How 300+ film experts say you should build your career from day one

Clear, practical steps that film industry veterans recommend for new filmmakers starting without existing connections.

Building a filmmaking career without industry contacts can feel impossible.

To explore practical solutions, I spoke to 327 experienced industry professionals. I asked them exactly what step they would take first if they had to begin their filmmaking careers again, entirely from scratch.

Below are the eight most consistent pieces of advice they shared.

1. Build your own network(s). Proactively create meaningful connections and form your own professional community, rather than waiting to break into existing circles.

2. Know who your audience is. Clearly defining your core audience from the start gives investors, distributors and audiences confidence in your projects.

3. Embrace the business of film, not just the creative. Filmmakers comfortable with budgets, funding and market realities build sustainable careers far more easily.

4. Test your films with real audiences. Frequent, objective feedback from unbiased viewers sharpens your storytelling and helps you avoid costly mistakes.

5. Learn how funding works. Navigating film funding clearly, efficiently and realistically greatly improves your chance of securing financial support.

6. Embrace audience-building from the start. Start building and maintaining your audience early in production to give distributors and investors greater confidence in your projects.

7. The industry changing - you should too. Stay curious and responsive to technological shifts, new distribution models and market trends like the rise of AI tools.

8. Brand yourself. Clearly communicating a consistent filmmaker identity helps industry decision-makers quickly understand and trust your work.

Let’s go through them in more detail:

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1. Build your own network(s)

New filmmakers often talk about "breaking into the industry" as if it's about gaining entrance to an exclusive club.

In reality, careers thrive when filmmakers create supportive groups around themselves and form meaningful communities together. The film industry runs strongly on relationships and trust. People want collaborators they already know and trust personally.

Do not think of networking as pushing into someone else's circle. Instead, start now to build your own connections. Find peers with similar taste or ambitions and support one another.

Over time, these early connections become the foundation of your career.

Practical advice: Attend film industry events regularly and consistently to meet others. Take genuine interest in people you meet. Instead of pitching your film right away, build actual friendships and professional connections first. Become someone people know, like, and trust.

2. Learn who your audience is

Understanding and articulating who your films serve affects how successfully you reach distributors, investors, and audiences. When decision-makers read pitches or watch early cuts, they immediately ask themselves who would pay to see this film. If you clearly identify and understand that viewer early, your project feels less risky to everyone involved.

Define the core audience clearly and specifically from the start. Think carefully about the size, needs, tastes, and expectations of your audience.

Choose projects and genres which naturally connect with existing groups of engaged viewers.

Genres like horror, thriller, romance, and comedy consistently attract clear market interest, in part because the audience is easy to recognise and reach.

Practical advice: Define your film's intended audience clearly before starting your project. Choose projects and genres that connect naturally with an accessible audience. Genres like horror, thrillers, romance, and comedy consistently attract clear market interest.

3. Embrace the business of film, not just the creative

Long-term filmmaking careers depend on understanding financial, funding and market realities of filmmaking as well as creative storytelling. Many of the experts I spoke to described how creative choices are almost always shaped by practical constraints around financing, distribution requirements and market preferences.