessons that he has learned from independent producers who have forged the way in terms of building sort of large national media campaigns and we've also spent a lot of time

thinking about how do we use the documentaries that air on p o of e to really build national public awareness campaigns not just for the broadcast but now we're really thinking holistically about the entire lifespan of a film. So sometimes when we accept a film we sort of look at the film and say OK wait a second how do we you know during the festival distribution or the theatrical portion of the distribution in addition to the broadcast in addition to the DVD distribution. Have conversations with the filmmakers to set specific goals so that at each stage of the distribution there are various kinds of marketing campaign tools that are used to reach the goals that the filmmaker and I want to embark on. I want to provide one sort of brief example. There's two examples I want to talk about but there's one brief example of a film that we aired waging a living. The film was you know really put a human face to the problem that many Americans face in this country who are stuck in jobs that

pay less than the federal minimum wage. The film was produced by an award winning filmmaker Roger Weisberg. And one of the things when the film came to us and we you know through the editorial process we accepted the film to be on PRV. We said gosh you know you know how do we impact what's happening on a local level in various states how do we develop a nice marketing campaign if you will to really focus on states who were involved in waging a living campaigns. And one of the things we did very closely with the filmmaker was identify the 17 states that were embarked on waging a living campaign issues and said you know again we have limited resources. We really need to focus and you know put the attention behind those states that need one the access to the media and to need more information and need to be able to sort of operationalize their local campaigns using this independent Lee produced

documentary. In the back I've put some packages that also include the Living a wage campaign sort of delineating clearly of the steps that we took and what we accomplished and the impact. But just to talk a little bit about that campaign you know in the end you know the film was on purity over 1.5 million viewers to the film for the broadcast. It had one of the highest you know ratings in the country in various states that again where we marketed in those states that were involved in living wage campaigns in Chicago Kansas Phoenix and San Francisco there were sort of lots of people who watched the film and were engaged on a local level when we really thought about promotion and how best to promote the film in those cities. You know a lot of people said. Nobody wants to talk about the federal minimum wage in comparison like nobody's going to include something about this documentary because really what they want to do is focus on the powerless E in that

state. Well we found that that was not the case. We went to many people who were following the policy and said you know can you really take a look at this film and either do a side bar or do a conversation with the filmmaker. Or better yet one of the activities that we did was we engaged Barbara Ehrenreich to assist us given that she had really written bait and switch and Nickel and Dimed. And we said could you work with us because similar to Roger's film you know her career has been built on looking at you know waging a living through various perspectives. She agreed. We worked with her publishers and we sort of packaged having the filmmaker and the Rother travel together to the states who were involved in these waging waging a living campaigns. And what we found in the end was as a result of doing various kind of strategic work that there were three thousand three hundred forty press placements that we were able to garner. We also found that 175 of those were print

articles that we you know were able to really work with the filmmaker work with you know given barber's name and the attention that she brought to the project. And we did three thousand two hundred fifty eight radio spots across the country prior to broadcast. Now a lot of you don't know p o v but there's kind of 19 of us in a room that's very small and not that small but kind of small for 1000 people. We work really hard but we work very strategically because what we want to do is work with the filmmaker work with public institutions one of the things that I was really happy about this morning is the chair of the Boston filmmakers collaborative drove me and was like you know the link between the university. Film makers and media is extremely important because we believe a PRV that you know media is a tool for democracy. It's the only tool that we will be able to preserve our democracy worth. And it is only through campaigns like this and when I see the work of my

colleagues here up on stage I have to say I get very emotional because I think gosh if we are going to have any change in this country it is based on what it is you will produce what it is we will distribute together and the reality is we have to take the best minds and work together creatively to make things and to make these kind of projects work in terms of the radio spots just to say again talking about me. Nisha marketing development ex-editor a close to about 10 million people heard something about waging a living on the radio. So if you aggregate the print stuff that we did the press placements the radio stuff. We also did 16 television shows and we focused on doing programmes in the morning news programmes in the morning. And you know anywhere from CNN MORNING NEWS to new times. Today in New York those kinds of shows and PS magazine we aggregated all of this stuff have a real conversation about. Waging a

