Who Shot Mamba? & Social Networking

(WHO SHOT MAMBA? is a full-length feature film I’m heavily involved with – click here for more info on this site, and here for the IMDB page.)

So WSM? is coming online in the fall – 10/13 to be exact…unless that gets bumped to 11/10, which I’m hoping it does. In either case, it’ll be split (very organically, because it was made to be) into 9 parts.

The company we’ve licensed it to will be doing all their various promo and press stuff, but I want to do everything I can to help. As you can well-on guess, social networking will play a big part in that.

Anyway, I’m gonna lay out my plan as I see it today – the things I’ll be spending time on to build a large network/platform. Then we have all kinds of fun things happen over the course of the run that generates talk, links, etc – ultimately leading people to the film.

What’s outlined below is the construction of said network.

WSM? BLOG
There will be a blog for WSM?, and I’m 99% sure it’ll be just be redirected to this one. There’s no doubt I’d write it if it was on the WSM? site, and also little doubt I’ll be writing about WSM? here when it comes out. I see little use in splitting my efforts, unless someone else from the production came on to write the WSM? blog, which I don’t see happening, because I’m a control freak. Something may strike me yet.

PRELUDE TO A MAMBA: How to Destroy Your NBA Blog by Turning it into a Movie
This is an e-book I’m working on that gathers all the pertinent source material from YAYsports! NBA, and explains how it worked its way into, or out of, the movie itself. Think of it almost like one of those “art of…” books they do, along with a loose narrative of how the movie helped destroy the blog.

This will be super-fun for fans of the old site, and also super-fun for people who have never heard of the old site. For nobody will it not be super-fun.

MYSPACE
I’m gonna have to do a page for WSM?. I hate MySpace, and I know it’s shrinking, but it’s still a major force, especially in the video world – plus it skews young/teen, which WSM? does, also. To me, this one is just a numbers game anymore, so it is what it is.

FACEBOOK
Facebook is in the midst of a major overhaul into Twitter 2, so this is somewhat up in the air until I see how it lives and breathes over the next few weeks. My thoughts as of today: over the couple years I’ve been there, I’ve joined Fan Pages for a bunch of stuff, and never did anything with any of them. (Except that time I posted on the “Drywall Fans” board.)

My best guess is there’s a page for the film, via Calvin Stadiums, a pro basketball player character from the film. There will be some ongoing exclusive content involved to encourage joining/following. Again, I need to see how Facebook shakes itself out here. Here is a Calvin Stadiums commercial that was made as part of the movie:

TWITTER
Here’s a rundown of all possibilities:

@brianspaeth – This is my feed, and obviously it’s probably the best one for promoting the movie once it’s time to do that. That said, I don’t want to turn into a spam fountain, because it’s a crappy thing to do to your friends/network. My feed is my personality, and I enjoy using it how I do now, which is primarily to talk to people about “whatever”.

This leaves a few other options – feeds for characters from the movie. I don’t particularly like when films do this, and like it’s the actor’s picture, but you know it’s some intern. Since WSM? has some eclectically cartoonish characters, I’m toying with these at the moment:

@OrangeRoundie – “Careful…everyone on Earth…carrrrrrefullll…” After playing with this for a few days, I think he may just follow @NBA and @DwightHoward and harass them to no end regarding his one-way rivalry with David Stern.

@Inflatable Ben – “Girl, you know Ben wanna hug-n-kiss you…oh yeah!” Ben would just hit on every booty babe he sees, with that touch of charming innocence he does so well.

As long as the accounts provide actual entertainment value and aren’t spam machines, then they’re worth doing. I also have @whoshotmamba, but unless I can find an actual person who wants to run it as a person, then I can’t see using it. I just don’t believe in the “gather maximum followers and spam all day” theory for Twitter.

In support/conjunction with these efforts will be 2 Teaser Trailers, 1 Full Trailer, 3 Scene Clips, and the 3 Calvin Stadiums commercials. There’s also the release of the WSM? score, and the two original songs, The Crepes are in the Oven and Girl, You So Pretty.

So…there’s plenty to have fun with and promo through these channels. I’d love to know your thoughts – from a “selling a film” context, the angle of social media use, and from those of you who have seen the movie and know the source material well.

If any of you social media fiends think you’d want to get involved, there are rewards/perks/credits we can surely work out. I’d love to have some Official Roundie Henchmen out there as ambassadors. Thanks for any feedback or thoughts/suggestions you may have -

(You can find out more info about Who Shot Mamba? on IMDB.)