How Softie’s Supporters Powered Breakthrough Cinema Attendance Amidst a Pandemic
Documentaries aren’t typically known to pack out cinemas. And yet, in the midst of a pandemic, @SoftieTheFilm became perhaps the most watched Kenyan film ever.
In 2020, we helped launch Softie, a Kenyan political documentary that shook our team to its core. We watched, we grimaced, we laughed, we cried, we were inspired. We knew the world had to watch #SoftieTheFilm.
It all began in January 2020 during Softie’s world premiere at Sundance Film Festival. In just a few weeks, we’d reached millions of people, gained thousands of followers and felt immense pride when Softie won the prestigious Special Jury Award for Editing - a first for East Africa!
8 months later and we were thrilled to come on board for Softie’s Kenyan cinematic debut in October 2020. We couldn’t wait to share this vital piece of work to the world.
There was just one hitch. COVID-19.
Softie Comes Home
`Softie’s in-house team had been posting about Softie for months, and a small group of documentary lovers and politically engaged supporters were amped and asking when it was coming to Kenya, having heard about its international acclaim.
At last, in mid-September 2020, it was time to launch Softie’s trailer. We seeded it to dozens of influential voices in the Kenyan social media ecosystem, and to our super-fan WhatsApp group. And it took off! The trailer organically garnered over 42.5K views on Twitter alone. With a base of around 2000 followers at the time, this was impressive, to say the least.
The people of Kenya were ready for #SoftieTheFilm. Finally, a film that spoke truth to power and so pertinently depicted their country’s political breakdown.
Massive Response
Authentic community management has always been a core facet of our methodology. Ensuring each comment is acknowledged thoughtfully and building a true sense of community has been vital to the success of previous campaigns.
We know this approach drives up engagement, but nothing could prepare us for the tidal wave of engagement that Softie’s cinema launch amassed. We soon realised that responding to this amount of people was far too much for one person. We brought on three more team members to manage the floods of online support and divided the week into shifts that lasted until 9pm. This helped us achieve a near unbeatable response time.
The work was well worth it. Engagement built momentum and fuelled a media frenzy.
Breaking Records in Cinema Attendance
Lockdown was in full force across Kenya when the one week cinema run was scheduled. This meant cinemas had to operate with fewer staff and host smaller audiences. Our job was clear: we needed to assure audiences that their safety would be top priority during screenings, but also encourage people to attend.
We enlisted local Kenyan fashion designer, David Avido to create custom Ankara Softie masks for the cast and crew to wear to the events. Stylish? Check. Literally in Vogue? Also check.
Boniface and Njeri with their custom Softie masks from David Avido
We also saw the power of championing our physical audience in the online space - making them feel seen, appreciated and part of the Softie community.
We asked people to share their cinema photos, posing with a fist raised in front of the epochal Softie poster. We responded to every one of them and posted many to Softie’s channels. Our South African team also learnt basic Swahili in order to respond to Kenyan comments with understanding, care, and delight.
Watching Softie became a badge of honour; the responsible thing to do for those who cared about their country and more widely, their world. Softie became a symbol of rebellion, of hope. You wanted to be on the same side as its story.
A pay-it-forward dynamic emerged where supporters started contacting us to buy tickets for other people who couldn’t otherwise afford to see the film.
The film spread like wildfire, with each week bringing news that the cinema run had once again been extended. After one week was extended to well past five, Softie became one of the most watched Kenyan films in the country’s history.
Custom Softie Whatsapp stickers
The element of play
The film’s subject matter is often serious. And its key themes often relate to the harsh reality of operating in an increasingly daunting world. We soon realised the need to avoid over-seriousness and maintain an element of play throughout the campaign.
Our commitment to play also came through in small, meaningful gestures. We launched custom Whatsapp stickers for the team and people on our insider’s group (a list of strong Softie supporters gathered since Sundance) to use.
We produced reaction gifs from the film and uploaded them to Giphy to use in community management, whilst also finding a greater audience for Softie via people searching directly on Giphy (download all the Softie gifs from GIPHY here).
We also wanted the community to get to know the incredible crew behind Softie. We introduced them each on social media, shared baby photos, celebrated birthdays and award nominations and did a few old-school throwbacks.
An audience favourite was Khadihja Mohamed, Boniface’s campaign manager. To give the community an opportunity to engage with her directly, we hosted a live Q&A session with Khadija and Softie’s Director, Sam Soko. The creative team ensured sleek production of the broadcast to Facebook and Twitter, with Khadija giving practical tips on how to protest and mobilise around various issues.
11 million people reached
From September 2020 onwards, we saw the Softie community grow from around 3000 followers across all channels to over 15,000. We reached over 11 million people (around the world, not just in Kenya) with over 47,000 engagements on social media alone. We garnered high-level shoutouts, gained international acclaim, and helped to frame the film and its eponymous hero, Boniface, within crucial discussions surrounding democracy and justice.
If you haven’t yet seen the film, it’s still available for streaming on multiple platforms across the world. It has scored 92% on Rotten Tomatoes, 73% on Metacritic, and 8.1 on IMBD. Softie won the World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award for Editing at the Sundance Awards (2020), the award for Best Documentary at Durban International Film Festival (2020), Best Film at the Encounters South African International Documentary Festival (2020), the Cinema Eye Awards Distinctive Honour Award of ‘The Unforgettables’ (2021), Silver Star for Best Feature Documentary at El Gouna Film Festiva (2021), International Documentary Association (IDA) nominee for Best Feature (2020), PGA nominee for Outstanding Producer of Documentary Theatrical Motion Pictures (2021), and the Academy Awards Longlist (2021).
