Web Series Network Interview With Walter Gottlieb [Speaks On His Web Series, Audience Response, Marketing Commitments & Much More]

Web Series Network.com talked to Producer Walter Gottlieb. He speaks on who he is and his web series "The Videomakers," audience response, tools he's using to get the word out, and much more!

Rich Mbariket: Walter, what can you tell us about yourself?

Walter Gottlieb: I’m an independent producer in the Washington, DC area with my own company, Final Cut Productions. I graduated from NYU Film School in 1983. Did the TV news thing and the TV talk show thing. Since ’95, I have been producing, writing, and directing non-fiction television (PBS, Discovery, TLC, Smithsonian, National Geographic, HGTV, etc.) and videos for clients. I produced several “passion project” documentaries that aired on PBS (including a history of my hometown and a film about the songwriter behind Broadway’s “Guys & Dolls”). “The Videomakers” is my first narrative project since college.

RM: What attracted you to making web series?

WG: I had been watching a lot of quality television (“Mad Men,” “Entourage,” “Californication”), and I thought, ‘That looks like a shitload of fun to write and direct, but at this stage of my career, I’ll never get the chance.’ Then one of my NYU buddies sent me an article in the New York Times about how independents were creating original web series and earning ad revenue. So I decided to jump in. I figured, at the least I could try my hand at producing, writing, and directing my own narrative project – without waiting for someone at a studio to green-light it, and maybe make some money down the road.

RM: Let's get to the "The Videomakers!" What's it about and why should we care to watch?

WG: “The Videomakers” is a satirical comedy about the industry I’ve worked in for 25 years, the non-fiction TV business. It’s about a fictitious company called Lowball Productions, Inc, the lowest-common-denominator TV shows they produce (“Chefs Behind Bars,” “Pets of the Third Reich,” and “Top Shots,” an elimination show where young women in bikinis shoot Airsoft guns at each other). It’s about Lowball’s struggle to stay afloat in a world of outsize egos and undersize budgets. It has office intrigue and romance, but it’s also a commentary on today’s popular culture. We think it’s smart, sexy, and funny - though I’ll leave that to the audience to judge. I think anyone who enjoys behind the scenes comedy about the entertainment business, and anyone working in this business, will love “The Videomakers.”

RM: Tell us about the audience response?

WG: We’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback about the show’s production value. We were committed to making a professional-looking product, with professional videography, lighting, sound, music, and editing. We shoot a lot of close-ups, which works well on the small screen and helps draw the viewer into the story. I think the high production value makes the show more watchable than some other web series, and sets it apart.

RM: During this economic crisis, indie content producers have closed shop or abandoned projects altogether. What's the likelihood that we'll see the end of season 1 and possibly season 2?

WG: We already have most of Season 1 in the can and are editing additional episodes as we speak. (Episode 6 comes out later this week). All we need to do is shoot the season finale (a two-parter where all hell breaks loose), which will happen in early winter. We’re committed to finishing Season 1 no matter what. In order to produce a Season 2, we’d need to bring in enough revenue to cover production costs, which would be cool because we have a lot of great ideas for Season 2. Let’s say we’re cautiously optimistic.

RM: How do you plan to monetize?

WG: We plan to monetize by sharing ad revenue with the online channels that carry us. Eventually, we might attract a sponsor of our own.

RM: What are some of your marketing commitments to get the word out and build your audience?

WG: We started with our base. We hit our personal social networks – not just ours, but the actors’, the crew’s, anyone and everyone’s! We built a Facebook fan site (http://facebook.com/thevideomakers) and a Twitter presence (http://twitter.com/thevideomakers). We sent out email blasts. We used social bookmarking sites. We put the show on webseriesnetwork.com, YouTube, and Blip, among others. Then we started a campaign for free media coverage, starting in our local area and building out from there. Some bloggers wrote about us and embedded our webisodes, which helped our hit counts. Web Series Network has been a great resource, of course. For having launched in August, I think we’re doing alright.

RM: What's your message to aspiring web series creators?

WG: A few messages, I guess. First, find your own niche; try to think of a series idea that might have a built-in audience that hasn’t been exploited yet. Second, some of the best advice that I read online turned out to be true: don’t do a hard launch after posting episode 1. Wait till you have a critical mass of episodes (maybe 4 or 5) before doing the big push. Otherwise, you’ll get a bunch of hits for episode 1 and the audience will fall off after that. You want to have a bunch of episodes online when people start to notice. Third (which I also read online somewhere): creating an original web series will be one of the hardest, but most fulfilling things you’ve ever done.