living issues in this country. The outreach side that was the promotional side on the outreach side. There were about 10 public television stations that did activities about 30 educational institutions and 17 grassroots organizations that were involved. We did about 52 cities in 27 states and again with 17 of those states having a real focus that they were involved in a policy issue. All of that to say we don't advocate for specific policies but we advocate for the appropriate information so that people can then decide what stance they want to take on a particular issue. So with that in mind I just wanted to delineate quickly and I know we we only have a couple of minutes but so let me quickly that particular campaign and what we did with heard but there's much more information in the back that really talks about the results and you know how we did what we did. The second example that I wanted to talk a little bit about because when we think about

social issues that impact all of us obviously how much money we make the amount of health care that we have and also the war are three issues that really affect the American public today. And I want to just show a preferred clip of the film and I'll explain a little bit after the clip. Whole soldiers of conscience that this film will be up on P.O.D. in 2008. And we have very specific sort of campaign ideas that we're embarked on right now. So I want to see if we can go to that chart now have. You. Oh.

The reason why I join the army. I mean easy for my recruiter I say I don't want to shoot a machine gun just out of a plane he said say right here. I was raised on American Pie cradle conservatives. I was voted Most Likely to Succeed most conservative. My nickname among a lot of my friends was a guy Josh. I wanted to defend my country. I tried to enlist in the Marines right out of high school playing football. So I joined the National Guard and then ended up going to West Point and the commissioner put it bluntly I'm a patriotic son of a gun. I love this country. It's done some great things for me a bunch of great opportunities both my grandfathers or. My father for a world war to Korea

because it was over the years. So there's been a family member in the military since there's been. At some point. Every soldier. Has to face the question. Will I be able to kill another human being. In combat. This film is about killing in war. And about some U.S. soldiers who have chosen. Not to. The evidence is that far more soldiers refused to kill than we might expect.

In World War 2. Research by the official US Army historian brigadier general SLA Marshall revealed that among the U.S. soldiers in combat. Less than 25 percent. Actually fired their weapons. At the enemy. Even with their own lives at risk. 75 percent did not. Try to kill the enemy. Marshall wrote. The average individual. Still has such an inner resistance toward killing a fellow man. That he will not take a life if it is possible to turn away from that responsibility. But the vital point. He becomes. A conscientious objector. I encourage you to watch the film I'm not going to show any more of it but it's on TV this season. We are embarked and you know working with the military working with various groups

to actually really talk about what's happening to the soldiers that are coming back. There has been already a couple of screenings with the filmmakers and it's pretty amazing. You know when you get to the facts of how people are at war on the front lines you know when I when I first looked at this film and I thought who you know it's shot in a pretty traditional way and usually pushes the boundaries on documentaries in many ways on the genre documentary. When you see the entire film you'll see how the filmmakers do push the push the genre in many ways in terms of the information that they give out. And even in terms of. The footage that is on there and it makes I have to say you know again the staff at p o v and the filmmakers and the people that are in got engaged in working with this film on a local level. We will do our best in terms of coming and developing a campaign that we hope will shed some additional light on what's happening right now. I wanted to go

back two seconds just to talk about in terms of waging a living campaign. There's a couple of things that we also did in terms of developing a podcast series and also you know with every film with very campaign that we do we actually develop a discussion guide that's geared toward teachers. And so every campaign has that element. We just fine tune with the filmmaker who they are what what type of teachers they're trying to recheck cetera. But one of the things I would say in closing you know. While as I mentioned before at the beginning that you know there's been a couple of articles saying do we still need public television. And I know that the folks here I would assume believe that we still do. PBS is the place to be. I'm very proud to be on PBS speak our series to be on PBS because when I think of the level of investment and I think of how many documentaries have been distributed on PBS and this kind of engagement campaign PBS has been on the

forefront for many many years. PIV has been at this for 21 years. But PBS has been at this for many many years. And you know when I think of Bonnie and I think a participant in other groups you know cable stations that are doing this work in the last 15 20 years as well. The reality is there's something to be said that if we were to develop a public media agenda in this country it really has to be with partners from various you know institutions. And I can't help thinking you know what. Recent polls talk about how the average poll of American television viewer watches four and a half hours of television a day and then the average amount. I recently heard the CEO of YouTube speak and he said you know right now. At close to full hours of people downloading material for hours a month you know there people are still watching television in major ways and now it's a matter of us figuring out

