I got to speak on a Twitter panel at the SAG Conservatory recently with these fine folks: Claire Winters, Laura Hunter and Assaf Cohen.
Despite the 9am start time (on a Sunday! Come on!), I had a blast.
Twitter is an amazing tool for actors. You can connect with filmmakers, editors, casting directors, agents, critics, fellow actors, fans of your work. It is the simplest way to market yourself, your projects, and your career news.
And you should be.
HOWEVER, if you’re going to use twitter as a marketing tool, you need to be smart about it.
If you don’t use your head, you could tweet yourself right of a job.
This is happening more and more now.
The question of when it is safe to tweet about your auditions, your bookings, your onset photos, came up at the SAG panel. So let’s talk about it.
Read your NDA’s
If you are given an NDA to sign (whether at an audition, at a contract signing, on set, or otherwise), you need to read that shit. Understand what you’re signing. There will likely be explicit guidelines about the use of social media in relation to the project.
Know what those guidelines are. If you agree to them by signing, you need to do what you agreed to do. If you don’t, you will lose that job.
But you told me to market myself
This is true. But not to your own detriment.
You should be marketing your acting career progress, like auditions, callbacks and bookings. Just do it in a vague way until the thing you auditioned for airs.
For example -
Instead of – Just auditioned for Mad Men!
Try this – Just auditioned for a major cable show!
And if you do in fact book a specific job, wait until it airs to tell people that you’re in it.
This way you can still create momentum and excitement around your career, without taking yourself out of the running by leaking information the producers don’t want to get out.
What’s the big deal?
Money is on the line. Every production you participate in has their own marketing plan they need to work. Just like you have a marketing plan that you are working.
Part of the production’s plan may call for secrecy. Matthew Weiner is notorious for keeping the Mad Men show developments on lock down. TV spots may not want the details of their brand new spot broadcast all over twitter. It can put them at a competitive disadvantage.
If surprise and the unexpected is part of the plan for the project, don’t be the dumbass who blows it. Not only will the production be pissed at you, but you will likely be replaced without warning, and never hired by them again.
Don’t let your excitement bite the hand that writes the checks.
When in doubt, ask
If you’re not sure if you have permission to tweet something about a project, just ask. Ask the casting director when you’re leaving your audition. Ask the producer of the film. And if you don’t have access to the person who has the information you need (the ad agency of the commercial, for example), stick to a more conservative approach until the spot airs.
Don’t use company names, product names, show names, or office names.
Stay in the good graces of the nice people who get you paid.
Got questions about using twitter for your acting career? I’ll be doing a special free webinar July 30. (It’s hosted by Erica Derrickson, creator of the Hollywood Actors East group).
Want to get in on it? Check it out here.
