Filmmakers Ask me about Recoupable Expenses all the time. A lot of filmmakers think that recoupable expenses mean money they have to pay. Except in some VERY limited circumstances, that’s not the case.
A recoupable expense is simply an expense that a distributor or sales agent fronts to your film. Another way of looking at this is that your distributor is your last investor, as they’re putting in a zero interest loan in the form of paying for fees and services necessary to take the film to market. Most of the time, the distributor will need to get that money back before they start paying the filmmaker. Distributors and sales agents have businesses to run and general put money into anywhere between 24 and 60 of films every year. Without the ability to recoup what we put in, distributors would not be able to continue to invest in new films. 
If you want to understand how best to market something, you need to first understand the steps that a customer would take in buying it. This isn’t just true for film, it’s true for everything any entrepreneur might want to sell. It’s called the purchase process or purchase cycle. Here’s what it looks like for film.
I get A LOT of questions about how best to make money with short films. It’s something that I think is inherently appealing to most filmmakers, to start making a little bit of passive income from every project they make. Unfortunately, while possible, it’s not that easy, and the reasons why are relatively simple.
The Distributor’s job is largely to make your film available for sale, and set it up in such a way that people are likely to buy it. Some will work to market your film, but most won’t. Even when they do market your film, you helping market your work will make the marketing your distributor does much more effective. However, there are some basic rules that you should follow to make sure everything goes as well.
If you think your work is over when you finish making your film, and someone will just give you a few hundred grand more than it cost to make it so you can make your next one then you’re in for a real wake-up call. Sadly, there’s no money in making films, only in selling them, and the work of selling them is no longer solely on your distributor. Or, at least you shouldn’t count on it being that way. Here’s why.
Over the past few weeks I’ve been writing about and how we used to market movies, vs what works in marketing them now. So to expand on that, here are the most important things in marketing your movie in todays day and age.
A lot of filmmakers I’ve worked with don’t know enough about distribution to really make a career making creative content. This shouldn’t be a surprise, as it’s a something film schools tend not to teach. That being said, there’a a part of the equation most people just don’t talk about, and WHY it takes so long for filmmakers to get paid. This blog addresses that.
I try to stay active in at least a few facebook and LinkedIn groups, and one question that comes up more often than I thought it would was why distributors need to know your social media numbers. The argument that generally follows is something like “just because people follow us doesn’t mean they’re going to buy our movie.” For the most part, we get that you probably have a lot of filmmaker friends, and your filmmaker friends are often surprisingly difficult to get to buy your movie. That’s not the only, (or even the primary) reason why we need to know about your social media. Here are 6 reasons why
Last week I examined the rise and fall of physical media for the film industry. As promised, this week I’ll outline WHY that matters, and the practical aspects of the current independent film industry. Well, the answer to that (and so many things in both this industry and in life) is that it’s all in how you do it. What follows is an examination, looking to lend guidance to that question. Here are the ways you can still make money with independent film.
If you thought that I missed a few genres in my blog last week, it might be that they’re more classically sub-genres. The biggest difference between a genre and a sub-genre is that a genre is generally a tone or a feel of a film (and sometimes some elements related to those tones) and a sub genre is more related to Themes, Settings, Style or niche audiences that targeted largely by those themes settings, or style. Some sub-genres pair better with certain genres than others, and it’s common to have more than one in a film. More as we go through them.
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AuthorMy name is Ben, I'm an Entrepreneur, Producer's Rep, and Author. I'm the founder of Guerrilla Rep Media, Co-Founder/CMO of ProductionNext, and founder of Producer Foundry. Together, the organizations seek to help make filmmaking a more economically sustainable endeavor. I am dysic, I have capitalization issues, and the blogs are often unedited. opinions all my own. 
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