what does an audience forward ecosystem look like?
is this an odd question...?
As I write the title of this post I’m struck instantly by the thought that in some ways this is an odd question to ask. What does an audience forward ecosystem look like? Don’t we all make films already with the audience in mind?
Making films that will engage them.
Making films that will create an emotional response.
Making films that excite the audience?
Sometimes the answer is actually no. But regardless, that’s not the kind of “audience forward” I’m thinking about. What I’m wondering is how to engage your audience before and during the making of your film—not just waiting till it’s finished to start thinking about your relationship with the audience and how to get butts in seats. Folks like
, and are wondering similar things:How can we make people care about moviegoing again?
Not just seeing a film, but allowing their excitement to grow while they stand in line waiting for their ticket to be torn - or scanned - breathing in that buttery scent of popcorn.
Pulled from a good piece The Label wrote last week “How the Audience is the real hero of NonDē”.
So these are the questions that started my wonderings, but as I’ve been thinking this through, it goes further. We’ll get to that in a little bit.
The key thought is building an ecosystem with the audience as a part of it. If you know me, and have heard me off and on in the past, you’ll surely have heard me say something about the film business needing to look at and learn from the music biz, in particular the non-commercial side. There are music labels that create an authentic brand for the music they release. This isn’t tied to a singular artist, granted, but the number of Sub Pop, Merge Records, International Anthem, Tru Thoughts, Jazz Is Dead, Gondwana Records—far outweigh the Neon and A24s in the film world. These labels deliver consistently, and you know the curation is up there, so your trust is engaged. As a fan, you’re brought into the world and relationship are developed.
We’re ready to pick up the latest release from our favorites, be it Radiohead, Theo Parrish, Kamasi Washington, Sault, or James Blake. And if they’re doing work consistently, they know there’s a set fan base who will support them, buy their records, go to their live shows, and rock their merch. There’s the main work, the music AND there’s an ecosystem built here that does a decent job of sustaining (at least from the outside that’s what it looks like) a career. Think of Bandcamp: direct-to-fan, fan-supported, physical releases, artist-forward. A whole infrastructure designed to let the audience support the work more meaningfully. Think of Sub Pop’s Singles Club—people subscribed and received a new 7" single every month. Fauve Records an indie label from Hong Kong puts out music on Bandcamp with each release available for a limited time and then it disappears. But if you join their membership club, called Top Cat, you get assess to deleted releases forever. There’s a culture built around discovery and loyalty. Imagine if something like these existed in film.
In the film world there are not as many of those filmmakers who have built direct relationships with their fans where they have direct communication and offer their work for purchase. In the documentary space there are people like Gary Hustwit, and Jeanie Finlay (good piece today from
in conversation with Jeanie). But I struggle to name more (share with me names I’m missing!) who are audience forward with their work and are building a community to sustain their careers.What are the equivalents in the film space to the indie labels? Not the companies the industry insiders know. I mean the ones the audience knows. I’m talking about collectives, production companies, filmmakers and the like where if they made merch, the audience would buy it. I asked ChatGPT for some ideas and I didn’t like what came back. I really can’t think of m/any.
Recently we have
starting up. Excited to see where they go and of course we’re all talking about this already...there is the Creator-Sphere.
They’re light years ahead in their audience-forward thinking. They had nothing else, no gatekeepers to lean on to reach the audience, they had to build that relationship just to exist. And they built it. They can sell merch and people will buy. Other folks are writing good things about this space and there are many things we can learn. Go read about it.
"What the 'Creator Economy' Promises—and What It Actually Does"
The New Yorker — A nuanced look at the realities versus the hype of the creator economy."Power Is Shifting Rapidly to Indie Creators"
Ted Gioia on The Honest Broker — A compelling argument that the real creative power is moving toward independent creators."Social media creators to overtake traditional media in ad revenue this year"
The Guardian — Reporting on a major tipping point: creators generating more ad revenue than legacy media."The Creator Economy is Just Getting Started"
Li Jin on Substack — A foundational piece on why the creator economy is only in its early stages."Why the Creator Economy is More Than a Fad"
Hunter Walk on Substack — A case for why this shift isn't just a bubble but a structural change in media."Creators are Owning the Media Stack"
Nathan Baschez on Substack — A strategic overview of how creators now control distribution, monetization, and audience relationships.
Thinking out what the ecosystem looks like, I drew this as my first draft. It’s not quite right but it’s a starting point. Later in this post I’ll show you the latest version I sketched.
