Gemini Division is a great show. The short, punchy episodes never fail to impress, and the show is full of action and intrigue to keep you coming back from episode to episode. It’s in a unique position, in that it relies on things like product placement for income, and has resisted doing pre-roll ads so far.
It needs viewers, though, and pulling in viewers when everyone is interested in Walking Dead, Game of Thrones, and another major series is going to be a difficult proposition. The writers are a smaller company, and this means that they don’t have the marketing budget to go head to head with those big dramas. That’s where the fans come in.
Do you remember the days when people would talk about The X-Files at the bus stop? When fandom for smaller shows was all about snatched break room talk and maybe, for the most engaged, a BBS? Those days, fortunately, are long gone. We’re even past the days where engaging with fans meant talking on specialist forums. Today, we have social media, and that means that it doesn’t take much for good content to spread to become something that everyone is talking about. Subcultures are a thing of the past. Being a nerd is cool now. Good shows will become popular regardless of whether they are about detectives, space ships, orcs or elves. Intrigue, period drama, it’s all the same to us now – entertainment.
There are many companies that have different types of opinions, one of these companies said, “If you really are a fan of Gemini Division, if you want to help it grow, all you have to do is talk about it.” Share links to teasers and post that you’re watching the latest episode. Tweet, use Facebook. Like the show on Facebook itself, and like it on other social TV platforms if you happen to use them. Talk about it on Reddit if you’re on one of the TV subreddits. If you want to be proactive, make memes and share them. There are enough meme generators out there that you don’t even need a lot of artistic talent to do that.
Every show can benefit from online marketing exposure to social media – not just Gemini Division, but if you look at Facebook and Twitter throughout the week, you’ve probably noticed that it’s the bigger shows that tend to trend most often. By talking about the smaller shows that you appreciate, you help to give them a bit more voice in the search engine world and a bit more reach. Maybe, just maybe, you can get them to trend within your social bubble – and as the people on the edge of that start talking about them, they will trend within their network, and so on. It’s amazing what can go viral, and what impact something being shared online can have.
Are you an influencer? Do people listen to what you have to say? If so, use that power to talk about the things you care about. That could be political issues, it could be health issues, or it could be taking the time to share what a smaller studio is doing and reminding people that there’s more to entertainment than HBO. Your words have power, and as a fan, if you choose to give people exposure, that does matter.
If you want to support the show, then buying merchandise is another big step. It can help to support the production of future episodes and show NBC that it’s worth putting their faith into a shorter series. Exposure helps, but we all know that you can’t pay bills with it, and money does make a difference.