It's not completely a filmmaker's fault if they think they can market an independent film just like a mainstream movie. There aren't many other models for filmmakers to follow, and coming up with your own marketing plan takes a lot of trial and error. Since film makers aren't in the position to use traditional methods that requires lots of money, they must resign themselves to failing or to the task of coming up with something new that will work for their movie.

I disparage these marketing techniques not to dismiss their value entirely but to bring attention to the need for creative marketing as opposed to slavish following of status quo tactics.

Trailer

Trailers are meant to be played in front of other movies in theaters. They are made to get somebody to want to see the movie. It's not built to make fans and a fan base that will want to be involved in the storyworld, it's just to get them to see this one movie. Your movies will likely never play in theaters, so don't worry so much about this. Your movie is more than the sum of it's exciting parts, so why present it this way? Your movie isn't simple to communicate, so there is no advantage to making a trailer. Worst of all, a trailer gives away the best parts of the movie that should be a part of the experience of seeing the movie.

Poster

Posters are made to be put up in theaters to generate interest in the movie. They are printed and put there because that is where a large amount of the movie-going public can be communicated to. Since you won't be in theaters long, if at all, (and you won't be making lots of money there anyway) why put emphasis on this tactic. Your audience is spread across the world and not concentrated in any single place. Posters are meant to be printed and put up in some physical place for passersby to view it. Posters don't look great on the internet and in fact large static images are antithesis to the internet. You want to put images for the film in front of people's eyes, but a poster is not the best way to go.

TV Commercial

It's a 30-second trailer. It tells even less than a full-length trailer and depends even more on exploitative elements to grab attention. You don't make friends in 30 seconds, nor can you make a fan that fast. Television advertising is expensive and not even certain to be seen by many people. With the advent of the remote control and DVRs, TV commercials are just a glamorous way of wasting money. You want to communicate through video and audio to possible fans getting them information about your film, but there are more effective and cheaper ways to go about it.

Press Junket

A staple of major motion pictures, a press junket will be a waste of time for an indie movie. Unless you have big stars that journalists are willing to spend only 5 minutes with, you need to develop a deeper relationship with a select group of media people. Instead of putting on a phony party in a hotel and inviting everyone you could fit in a single email, why not talk one-to-one with journalists from magazines your fans probably read. Instead of giving them the most banal, terse anecdotes why not give them real stories that they would be delighted to write about. Treat them like people that have problems, they need news to write about. Help them solve their problems and they may be able to help you with your problem of obscurity.

Premiere

Your movie is not going to play in theaters. We've covered this. So don't put together a one-time in-theater extravaganza that isn't followed up by a run in movie theaters. It's misleading to your fans and worse yet it's boring. Premieres at one time used to mean something; they were special, something media would write about. Premieres were a gimmick to get media attention with the side effect of a few fans seeing the stars. But since your movie's fans aren't in a single territory, it makes no sense to put together an expensive gala event in theaters for a movie that will never be in theaters. This has been done to death, there are other ways that a movie can be debuted to the public and media attention garnered.

Schwag

It's a whistle with the film title printed on it, we'll give them away and it will make people want to see the film. I don't see movies because of the cheap giveaways they throw at the public. These things cost money, too. For each one you give out that is another few pennies or dollars you must shell out. The idea is close to something relevant; give away something related to the film but not the film itself. Pens with the title printed on it aren't going to do anything but prove how little creativity you put behind the marketing. There are other things you can give away to tempt people to check our your movie, things that are free to make copies of. Maybe the physical things you create for the film are expensive and worth charging for, maybe you can be more selective with how you give them away. Just don't look through the movie schwag catalog, spend a few hundred, give them to strangers and expect miracles.

Flyers

Flyers are supposed to inform people about something and at one time they would get attention by themselves. Color printing used to be uncommon and cool graphics a rare sight. With the advent of vistaprint.com and Adobe Photoshop, everybody can make flyers that are as cool as any. This added with the fact that it seems everybody makes flyers for everything doesn't make a case for you also doing so. If the idea is to communicate something to people in a certain geographic area, like near a film festival location, there are other more remarkable ways to do it. Don't just give them a piece of paper with words and pictures on it, there are other ways to get the word out. Don't concentrate on selling, hinting can work just as well.

Hollywood has created a paradigm for getting the word out about films, but you put yourself at a disadvantage if you follow their lead. Some of these tactics might well be necessary for your project. If you've given it a thorough analysis, then do so. Don't assume that these will be the ways you market your film and not give the marketing any more attention. Each movie is unique and so will be the marketing. You can't sell unique films in boring ways. Just keep this in your mind and with a little effort you will find a way to get the word out about your film that is cheap and more effective than traditional methods.