how do we interpret great what's happening online what's happening on the ground what's happening in terms of broadcast and theatrical in these really creative ways that Bonnie was talking about what's happening in terms of television development when we look at Nat Geo and what they're doing how do we still go with these different components figure out a way creatively together to get public service messages out that not only in from Lima but actually inspired change on a very grassroots level. And so with that I'll end here and I know we'll go to questions in a little bit. Thank you. Thanks. Well he's switching this I know I'm in position to the barbarian at the gate here and I'm comfortable with that role but particularly among this esteemed company but what I'd really like to position myself as is the representing the consumption and of this supply chain and what you guys are the creators and distributors of content because what I really do is study consumer behavior and for better or worse I then put those

insights and findings in service of brands and companies who are trying to reach consumers and viewers and motivate them to watch their content and consumer behavior and I think in the context of some of the things you've heard today my news might actually be comforting. And I'm not here to tell you trying to convince you to sell out although I am a fan of expense account dining so. But since I do come from the world of marketing I felt obligated to provide a five second version of my presentation which is that's it. It is certainly true that consumers are distracted and doing many things at the same time. The majority of people I'm one of those people that convene those groups of 14 to 16 year olds and talk to them about their media habits and all of them are in fact watching TV with their laptops on their desks we call it continual continuous partial attention in the trade. But it is not true that all they want to do is watch two minute videos of cats falling into the toilet. There is the they do have an infinite amount of video or entertainment options as we all do and most of us enjoy that fact. But all of us engage deeply and still are looking for

deeply engaging content rich complex complex content. If anything TV has gotten better over the past 10 years versus worse and there is certainly a high tolerance for very complex narrative content but they will do it which is what that selective suggests on their own terms so all the work that my esteemed panelists are doing in terms of providing multiple ways of access and particularly multiple formats what I found working with passionate advocates particularly for social causes is they feel that the story can only be told in 15 minutes to two hours and that is a long time in the contemporary media marketplace which isn't to say that some people won't watch that. But if you want to reach a wider audience you might want to give them smaller ways of engaging or engaging on their own terms. So. As a way of approaching this very large subject in a way that I hope will be useful to you I mean my idea here is to share a couple findings around these three categories in a way that will inform at least your thinking if not your practice about how to position the content that you're producing and reaching the audiences that you want to want to reach in the three subjects that I've

chosen because I think they're pretty foundational. This question of authority the one thing I feel very strongly about is authority or relation to authority or what I used to call in graduate school the subject position of the narrator or source of the story has definitely changed and younger audiences in particular have a very different relation to what authority is and both the style tone and role of that authority around this larger term engagement I'm going to share what are probably the familiar theories or buzz words and tell you in a couple ways that those apply and don't apply. And then finally and then some good news I think that this politicization of media opportunities has actually created opportunities for collaboration which with commercial interests in ways that might not be as statically and ethically objectionable as they would have been to you say 10 years ago when you had to work in more rigid formats. The first foundational fact about authority which I think is should be well known but I think is important to emphasize because in some ways it's the foundation of. A lot of the consequences in consumer behavior is that all information now exists in a

competitive environment. We could all go online right now and on virtually any subject including the subject we've been talking today find contradictory point of views well-credentialed contradictory point of views. I've used in the context of these subjects quite a glib subject of dieting but virtually any kind of politically charged subject the notion of a single truth even what we used to call a scientific truth is a contested subjects consumers are aware about and are suspicious of any kind of subject position or authority that claims that they have the single story or single truth and they in fact a likes to be invited into the debate and see multiple SP respective. Another consequence of that fact is they research everything. This may not be directly relevant to the fact that consumers never research what detergent fo buy because they can but they do have access to an infinite amount of information that they'll pursue even in terms of choosing what kind of content they'll provide and then the third major consequence is this the tone or style of authority has also changed. There was a time of course when the New York

