Getting financing for a film is a great way to extend the filmmaking process and in the end never accomplish anything. I hear from filmmakers often how they can't get funding or they are waiting on funding. Resources are needed to make a film, but money is only one of them.

Asking for money to help pay for the production of a film isn't completely without merit. Aside from the ability to deliver better production value, it an also serve a valid marketing purpose.

Social Proof From Reaching A Funding Goal

Not everybody will be gung ho about your proposed film projects. For every successful filmmaker there are 10 others that quit before the finish line. It's understandable that many people would be skeptical about your claims about the value of your feature film idea. One way to get through to skeptics or those on the fence is to visibly display the support of others. By running a successful film funding campaign the non-believers may be swayed by seeing a fund raising thermometer going higher and higher till it's full.

Awareness From The Asking

If you are trying to get the most of the marketing aspect of fund raising for your movie you should be contacting as many people as possible. This is a perfectly reasonable way to talk about your film to people. It's a genuine offer of value even if not an investment per se. You are offering these people the opportunity to be a supporter of what will be a great film project. They will be able to say they had a hand in its success. Not only will you generate some awareness from this canvassing, you might also find some people eager to get involved in the production in other ways. Telling somebody your movie is for sale won't generate much interaction, but asking if they'd like to help get a movie made might get them talking to you and to others.

More Investors The More Fans

Traditionally film financing would come from a single institution, a studio. Recently some studios have split the financing and we've all heard about indie films getting made from a consortium of Mid West dentists. There is a notion that since it's less hassle to get more money from fewer people than that's what ought be done. For marketing purposes it's counterproductive to let a single entity do all the financing. The best solution would be to get the financing from as many people as possible. A single entity with 5 friends tell 5 people about the project, but for every new person you allow to participate they tell their friends, too. 5 investors with 5 friends might not mean 5 times as much money but it will be 5 times the word of mouth generated. Don't be picky about how much they give either, sometimes the poorest among of has the most friends.

Don't Have Production Depend Solely On Financing

As a marketing exercise film financing makes a lot of sense, but don't put your production on the line to where lack of money means lack of production. This financing is not to make your movie. It's to help your movie get made. It should still survive without it. This way you won't be hard-pressed when somebody wants their money back or if the fund raising is slower than you'd hoped. The production should happen no matter what. Use the fund raising as a bonus if and when it comes through.

Sell Stuff Instead Of Asking For Investments

There are lots of legal barriers to actually selling investments. As much as we propound ignoring most legal considerations, it seems a really simple way to avoid lawsuits by selling things that pay cultural rather than financial dividends. You can sell merchandise that comes with literature as to what exactly they are supporting. You can offer access to a restricted part of a web site where they can interact with other "investors".

As we say with anything already done in the movie business: give it a good look then drop it or make it work for you. These are only a few ideas on the way you can use the pursuit of funds for your feature film but there are countless others. Don't keep lack of funds from you making the film, let it be a supplement.