Hey guys,
Recently I found out my documentary film RASKAL LOVE was bootlegged. Someone uploaded my entire movie onto youtube in 4 parts. What's worse is that they made a channel with MY NAME! The guy was trying to pretend that they were me. I found this extremely disturbing.
However, I took some time to asses the situation. In this day and age, the internet is a life-line to the filmmaker. I had been researching internet marketing strategies and I realized that I could use this incident to my advantage and see it as a marketing opportunity.
One advice I can't stress enough is that indie filmmakers need to take the time to learn internet marketing and on a serious level. For me, I connected with a friend who is an internet marketing specialist. He knows how to target your audience through the use of facebook ad campaigns, how to create an opt-in email list of dedicated fans, and how to give VALUE to your audience before you try to sell them your movie. These are all very important things to understand if you want to make any progress in the future of indie filmmaking. (I offer consultation to filmmakers!)
So the way that my story ends, is that I actually found out who the bootlegger was. I looked up his email(which was found on his youtube channel) and I found out that it matched with someone who had bought my DVD. Now I got the guys name, address, and even found his picture on facebook. I emailed him to let him know that I know all his information, along with a cease and desist letter. I also contacted Youtube to have the videos removed and it was done so within a couple days.
If anyone has had a similar experience of piracy or bootlegging of their movie, please share it! Hope you guys get a kick out of my story.
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