Times or Walter Cronkite could get on the news and say this is the way it is that time is long gone in most cases consumers have turned away from traditional expertise. Two personal experience as the source of authority I put Brooke Shields up there because it was a shocking moment to me when I turned to it after reading the New York Times daily for 20 years and saw Brooke Shields on the op ed page talking about her public battle with Tom Cruise over her postpartum depression. Because I've never seen a celebrity talk about their personal experience on the op ed page The New York Times it was clearly an editorial decision that reflected a shift in readership and consumer perspectives this isn't just about celebrities but in study after study consumers will choose a peer review over an expert review in fact they're saying they're suspicious of extra reviews even when they shouldn't be even around things like surgery. They'll still turn to peer reviews. So the importance of enlisting your audience as advocates is well-known under the buzzword of viral marketing. But I just wanted to emphasize that even when you're thinking about the

subject position or source of narrative authority that consumers have a native draw toward personal experience narratives and I know this is true I saw Fernand this morning talk about story structure and say that film festivals are present experience. I myself I'm not a big fan of the memoir form but I'm not advocating it but I know that is a strong compelling way that would consumers relate to authority and then finally most shockingly to me being a former academic and spending my life looking for footnotes. Many younger consumers don't care at all what the source of authority is. They have such a relation to topicality and utility around certain functionalities that they just will try it and see if it works. So this was a project we did for MTV U. They were losing touch to their audience we were developing a guide for various kinds of campus websites in which we said who should be the source of this authority should it be the campus newspaper should it be your fellow students. Everyone does what they want you just have to give them search tools to find it in their board by texting you need rich media and they have incredibly short attention spans. Like

I'm sorry I don't know your name but you mention your nephew who could only watch things for two minutes like I'm not saying that that stuff isn't true but it isn't entirely true and it has the biggest impact on mass marketing people that need audiences of 30 40 50 million. Many of you are looking for smaller audiences but still substantial audiences and so the real conclusion I'm going to take you to is that you've got to think about your audience in particular and where they are and how to reach them. This isn't to say that brands haven't gotten really excited about this notion of getting consumers to share and their product production process so this is my favorite Boeing asking consumers to help design airplanes. This you'll see this in almost every blog corporate blog out there. And this trend is going to pass because obviously it's absurd What do you want to go to the Wrigley's spearmint blog or the boing blog and make comments about airplanes. This will speak as Fernando said to the dedicated or passionate audience but won't speak to anyone else. So there's a lot of buzz around this and giving consumers names but the reality is this is a study we did for a start up web site that was a kind

of you to cross with something or other. It was designed to kind of give consumers a record like sponsor consumer reviewers get them credit and give them kind of fee to participate. What we found and I've seen this validated in other studies that about one half of one percent of people in these spaces actually blog and create content which isn't to say those people aren't important. But it's a really small fraction of the audience most people are consumers of this content and not producers. This is my my Probably favorite slide that will hopefully comfort you to some degree. This is very recent work done around you can't read the details here but I'm happy to share them with you later. Done for a major major media company who is terrified about the fact that young people are stealing all their content and what are they going to do about it. And we did a study in which among other things we checked out people's consumer behavior with various media platforms and you'll see that what most people do that's an often section there is they watch TV during their regular scheduled time. That's what a lot of people do. They still watch TV and they still watch it on DVR penetration is still only. 20 percent of the

population I showed this to the client who's a very senior executive at a major media company say that looks like old media behavior and I'm like well it's a good things that you know a lot of television channels you know that you still have people by dissipating into old media behavior. And I don't want to say that it might there may come a time when people are watching the movies on iPods but the history of media innovation suggests that it's supplemental rather than people still write poems for godsake and read them you know let alone go to movies. What we need to ask yourself is not am I do I have to make or just my content have to work on an iPod but rather what is my subject what is my audience and what's the best way to connect this content to this audience how do they access this work. This particular content or this subject area which could be broader than you think. So couple quick examples. I mean like video is the question on every company's mind if not on your minds as well no one knows what's going to happen. The short answer here is it's a mess. It is not a satisfying experience to to as

you just put. To watch hour after hour of two minute clips on YouTube it's not organized that way. So this is for the tap which is a next generation video search engine which is pretty good it's designed by these crazy smart engineers in Bangalore India and it's pretty good it's much better at YouTube and sorting through video content. But in the project we found for them is it wasn't enough because people didn't even know what they were looking for. The majority behavior on online videos people send you something funny. You click on it you open it it takes you to YouTube you poke around a little bit then you get bored and you knock off. That's the behavior that's like 90 percent of the behavior. Very few people are watching hours and hours of YouTube video it's I describe it as if going to a cable like we looked at our cable IPG is every night and there was no channels names nothing but numbers you like how would you know what to watch. You'd watch what your friends tell you to watch right so what we found was you needed a feed mechanism we in fact in an old fashioned broadcast mechanism in which people enter their interests and then contact outside out to them. That was what was necessary in this world where the search tools

