From audience to advocacy: Rethinking engagement in screen media

A trusted advisor said something the other day that has stayed with me.

We were talking about the need for many corporate brands to shift from performance marketing to what I think of as performance storytelling: looking beyond the immediate conversion to the longer-term value of building stories, relationships and communities.

At one point he said, “Not audience. Community talking to each other.”

It got me thinking about three words we use in screen media, often interchangeably:

Audience. Community. Fandom.

They don’t mean the same thing. And they don’t necessarily describe stages of the same journey.

Audience is who you reach. It includes everyone who encounters your content, whether they watch once, return regularly, or become deeply engaged. Some will watch once and disappear. Some will come back. Some will develop a much deeper relationship with the content.

Community is connection. It’s people who gather around shared interests, values or experiences. They may interact with each other, share information, exchange ideas and develop relationships.

Fandom is identification and participation. Fans don’t simply like the content. It means something to them. They may create additional content, develop rituals and inside language, defend it, recommend it, collect it, remix it or make it part of their identity.

For some projects, such as social documentaries, there is a fourth category: Advocates.

Advocacy is action beyond consumption. An advocate does something because of what they have experienced. They recommend it to someone else. Sign the petition. Make the donation. Show up to the screening. Campaign for change. Encourage others to participate.

It’s interesting to note these aren’t necessarily stages. They’re different kinds of relationships people can have with content, and they can overlap.

Someone can watch a documentary once and become an advocate.Someone else can watch a series every week and never talk about it.Someone can spend years creating fan art and debating theories without ever becoming an advocate.Someone can become part of a community that continues long after the content has ended.A passionate fan can participate alone. A community can include people who aren’t particularly invested in the content itself. An advocate doesn’t necessarily have to be a fan.

Why does this matter?

Producers, filmmakers, creators, and arguably brands need to be clear about what they’re trying to build.

The strategy, content and measurement might need to look very different depending on whether the goal is an audience, a community, fandom, advocacy, or some combination of them.

The first question shouldn’t be: How do we grow our audience?

It should be: What do we want people to do, feel or build after they find us?