LIFESTYLE
By Jason Titus
Before I tell you about the tips and unique
experiences I’ve encountered along my short but
meaningful road down the social media highway,
let me first tell you a little about me. I am a
twenty-one-year-old, African American male born
in Hayward, California about 30 miles north of San
Francisco. I have wanted to be a screenwriter
since I was ten years old. I guess you can say it’s
been my calling from a very early age. I’ve been
filmmaking for over six years and writing stories
since I was eight. After leaving high school, I
began my educational journey at Columbia
College Chicago. During that time a film producer
in Los Angeles and excellent professors at
Columbia College became my mentors. These
experiences provided me the foundation for my
growth as a screenwriter and fueled my desire to
grow my network and share my unique perspective
of the world.
B
This summer I started a campaign to
expand my social media network across multiple
platforms and to grow my network from 0-500
followers. After five months of vigorous networking,
I became the most viewed screenwriter on
LinkedIn amassing 4900+ followers and ranked in
the top 1% percent amongst my industry
connections. My connections include film, fashion,
music, graphic design, and high-tech industries
professionals. Through this process, I connected
to talent recruiters from studios like ABC, Amazon
Studios, HBO, NBC, Netflix, Hulu, Showtime, and
Warner Bros, as well as talent agencies such as
CAA, IGM, and William Morris. I also have five
industry connections in every major film studio in
America. Through LinkedIn, I was able to connect
with executives, producers, and directors at the
BBC Network and with multiple European and
Canadian film production companies.
To achieve my goal I targeted two
professional networking platforms: LinkedIn and
Stage 32. Through these
awesome
networking
platforms, I launched a
fierce
networking
campaign that far exceeded my wildest
expectations. Today I have 4,967 LinkedIn
connections and on Stage 32 I have 2,592
entertainment industry connections—and growing
every day.
My Stage 32 campaign was hugely
successful in helping to create opportunities that
would have taken me years to achieve. Through
Stage 32, I connected with the founder and
executive director of Ghost Writers, Inc., where I
landed a gig to become a ghostwriter for them,
making me one of the youngest writers the
company has ever hired. My connection with
Ghost Writers, Inc., lead to a connection with a
diversity recruiter at Amazon Studios who has
taken tremendous interest in my work. She has
given me extremely important input on my short
screenplay Connor and gave me great ideas for
ways to further develop it into a script for a feature
length film.
The secret to my success came to down to
“C.U.R.E.” (Confidence, Uniqueness, Repetition
and Endeavor), a formula I created to drive the
success of my campaign.
1. Confidence
Target a social media platform in which you
have the most confidence. This will enable you to
attract the type of followers most likely to support
your future goals. “Lean in.” Driving a campaign
to increase your professional networking presence
in a big way will initially be time-consuming,
nerve-racking, exhilarating and sometimes a crazy
experience. There are many unknowns that can
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