aren't enough where you don't even know it's out there. You know it's not really adequate to provide good tools. This is Travis who are some of you may have heard of it is about as old fashion and outbound email newsletter as can it's just it's just Republic. Deals vary 600 million dollar plus business. Twelve million subscribers get this thing every Wednesday right. So. If they follow the traditional rules of new media this thing would be out of business on the other hand the very simplicity of this format the ease of consumption the way people relate to travel tells led to a very simple format being an ideal format making this a rich media format that took a long time to download that you'd have to click through would be a problem. So it's again it's about thinking about who your consumer is what how they engage in that kind of content that they're engaging at and what formats appropriate. And then finally a very short list for some of you may be old fashion curated expertise. Also a very popular and successful new site in which people are still looking for curated. Curated or expert resources in terms of understanding content and making discoveries. So

all these things exist simultaneously the question is matching it to the right kind of content. Finally and I hope this will be very comforting. I just talked to a bunch of super cool and poised New Yorkers 20 years old all of whom are engaging in what we call super fan and one day behavior right they're basically discovering content charmingly British Invasion music. Dionne Warwick this one woman was a big fan of that content is kind of hard to find in kind of contemporary search engine tools where they're discovering. TV shows that they missed. There's so much good content being produced now that they miss it and then they want it all right they want to like download it or rent entire series. So they engage in these orgies of consumption that last an entire day. Dexter is an example because a lot of it was a kind of underground hit for a while and didn't surface and then people suddenly decide oh this is an interesting show and they would read the entire series at the time which suggests that in the midst of this video snacking or whatever that there's new kinds of engagement and immersive content and it's the political I mean gaijin of the younger generation to attest to right now.

There's also a lot of interest in political content as well so this is just supposed to be a comforting mention that people still care about complex content. They still care about kind of narrative content. But to your point it does have to be easy to slide before is what you'll see is all the kind of behaviors that have penetrated deeply and quickly including something as simple as Hulu which is essentially a player of TV content online. That's it. Pretty high quality better than YouTube. It's gotten severed for 7 percent penetration across a mass audience very quickly. Finally this is I'm not going to stand for any time on this because this reaffirms that everyone sense the importance of multi-platform creations here content. The one thing that's certainly true about new media is people want to bunch of different ways to engage in their content not just because they're lazy not just because they have short attention spans but because they like to it's fun and satisfying to engage more deeply in a subject around multiple ways. This makes the obvious point that people want it both ways do you want to download Do you want to stream. I always have to ask these questions for my clients even though the answers are self-evident. People like multiple options in different

degrees of engagement different formats of engagement. So I know that this poses challenge challenges with some of your resources but with digital content you should start with the assumption that you're going to formatted a bunch of different ways there isn't one way to tell a story. If you want to reach a broader audience. Finally the good news and save a little time for questions is these these do digital content and broader platforms have opened up new opportunities for the producers filmmakers and distributors to contact with commercial interests. This BMW Films which I'm sure many of you are familiar with was a foundational use. Very high end directors and talent in in line with a very high end product right in was it was an experimental but breakthrough effort to tie really high quality online video content to up to a product launch. The combination of the broadening of formats as well as a consumer brand attention to value what we call value based purchasing has really created opportunities for people with social causes and progressive

interests to tie their content to brands assuming you're comfortable with that. But I'm going to tell you that the business world is not all alike and I have clients that I have to remind healthcare clients that they actually stay in business and get members because they're so invested in spreading healthcare to larger amounts of the population. But people will still engage and contents the most extreme version of this and it's good news for people in my business is people actually look up bad. It's on YouTube and watch them right so like they're using digital content to access ads we always hear about people fast forwarding through ads on their DVR. That's certainly true but like everything else people watch stuff that interest them and engaging in 30 second entertaining films are things people like. So this is from the SciFi Channel which is quite kind of high end charming video about a lost orphan Martian. But people are are seeking out content even commercials on line. Patagonia obviously has been a brand for a long time now which is used to kind of social causes cause marketing. But I picked this image because such a beautiful image of high end photography and