I was talking to a filmmaker this week over lunch and spitballing what the audience + filmmaker relationship could look like. The first model we talked about is based on a filmmaker who over time develops 10,000 fans. This idea actually evolves from Kevin Kelly’s "1,000 True Fans" thesis, which is that you only need 1,000 people willing to pay $100 a year to make a living as a creator. That idea has stuck with me, and I’ve been wondering: what if we scaled that to 10,000 fans?
So, let’s say these are folks who will pay for your work. Set the community buy-in at $30 per person (they can give more if they want, we all love to support stretch goals).
That’s a base of $300,000.
Let’s also say the filmmaker has a year to complete the work. You now have a 300k budget. You can make the film for that amount with your production is fully covered. Boom. Maybe you need more, so you leverage this 300k to find a funder or partner to match, or you top it off with grants. But let’s stick with: you CAN make the work for 300k.
From there, any additional distribution outside your core 10k fans is your profit. Amazing. Reminder to the work in this world is not just the singular end product, the work is going to encompass bringing the audience in to your journey making the project.
Say you do this again the next year. If you did your job well, the 10k fans stay with you, and hopefully you’ve grown that base to 12k. With the $30 buy-in, that’s $360,000—plus maybe some profit from the last project rolling in, so now you’ve got a $400,000 budget. By the way, don’t forget that your raise from your fans also needs to cover your distribution costs.
Vision this forward: each year you make something, share it with your fans, and the base continues to grow aka you GROW YOUR CAREER.
What’s cool is if we open up our field of vision a little. Making films takes a village. So what about your collaborators and crew? If you’re making a project every year, the same team could be working with you. Maybe every March is your production month, and they know every March, they’re working with you. Now imagine there are 9 other filmmakers doing the same thing. This wider network of production collaborators and crew could count on 10 months of steady work, with two months off. That sounds pretty sustainable for the ecosystem as a whole.
And don’t forget the collaborators also extend to the folks in the distribution ecosystem—the exhibitors, the marketing folks, publicity, impact teams, etc. etc.
This is what I’ve evolved my sketch to look like...where surprise, Audience, is in the center.
About 8 months ago in the early days of this Substack I had written a piece talking about my desire to map the ecosystem and this sketch looks like a big part towards what I was thinking of back then.
Before wrapping up today let me drop one more thing I've been thinking about, what's the equivalent of touring in the music industry for filmmakers? Musicians go on the road to perform live, connect with their fans, sell merch, and build community around their work. In the doc world, we've actually had this going on over the years with filmmakers doing impact campaigns, community screenings, hitting the road with their film in tow. But what if that wasn't just for the activist docs or the special cases? What if it became a norm, part of your annual rhythm? You make a film, and then you tour with it. Not just a premiere and a couple fests, but a real run: pop-up events, Q&As, immersive screenings, maybe a workshop or two and hit some high schools and universities. You bring merch, a zine, a vinyl soundtrack, something tactile (the grails to your work). AND you have a budget line item for your fee during this process out on the road, supervising the merch making and so forth.
With the audience you create moments. It’s relational, not just transactional. Touring becomes part of your business model, part of how you stay in touch with your audience. And if you’re doing a new project every year, maybe you tour every fall, just like a band would. A season for production, a season for release, a season for connection. A rhythm. Audiences can count on you for new work, new experiences. Exhibitors can also count on you coming through their town and bringing audiences with you. Maybe your audience starts to also become the exhibitor’s community as well? I didn’t include this piece in the sketch and also missing is merch piece as well. So next iteration of the sketch we’ll find where they exist and how they are cogs in the wheels of sustainability and creativity.
What do you all think? Drop a comment!
And more importantly you should now go read this post from
“Build your Audience, Own your Future”, which has 20+ suggestions on how to do this!Perfect track to soundtrack your thinking as you fire off some comments would be (Matthew) Herbert’s track “The Audience” from his 2001 Bodily Functions LP. If you don’t know the song be sure to listen through to 1:40 where the beauty drops in.
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Welcome to the new subscribers. If you want to know what this substack is all about, start here and then work through some other older posts like this one and this one. Participate with your comments and suggestions. Share things you like and get your friends to stop by. Here’s another plug for the OG case study post which I’m constantly updating, so send me any case studies I’ve missed that you found useful! This past post about audience is a good companion to today’s reading.
This is excellent again Julian! We need to talk about testing this model out!
Preach!