The 19 Revenue Sources For WebSeries Creators

As a WebSeries or WebContent creator, there is much to do: Writing, Directing, Producing. Casting, Lighting, and maybe Acting, too. Often this is done with very few people. Often much of it is done by just yourself.

So, after all of that, to then add on what may be the most important element of all in some ways [the funding or revenue needed to develop or continue your series] is often overwhelming. Daunting, at the very least.

And for the sake of this article, we don’t even really address Social Media. Though it could, and should, play a part interweaving through nearly every segment of what you do for your project. Including this one.

Let me list the 19 sources of revenue, income or funding for a WebSeries / Scripted WebContent project. I’ll break each of these items out in future post’s. Here goes:

• Ad Agency’s
• Ad Networks
• Agents
• Affiliate Programs
• Brands [or for some of us, Clients]
• ‘Crowd’ Funding
• Distributors/Producers – Independent Firms
• Game Dev/Development Companies
• Gov’t Grants/Charitable/Institutional Funding or Support
• Licensing/Branding Firms
• Networks [Broadcast or Cable]
• Podcast/Downloads
• Private Investors/Venture Capital
• Product Placement/Barter Firms
• Studios
• Tax Incentives & Credits
• Video Ad Platforms & Content ‘Channels’
• Finally, of these last two, one is probably the most common of all the ones listed here, the other is the least desirable by far:
  
• Friends & Family
• Credit Cards, Loans & Cash Advances

We have run the gamut here, but that is the point. Some of these work in some ways, not so well in others. Some are inter-related. Some are connected. But they all can lead to revenue, and so are included here.

As I’ve talked about in coursework at WebTVWorkshop, the current state of flux in advertising, Hollywood, and the WebContent movement in 2010 creates both chaos…and opportunity.

In the Broadcast/Movie world, the path to getting ‘greenlit’ in Hollywood is well known, and well worn: you shop your project [through an Agent or a show-runner, if you can] to the Studios, Networks and maybe some Production/ Development companies.

They either buy your project, or you start all over again at the beginning. This of course does not mean any of that is easy, by any stretch. But it is pretty well established.

Not so in the WebContent world, or at least, not entirely so. Not yet.

While there is less money in each of these paths listed above as of now, you also need less money in the web world thus far…and there’s NINETEEN of them here for you to follow on…Nineteen.

We’ll be talking more about what this means soon, and how these translate into use in the real world.

Good luck with your Web Series project!

Note: Special thanks to the many talented people I’ve run across, met, and become friends with, as we all learn & contribute to the development of this nascent new industry, of developing Digital Media Content.

~ by MindOnMediaSales on September 24, 2010.