enlisting high end photographers in the in the service of branding some ways that you hopefully wouldn't be objections on finally. These are issues that I'm dealing with right now. Fallon community health care which is a local health plan which is the outsider. And as a fairly progressive company in relation to that Bama be a roster of Blue Cross and tie. US is actively trying to get people more engaged in their house and it's hard to do. And they're looking for content that can help and gauge people on the subject of childhood obesity all kinds of socially progressive issues that will make people take more responsibility for their health and have a direct impact on health care costs for urgent health mouses another program like that which is designed to keep people more active. All these companies in these crowded environments are looking for content that can engage consumers in the subject. Of course they also want to promote their brand through that content but if you don't get consumers attention you can't kind of promote their brand Saucony as well as another one of our clients who are working really directly and trying to expand running to a broader broader audience.

So anyone that can produce powerful content and get consumers attention now has much more leeway than they did say 10 years ago to have kind of creative freedom a broader array of formats as well as I think us more attention from the brand and corporate side to the ethical claims of that that content and the need to engage consumers around that. So I tried to be as fast as possible. That said I got more information but thanks a lot. Thank you. Thanks anybody have any questions. And you know what to save time we're going to ask you to stand up and talk really loudly please and I'll repeat the question. If you don't have a good voice. Anybody have any questions. Well all of our campaigns we have our own budgets for Social Action and normally it's a floor of $150000 which will be for smaller documentary. And then when it's theatrical can go 400000 half a million door for now the budget because of all of the initiatives that we're working on because we felt it's very important initiative you're trying to help end the genocide in Darfur through educating people about what's happening

was closer to three hundred fifty thousand. Forty thousand dollars. And you know again with the double bottom line with Jeff the movies one thing it costs one thing and that was co financed with Warner Independent Pictures. But the social action campaign is ours. We have curriculums for all of our projects for their documentary or features and we use different partners so on Kite Runner for example we had Amnesty International write the curriculum and they have human rights educators who are university professors high school teachers middle school teachers and they work collaboratively to come up with the curriculum and we say to them we would like to target this curriculum for middle school through high school. And so that's how we do it with. For now we're working with Facing History facing ourselves. And they've developed a curriculum that is going to be bundled with Don Cheadle's book not on our watch and with the DVD door for now but everything we do with the curriculums we give them for free. We do not charge any school. Our mandate is get the word out there through the campaign and we just feel that giving these materials to educators and they are all teachers

that write them and then you know making it downloadable First of all you can always go to our site and take part. You can download it for free or you can call us and we distribute them we also give them to school systems libraries and try and get as wide distribution as possible. Yeah Cynthia and Allan both can weigh in on this as well. I just want to say that. Participant has has. Contracted with National Geographic to create some materials for specifically for the Kite Runner through a program that exists through the National Geographic Education Foundation. So. Yes all of our materials are created by teachers and students and for. Them it's not work and I don't think the we basically hire consultants or educators to develop the materials for us. We also have a national board national advisory board of educators. Usually our discussion guides and the curriculum that's

developed is really geared toward high school and college students. And then we have specialists that you know review the materials for factual accuracy who are academic success but were always if they're educators in the room that would like to be you know connected to our community engagement department or educational work please you know give me your cards and we can definitely connect you. In addition to the discussion guide and curriculum we also develop something called delve deeper which is like a bibliography that we do in partnership with the American Library Association and we also have a resource guide. So those materials have been available on the website and also there is something cool for educators on the PBS website. That's very specific in terms of what teachers have access to and all the materials are for free. So I'm just going to encapsulate in case you couldn't hear the question is for the large. Organizations. It's harder for independents.

