Lessons from Ian Tarbert on building a film’s path to audience
This week’s post functions as a companion piece to last week’s post about organic social with Dor Dotson. We had the pleasure of having Ian Tarbert come talk to our most recent cohort of the 8 Above Distribution Lab and this is a write up about that session (more on the Lab below). Like Dor, Ian is one of the top indie digital marketing experts – and also working on Steal This Story, Please.
It’s true that it costs money to market a film, but it should be an important line item in your budget–even if it’s not much! You don’t need hundreds of thousands of dollars to do something effective. He’s no stranger to trying all levels of spend, from $250 to $250,000, to see what works.
Tarbert, who has worked across distributor, agency, and independent release consulting, in recent years working on Secret Mall Apartment, Pavements, MEGADOC, The Sweet East, and other feature documentary and narrative releases. Ian frames the work simply but sharply: “It’s an art form, but it’s also a business.” And more importantly, it’s a business rooted in behavior: figuring how people actually watch, pay for, and discover films.
Start With Behavior, Not Assumptions
Before anything else, Tarbert emphasizes understanding how audiences are consuming films right now. Who is going to theaters? Who is renting on digital platforms? What motivates those decisions?
For example, Gen Z audiences are increasingly drawn to theatrical not just for the film itself, but for the sense of community. That insight alone can reshape how you think about screenings, Q&As, and local activations.
From there, you should interrogate your own film, and who you think wants to see it:
- What kind of film do you have?
- Who is the core audience for that type of film?
- Where does that audience actually show up across platforms?
The overlap between those three points is where your strategy lives.
Release Within Your Means
One of the most practical (and reassuring) pieces of advice: build your release strategy around the reality of your film’s scale.
Tarbert urges filmmakers to budget for P&A (print and advertising) from the beginning, especially if they plan for independent distribution. Too often, money is spent on the production while marketing becomes an afterthought, leading to a film that exists without a clear path to an audience.
And just as importantly: don’t spend on things that don’t generate value. A premiere party or red carpet might feel meaningful, but if it doesn’t translate into awareness or long-term audience growth, it’s not doing the work. The goal, at minimum, is for your theatrical efforts to pay forward into your digital life—TVOD, AVOD, or beyond.
Build a Cohesive Campaign, and Team
Marketing materials like trailers, posters, social cutdowns/short videos, and email copy should not exist as disconnected pieces. They need to feel like part of the same conversation, and one of the cleanest ways to do this is to make sure your team is aligned.
Tarbert warns against over-fragmenting your team: too many voices, too much silo’d work, and suddenly there’s “no connective tissue.” Instead, aim for a unified creative vision. The strongest campaigns are the ones where you can’t see the assembly behind them.
Finding Your Audience When It’s Not Obvious
Not every film has a built-in audience, and that’s where experimentation comes in.
Tarbert points to Secret Mall Apartment as a case where a geographically targeted release—focused on Providence, where the film is set—outperformed expectations. The lesson: start somewhere specific, test, and pay attention to the data. Why are people showing up? Is it the subject? The filmmaker? A Q&A?
Your Website Should Be Intentional
A website for your film is still necessary, but its role changes depending on where your film is in its lifecycle.
During festivals, it might function as a deeper portal into the project: who are the filmmakers? What’s the synopsis? What is the look of the film?
During release, it should do one thing clearly: tell people how to watch. (He encourages filmmakers to use Assemble, which has an API that allows your site to pull showtimes from Fandango, for instance.) Tarbert also stresses the importance of setting up your data infrastructure early—pixels, analytics, tracking—so you can understand and retarget your audience over time.
Where to Spend (and Where Not To)
If there’s one consistent takeaway, it’s this: paid social remains the most efficient use of marketing dollars. It’s flexible, targeted, and measurable. Whether you’re working with $10K or $50K, the majority should likely live there. But there are also a number of other relatively accessible ad opportunities that can provide a healthy surround while maintaining a modest budget, just be careful you don’t fall into expensive traps that are outside your means or scope of release.
- Social Ads
- A highly efficient, self-serve mode of advertising that works well in coordination with a comprehensive PR and marketing strategy.
- Email Campaigns
- A targeted way to reach specialized audiences with high-value engagement. Letterboxd is a favorite ad partner for their ability to reach relevant cinemagoers.
- Connected TV
- A great way to mimic the “TV commercial” experience but more often than not will be outside your budget and release footprint to make this a worthwhile expense.
- Programmatic Media
- A cost-effective alternative to direct-buy display campaigns that will “follow” audiences across various web environments.
- Tastemaker Partnerships
- Authentic engagement on social media will always win out over pay-for-post activations. Sometimes an invite to a screening can create a meaningful connection with someone who can help champion your film with their online community.
Key Takeaways
- Knowing your audience (or who you want your audience to be) will only make your marketing strategy stronger.
- Know how people actually watch. Theatrical, digital, community screenings—each has different behaviors. Build around them, not assumptions.
- Stay cohesive. Your trailer, poster, social, and copy should feel like one unified campaign—not a collection of disconnected pieces.
- Invest where it counts. Paid social remains the most efficient tool; authenticity and targeting matter more than scale.
At its core, marketing your film is about being intentional: understand who your film is for, and build a clear, deliberate path for them to find it.
The 8 Above Distribution Lab
As we have indicated before the next cohort of the Lab starts this summer. The 8 Above Distribution Lab is a six-month, cohort-based experience where filmmakers develop and execute a customized distribution strategy while working with a cohort of other filmmakers going through the same process. The peer network often becomes just as valuable as the curriculum itself. Designed for filmmakers at every stage of the process.https://jonreiss.substack.com/p/people-want-to-watch-your-film-now