Make it and Sell it

[Kim Welch]

What if I just make a film and edit it and put it on a DVD and set up a website and sell it for my distribution? Won't that work?

Kim

Update, November 2026
It can work, and it's much easier today than it was in 2004. Filmmakers self-distribute through Vimeo On Demand, their own websites and YouTube, and through aggregators that place films on Apple TV, Amazon and other platforms. The hard part isn't the storefront, it's the audience. Build an email list and social following before release, and consider festivals first if you want press and sales agents. Make sure you hold clear rights to all music and footage before you sell anything.

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[DerekEastham]

that is one of the accepted measures of distribution...
you could also open up a Z-shop on Amazon, or an E-bay store... more traffic there.

Everyone likes bigger distribution... something that had never occured to me before working on "The Golden Leaf" were the cable networks like HBO.

 

[vegasindiestv]

And actually Kim if you don't do that your behind the game so many people have sites now catering to there films it's not even funny so anything helps. Pay Pal works wonders. just pop a link and people can purchase your flick. Good Luck let us know what happens.

 

[MarkG]

Certainly when I met Lloyd Kaufman a few months ago he was talking about some people he knew who made low-budget movies and sold them from their own web site rather than through a distributor, and made at least enough money to shoot the next one.

The main problem would be getting people to the site.

 

[ruthie]

im chiming in a little late...but....

also i have seen filmmakers that sell their stuff on those friendster-like websites via paypal. on their user profile they just put a paypal button and BAM! they're a distributor...

 

[optimist]

Yup!

Yup!

Absolutely Kim -- the key is just to drive traffic to your site which you can do with some good ol' grassroots marketing. I say, go for it!

Stacey*

 

[rogermarsh]

Driving Traffic

Driving Traffic

Driving traffic to your Web site makes all the difference. I created a film Web site - http://www.hauntedrandrstation.com - but sell very few directly from the site. Since my film has a haunted storyline, I spend $30 per month and advertise at www.ghostvillage.com in a rotating page ad with two other advertisers - which gives me like 50 click-throughs weekly, maybe a little more. I also have my DVD on e-bay, but rarely get more than one sale per month. Most of my sales come from the hotel where I shot the film, and two months after its release, they are selling about 10 DVDs per week - not a lot, but it's steady. Also, try reciprical links at related Web sites. I went to ghost hunting Web sites around the country and traded links with a few dozen sites - all of them driving traffic to my site. Also: send a copy of your completed work to radio show hosts around the country; pick shows that match your topic. We did one national radio interview so far that got us sales; and we have several other shows asking for interviews presently. Another: send copies of your work to major newspapers who review films. I have gotten a lot of print stories about the project. It's a lot of work, and I'm still looking for ways to drive traffic over. But for a film that cost me $8,000 to make, I've already made more than $4,000 back in just two months with the above methods.

 

[Red Prince]

that is one of the accepted measures of distribution...
you could also open up a Z-shop on Amazon, or an E-bay store... more traffic there.

Hello, this is my first post on this forum.

Personally, I would go with something more specific than E-bay or even Amazon. While I have not used their services yet (because I am not yet ready for distribution), I plan on going with filmbaby.com, which, as far as I know, is run by the same people who gave the musicians the popular cdbaby.com distribution channel.

Filmbaby.com has an online store, which handles all the details. They create a separate page for each DVD, which offers a description of the movie and even allows the potential customer to view a trailer. The customer just clicks to add the DVD to his shopping basket. While they do not mention this on the page describing their services, we can get an Internet domain for each movie and simply forward it to the page on filmbaby. Or we can produce our own Internet page and just link to the filmbaby page, and things like that.

Additionally, they act as a wholesale distributor making the DVD available to some 2400 retail stores, as well as to Netflix. Note I said available. That means they will not actively promote to those stores, you have to do that. But the stores can order from them and they will promptly deliver to them.

We set our own prices, they keep $4 from each sale and forward the rest to us.

As I said, I have not used them yet, so I am basing this on the information available on their site. But I know about them through cdbaby.com, which has a very good reputation among independent musicians.

Their services are non-exclusive, so if you also want to sell through Amazon and E-bay or any other outlet, you still can.

They even accept DVD-R, so you can burn them yourself if you cannot afford having it replicated.

The catch? Well, I'm not sure it really is a catch, but they charge a one-time fee of $39.99 for each new title. This covers the building of your web page, scanning your artwork, and things like that. They have no annual fees and no expiration dates.

The main advantage, imho, is that when people come to someone else's page, they can eventually end up on yours. And the people who come there are looking for films, not for books (like Amazon) or auctions. Of course, as I said, you can also use those outlets.

 

[Film_Distributor]

You can also sell your film without inventory at CustomFlix.com

They are a subsidiary of Amazon and also make your title available on your own e-store that you can connect to your website.

They have no set up fees whatsoever.