What are you doing to overcome some of the barriers to getting into some of these large distribution. Just in terms of PIV I would say you know in the last three years our sort of programming budget increased somewhere in the range from three hundred fifty thousand dollars for acquisition. So almost $800000 an acquisition. So we've done quite a bit in terms of trying to raise more funds to be able to distribute. Money to independent producers to you know do what you do Bast. That having been said there has been an increase in terms of the amount of documentaries that get submitted to P.O. each year. Last year there was about a thousand documentaries submitted and truth be told You know we accepted between we accept anywhere between 16 and 20 a year. So the competition is very great. There are other public forums public streams of you know funding

that are available on the PBS website. And I have to say when I look at how much private sector is investing versus public sector how much cable is investing versus public sector what you will still find given I ts is investment investment and PBS is investment. It is far the largest share in terms of documentary specifically. It's a hard time. I don't know how to answer it. I would just also say that funding is tough no matter what organization you work for whether it's discovery with that has lots of money or we're those of us at National Geographic working you know the the programs that we're producing for PBS in addition to the National Geographic Channel and it is tough. The only thing I know I would say. I can say is that there are so many platforms out there that if you're if you have an idea that can start as a

you know five minute viral that that's much easier sell it's much easier to get funding for a five minute viral that can grow into a bigger idea and it's a pretty easy thing to do to get it to get the idea out there on the internet or get it out. You know there are ways there are ways to grow the idea. It's a very tough time for all businesses including all aspects of entertainment and it's. You know it's it's a tough time and walk to competition. So great stuff out there just what Scott was saying there's so much wonderful material out there it's very competitive. So the question over here. Yeah the question is are is anybody working with Current TV and what are your thoughts about it. We are.

Al Gore we did an inconvenient truth and we are working with current TV they work with us and helping get the word out about our film so we're looking at a couple of other models with them. Oh. Well it's not just current TV but just about everybody is doing you see including National Geographic were about to launch we have on Launch been announced. UGC platform at National Geographic dot com. And you know we have very specific and most you know a lot of the Web sites have very specific mandates like we're looking for animal videos and we're not talking about the cat falling into the toilet we're talking about the lion falling into the ivory we're looking for. You know we're looking for it.

That's a huge opportunity I would think I'm not a filmmaker so I don't I don't I don't know how I feel about this if I were a filmmaker. But we are looking for amateur filmmakers but we're also looking for. Professional quality. Incredibly innovative material that will draw people to our UGC platform both as contributors and as viewers and it's a great we're trying to build a community of amateur and professional filmmakers around these very specific things that we have. And we're not alone everybody is doing and it's not just youtube it's you know it's a lot of different Discovery is going to be doing it soon. So there are a lot of opportunities again for the small. The beginnings of a project that can by all means grow and I use a great example as and we were National Geographic Television was not involved in this the channel was you know the video that everybody saw. On YouTube the lion and the

alligator trying to get the little poor baby water buffalo. Well the National Geographic channel turned that into an hourlong film and they used animation to sort of dissect the ME. It was it did incredible ratings and it started as a. Lucky big person on vacation getting happen and happening upon an incredible scene. And it started as a YouTube presentation and ended up being in our own National Geographic Channel. So people can hear. The question was how do we get regionalized audience information I'm throwing that one to Scott. I mean I kept this part off because I mean the short answer is you pay someone like me. Where we start is even if you don't have the resources for actual original research is a diff. A sharp definition of your kind of target and subject and starting and content and then starting to look through the various kind of vertical outlets of that target so you can look actually at certain kinds of blog networks were actually published that are published are kind of audiences buy by geo target and you'll see what people are using and how they're connecting So there's a bunch

of tools on line you can use free to get access to that kind of content but it kind of depends on the subject. I'm trying to think of other flicker can be a great resource actually for understanding how a new and different kind of groups on both Facebook and MySpace can give you a really strong sense of how different kind of configurations of enthusiastic groups participate in different kinds of subjects and where they're located and they will give you a lot of it. They'll just post a lot of information up there. So if you use some of those social communities in innovative ways you can actually use them as sources of resource for free. I wish we could keep going but assuming the panelist can stay kind of stick around a little bit before we have to clean up the room I don't know what your takeaways are but if I were to try to just sort of say what are the two things you could walk away from all of this. Multiple platforms I think you heard that over and over and over again think about different ways to get your content out and take chances like Scott said at the keynote. And the other I would say we've said it we'd implied it and that is ask something of

your audience and point you know really go to the fact that they. May want to do something with their newly found understanding from your content and point them to ways to get involved because it is amazing how much people can and will do if you ask them and show them what to do next.