Hal Croasmun - 33 Ways to Sell Your Screenplay!: How to Get Your Screenwriting on the Market and Start a Career as a Screenwriter

33 Ways to Sell
Your Screenplay!

Howto Get Your Screenwriting
on the Market and Start a
Career as aScreenwriter

byHal Croasmun

33 Ways to Sell Your Screenplay!

Copyright 2015 by Hal Croasmun

All rights reserved. No part of thisbook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any meanswithout written permission of the author.

ScreenwritingU Press

For more information, visit thewebsite: ScreenwritingU.com

TABLE OF CONTENTS

This book isdedicated to every screenwriter who has taken the risk of writing andpitching their screenplay. Your courage is inspiring. My hope is thatyou have the success you desire.

I'd like to thankthe ScreenwritingU Alumni for your never-ending support and belief inme, and for giving me the testing ground to prove the 33 Ways. Thanksgoes to Heidi Mastrogiovanni and Ann Kimbrough for going over everychapter of this book with me. Thanks to Dimitri Davis for editingthis book. Also, thanks to Karen Mueller Bryson for getting the bookready to publish.

And special thanksgoes to my wife, Cheryl Croasmun, the love of my life and inspirationfor most of what I do. You never cease to amaze me!

I'm committed to mywriters' success. Since you've joined us by purchasing this book, I'dlike to give you a quick video that will dramatically increase yoursuccess using the 33 Ways.

This 5minute video will give you a visual plan that you can quicklyand easily implement as you read the 33 Ways. I hope you enjoy it andachieve the success you want!

Early in my career,I asked more than 30 screenwriting teachers a single question:

"Howdo you sell a screenplay?"

Most of them saidsomething vague like, "You get an agent." And when I askedhow you get an agent, they'd shake their head and say something like"You win a contest."

The truth is thatthey didn't know. But it is not their fault. At that time, peoplethought that all that mattered was the writing. So they were focusedon writing only. Most of them hadn't been in the market, so they justdidn't understand that part of the process.

At the time, I wasrunning a corporate training firm and had been designing trainingprograms on leadership, sales, management, and other "softskill" topics. We had also done business with over 100 majorcorporations, so I knew there had to be an answer to how to sell ascreenplay.

I made it my missionto solve that mystery.

I decided to do whatI'm best atcreate an "Expert Model." Simply put, anExpert Model is a set of processes and steps to do things at aprofessional level. The design process entails watchingprofessionals, interviewing them, and synthesizing the model intosimple steps that make it easy for someone to perform them. Thentesting it, re-interviewing, and solving any problems with theprocess until it consistently works.

I began interviewingproducers. That was twelve years ago.

As of the publishingof this book, I've interviewed:

-700 producers in Los Angeles,

-120 agents and managers,

-over 50 studio execs,

-4 presidents of studios,

-more than 50 readers,

-and more than 100 top screenwriters.

With each interview,I gained another piece of the puzzle.

But having theanswers wasn't enough for me, and it isn't enough for you. So threeyears ago, I brought the ScreenwritingU Alumni together and askedthem to join me in this vision:

VISION OF SCREENWRITINGU
To focus on making screenwriting deals
and have as many of our Alumni break
into this industry as possible!

With that as ourvision, our Alumni has made over 250 screenwriting deals in the lastthree years. You can see them at screenwritingu.com/success-stories

By the way, Ilearned as much working with my writers on their deals as I did fromthe interviews. With many of these deals, I spoke with the writer asthey were making the deal. We discussed what was important to thewriter, what the producer needed, and the possible strategies forsuccessful negotiation.

I was not theirmanager or entertainment attorney or agent. I was operating solelyfrom an educational perspective, and in support of my writers.

Eight years ago, Iput out a predecessor to this book to 3,000 screenwriters called 33Ways to Break into Hollywood. They absolutely loved it. But sincethen, the market has changed, the Internet has changed, and I have atleast 10 times more experience marketing screenplays. Because ofthat, I believe youll find this book much more useful.

One more thing toremember: marketing yourself and your script is an ongoing processthat takes work. It is not a magical process that instantly producesa winning lottery ticket. You create a plan, make smart decisions,take consistent action, and then learn from every one of yourexperiences.

Do that and you'llsucceed.

You can do it.

HalCroasmun
President
ScreenwritingU

A screenplay can becalled many things -- art, story, blueprint, or even the launchingpoint for a blockbuster movie. Whatever you think it is, please knowthat the moment you begin marketing your screenplay, it suddenlytakes on a business purpose.

For a screenplay tosell, it needs to be written in a way that works for the market.These strategies will help you succeed at the Marketing Basics.

This one has to be#1 on the list. It is the basis for all of the other strategies.

Some people thinkthat their scripts should sell without great writing. They have atendency to go for "good enough." In fact, some writersactually send out scripts they know are flawed, hoping Hollywood will"see the potential."

Here is both the badnews and the good news.

No one in Hollywoodis looking for average writing or "potential."

They want GreatWriting!

That is bad news ifa writer wants to send in average writing. But it is GREAT NEWS foranyone who is committed to doing the underlying work that will havetheir screenplay be the very best it can be.

Why is it greatnews?

Because it meansthat your writing will stand out!

With 100,000screenplays coming into Hollywood a year, the competition is verystiff. But what most screenwriters don't realize is that their realcompetition isn't the contest winners. Their greatest competitioncomes from already produced writers who are constantly looking forwork.

How do you know ifthe quality of your screenplay is high enough? Here are four sourcesthat can help you gauge the quality of your work:

-Compare your script to the best produced screenplays.

-Enter high level contests to see how your script fares.

-Script coverage.

-The initial response of the market to your script.

At the minimum, aproducer needs to look at your script and say:

"This is a professionally written script and a professionalwriter."

Once your script haspassed those tests, then start pitching it freely to producers andyou'll instantly see if you made the grade. If a producer loves yourwriting, they'll contact you... even if they don't want this script.Producers want to be connected to great writers.

More than any otherskill in this series, quality writing can make the biggest differencefor getting you a sale and a career. It is worth doing whatever youhave to do in order to become a great writer.

You can do this. Andit is worth doing!