10 Best Posts of 2016

Published December 31, 2016 in FWD:labs

This year we published 11 articles on film, web, and design, in addition to sharing a few dozen posts on Facebook and Twitter. Here are our favorite subjects covered this last year.

TWEET: Nice approach to sponsored web content, @verge and @OnStar, with your Wally Pfister interview!
While branded / sponsored video for the web is still figuring itself out, we love seeing more low-cost, high-concept series efforts like this.
How The New York Times Showed Usain Bolt’s Gold Medal Runs at the Rio Olympics
Almost more jaw-dropping than some of the Olympic coverage on television was how the New York Times used information design to tell a separate story of Usain Bolt’s top events.
TWEET: Great to see @SoniaNCole featured today! For more about her, check out her sites at http://sonianasserycole.com and http://breadwinnerfilms.com.
We’ve been doing websites for Sonia’s production company and personal projects for years and it’a great to see her featured by one of the classiest intimate apparel companies out there — again with the branded / sponsored series approach.
TWEET: Just successfully helped one of our members get their expired domain name back. One of many things we do for filmmakers here at FWD:labs.
We do a lot of behind-the-scenes help for our clients and users that go un-tweeted. This one is just an example. After overcoming challenges with the registrar, it’s sometimes nice to tweet about winning.
TWEET: Looking forward to @WHMPodcast’s show tonight at The Improv in WeHo — their west coast debut! @ericszyszka
One of our original users switched gears from screenwriting to podcasting and blew up, both with a nation wide comedy show tour but now end-of-year acclaim from the likes of AV Club and others. The show we saw in Los Angeles was a riot.
TWEET: On this day 7 years ago we published an article which led to our Apps for Pro Filmmakers database: http://fwdlabs.com/resources/apps/ #ThisDayInHistory
This “throwback” post was especially telling because we’re in the midst of making the apps database its very own website. This will be our first “spin-off” product — with others on deck. Stay tuned!
The Benefits of Owning, Promoting, and Maintaining Your Official Website
This article came to life when a friend of a friend asked if official websites are dead, especially in the age of social media. It’s no slam dunk one way or the other, but this cheat sheet has become helpful for brainstorming what’s best for your own bandwidth and budget.
IMVDb’s Best Feature: Music Video Commentaries
Giving the IMVDb website some link love was long overdue, but this post ended up getting some “favs” from the music video directors we wrote about. Always cool when there’s a ricochet effect.
10 Tips for Search & Social Marketing
After getting asked again and again what’s the difference between organic versus paid marketing, it was due time to craft up a cheat sheet. This ended up circulating with a lot of our clients and helped pave the way for some low-cost, high-reward campaigns across several months. The even-keeled effort also led to our second “spin-off” product, which will also be dropping in 2017!
Websites of the 2016 Oscar Nominees
Before the Oscars, we meticulously combed through each nominee’s official site to see who built it and how they built it. This gave some additional fodder when, during the Oscars, we live tweeted each winner’s respective website.