how to invite audiences in

Rachel Van Riel

www.openingthebook.com

Inviting viewers in - a new approach to audience development

Traditional model of audience development

Traditional model of literature funding

Reader development model

Is the best way of supporting writers to find them an audience?

Reader development is active intervention to:

• Increase people’s confidence and enjoyment of what they read

• Open up reading choices

• Offer opportunities to share reading experiences

• Raise the status of reading as a creative activity

Viewer development is active intervention to:

• Increase people’s confidence and enjoyment of what they watch

• Open up film choices

• Offer opportunities to share viewing experiences

• Raise the status of watching film as a creative activity

Example: Give me a break

• National promotion devised with libraries across Wales

• Current paperbacks in Welsh and English offering different kinds of break

• Targeted to 20-30s - how does reading fit in their lives?

• Book displays in libraries plus a website

• Funded by Arts Council Wales

The reading experience

• The reader-centred approach sells the reading experience and what it can do for you, rather than selling individual books or writers.

• This builds the audience for literature by moving readers beyond brand loyalty to individual writers, developing confidence and interest in trying something new.

• Could this work for film?

• Free spirit

Make audiences visible

• Collect comments, opinions, recommendations

• Use real people and their own words

• Show different types of people who watch

• Show different types of films people watch

• Example: guess who’s watching what

Using real readers to promote to other readers

Short comments instead of long reviews

Display on posters, cards, websites

Readers’ noticeboard – physical and virtual

Recommended by a reader at this library

Reader-centred promotion in Danish libraries – what do men read? Could it be watch?

Reader-centred booklists – would this work for film?

15,000 reading groups in UK libraries – could we have viewing groups too?

•Reading groups start from the reading experience not the text

•Each participant is expert in their own reading experience. This gives equality across different preferences, knowledge and appetites

•It’s a social event and not a study class

Resources to help group dynamics

Ideas to get going

• Where do you watch films?• What do you watch when you’re ill?• Display 10 DVD covers – which appeal to you

and which don’t?• Choose a treat, a challenge and a film you

wouldn’t watch even if you were paid to• Which character in a film did you first fall in love

with?• … and lots more

Reader-centred websites

Social media ideas – what image best represents the reading experience

New project: bookdating.eu

Opening up reading choices – whichbook.net

• Search engines and catalogues reinforce choosing of known names

• Commercial marketing invests in a few big authors

• How can we promote the new, the less well-known, books on the edge?

whichbook model

• Starts from the reader and what you want from the reading experience

• Combines smart technology with individual readers to deliver depth and quality

• Averages 90,000 visits per month

• WelkBoek in Netherlands now live, Ønskebok in Norway ran for 5 years

• Unique – it does things Amazon can’t do

Big questions

• The reader-centred approach has changed book promotion in the UK and beyond

• Can it offer a model for audience development for cinema?

• How can new technology help this process?

• whichfilm would be a great project!

Writing about film

• Go for the experience as well as the content or story:

- does your comment tell me how this film feels to watch?

- is your comment useful to help people as they start on the viewing journey?

• Is the voice personal?• Write as you speak – use everyday language• Are you judging quality or describing flavour?

Rachel Van Riel

www.openingthebook.com

Inviting viewers in - a new approach to audience development

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