As we close out 2023, we thought it would be good to highlight a little more about our company. A kind of behind-the-scenes look at some of the inner workings of the company. There are probably a lot of things that you don't know, and this is a way of letting you know. We also understand that there are many unsavory characters in the distribution/entertainment field. This can lead people to think all in the field are shady and cause clients to question even the good companies. We understand and get it. So that is another reason we wanted to kind of deep dive into our company.
Each month we pay out thousands of dollars to our clients. In the event a client only has a small amount for the month, that amount is held over until the next month. In the distribution and publishing arena, royalties can fluctuate from month to month. Sometimes this fluctuation is due to the reporting schedule of streaming services. Some services pay monthly, some quarterly, and some depend on the dollar amount. Reports for books are a lot more consistent.
There are some areas in which Zombie Media excels that most do not even know about, so we thought we would share some info.
Many times, when a film has underperformed for the month, we don't even take out our percentage or we knock our percentage fee in half and pass the funds on to our client. Being in the filmmaking business ourselves, we understand the difficulties in creating a film and trying to recoup/make money. So sometimes a little human compassion and understanding is needed.
Here is a list of other things we do to help out our clients.
* IMDb Listing - If a film is not listed on the IMDb, we add it to the site. We do not charge our clients for this service.
* Artwork - We create artwork for books and films at no charge to our clients. We also work to make sure film artwork passes quality control, which can be somewhat difficult at times. Again, at no charge to our clients. Sometimes we purchase graphics or hire an artist for projects, this is paid by Zombie Media and the client does not get charged and the money is NOT normally recouped out of a client's royalties.
* Film Captions - Most streaming services require a movie to have captions. We get these made for films that do not have them. We pay for this service and cut the exact amount out of future royalties of the client over several months. This results in zero upfront cost to the client. We also translate captions into other languages for free for our clients. Having captions in other languages gives a film a much wider appeal to non-English speaking territories. Having bad captions will cause a film to fail quality control.
* Film Editing - Many times we fix minor issues with films, again at zero charge to our clients. We also fix audio issues. For example, a recent film had an unusual "pop" sound in the audio, which would cause the film to fail quality control and not be available to services. We fixed that, for free, and the film passed quality control. Other companies would charge the client a large sum to do these things, we don't.
* Book Editing - We also do minor editing on books. Sometimes it may be as simple as a misspelled word, or a punctuation left out. We sometimes have to do much more work on the layout of a book. We do this to ensure that pictures and chapters fall where they should and are not on the wrong pages. Example: we currently have well over 15 hours of work into a future book release to ensure it is as near perfect as it can be. This is done at ZERO charge to our client. This is all in-housework done for free for our client.
* Other Help - We also offer numerous tips and info on our official pages. Things like "Self-promoting and Marketing" and "Captions or Subtitles" informative posts. Promotional videos to help with marketing. Monthly updates to show top-performing titles. Again, all at No Charge to our clients.
* Funding - Sometimes, Zombie Media will help with funding of projects, the amounts we can contribute vary. We sometimes even help with titles that we are not even distributing, why? Because we want people to succeed, and we support filmmakers and authors.
This is not all that we do to help our clients but hopefully you can see that we are much more than just a publishing/distribution company. We do our best to help a book or film be successful. Of course, not all books or films will be runaway hits, but we still put forth the effort to make it a success. The market is tough. There are tons of films/books out there all competing to get viewed or read. There are numerous streaming services with varying pay structure. All this factors into the overall success of a project.
We hope you can see the benefit with signing and working with Zombie Media. We work hard. Some may be discouraged or feel down that their project is not performing well, but don't be. We have seen projects not do so well and then take off a year or two later. You just have to keep marketing and promoting and reaching new customers/viewers. You build a viewership/readership with each project, which helps ensure future success of the next project.
We thank everyone for the support, and we look forward to making 2024 another great year!
Thank you!
ZMP