In the international film markets, Cannes, Berlin, Toronto, AFM, a sales agent does not just sell films. They sell a catalog. And a catalog is built, positioned, and argued.
The problem that no one says out loud
Most sales agents arrive at the markets with a line-up made up by opportunity: the available films, the producers they work with, the projects that have come up. Rarely by strategy.
As a result: faced with a German buyer specialized in thrillers, faced with a Korean distributor looking for auteur drama, faced with a Scandinavian platform in search of genre, the sales agent defends what they have. Not what the buyer is looking for.
This is where sales do not succeed. Not because the films are bad. Because the catalog has not been built to speak to those buyers.
What a structured approach to the line-up changes
An attractive line-up in international markets is not the longest. It is the one that responds to a logic that is readable for the buyer.
This requires knowing, before the market:
- Which territories are receptive to each film in the catalog, according to genre, themes, format, comparable performances.
- Which buyers to target as a priority, according to their current catalog, their identified needs, their purchase history.
- How to position each film differently according to the territory, because a film does not sell the same way in Korea, Germany, and Brazil.
- What documented arguments to put forward to address objections before they arise.
A line-up built with this logic changes the nature of conversations in the markets. We no longer pitch into the void. We respond to a demand that we have anticipated.
What it produces concretely
A sales file structured around real market data. A differentiated argument by territory and by buyer profile. A selection of qualified targets before the start, to avoid wasting available time. And a commercial posture that inspires confidence, because the work has been done in advance.
In the markets, time is of the essence. A buyer who sees that a sales agent knows their market, their needs, and the comparable performances of what they are offering, is a buyer who stays in the conversation.
What do we do at Éclats?
We intervene upstream of the markets to help sales agents build this logic. Not just analyze a film. Analyze a catalog in its entirety, identify entry points by territory, build arguments that give the line-up commercial coherence.
We know the reality of these exchanges and what it takes to be immediately credible.
Notre rôle : que le line-up arrive sur le marché avec des arguments. Pas seulement des films."