Hemlock Circle Productionshemlockcircle.com
Last Shot — theatrical ramp-up

Social
Campaign
Strategy

A focused social and content-production plan for warming cold audiences into active ticket buyers. Dallas is the first market model — and the blueprint for every city after it.

Market model
Dallas first
Audience path
Cold → Warm → Hot
Phases
3 acts
Themes
6 pillars
Campaign objective

Move audiences from cold to warm to hot — and turn local warmth into ticket intent.

Build awareness, emotional relevance, and urgency for Last Shot. Establish the film as both a sports drama and a family story, while ensuring each local market receives a clear, timed path from discovery to ticket.

Campaign phases

Three acts. Each one has a different job.

The messaging and content mix should change as audiences get closer to ticket intent. Tap a phase to drill into its specific jobs and signals.

Goal

Establish Last Shot as a family story inside a basketball world — and make the title memorable.

Awareness
Positioning
Story world
Jobs to be done
  • Lead with cast-forward trailer cut-downs and recognizable on-camera moments.
  • Use cast character spotlights as the primary awareness assets.
  • Layer in Todd and Andy as supporting storytellers to add context — not as the lead recognition hook.
Signals to watch
  • Profile follows and saves on key clips.
  • Watch-through on 30s and 15s trailer cuts.
  • Title recall in comments and shares.
Dallas timeline overlay

A week-by-week ramp toward opening.

The first market model. Each row is a window — tap any one to open the execution note for that stretch.

Influencer layer

A targeted trust-building channel inside the social plan.

Not a separate campaign track. The influencer layer sits inside the warm-to-hot window to convert relevance into recommendation and local attendance.

Where it fits

Use influencers in the warm-to-hot window

The influencer program should start after the audience already understands what the film is, then help convert relevance into credibility, conversation, and local attendance planning.

Primary role
Trusted parent voices explain why the film matters to families and sports households.
Best creator profile
Local micro-influencers in Dallas across sports moms, family lifestyle, school-community, and “things to do with your family” accounts.
Why here
This is the point in the funnel where recommendation and social proof start to matter more than basic awareness.
Operational structure

Recommended activation model

Invite a small Dallas cohort to a screening or early access moment, then ask for simple, authentic content built around parent reaction rather than overt ad copy.

  • Target roughly 8–12 local creators for the pilot.
  • Ask for one reel, one story sequence, and one optional static post or carousel.
  • Track performance by creator links, code, or UTM-based ticket-page traffic.
  • Reuse the winning creator profile and posting format in future markets.

Recommended placement

Where the influencer layer lives in the plan

Influencer strategy shows up in three places so it feels integrated rather than bolted on: as its own layer after the timeline, as a named tactic inside the warm and warm-to-hot timeline rows, and as part of the parent-facing and social-proof content themes.

That makes the influencer work read as a conversion-support system inside the full campaign, not a disconnected add-on.

Content themes

Six pillars the campaign keeps returning to.

These are the recurring strategic themes. Expand any pillar for the production detail and content examples that support it.

What this theme is doing
  • Broadens the film beyond sports-only audiences.
  • Supports parent, family, and adult drama positioning.
  • Helps explain why non-basketball viewers should care.
Content examples
  • Cast-led clips that put recognizable faces in front of family-stakes moments.
  • Talking-head clips from Todd or Andy about grief, healing, and parent-child relationships — used as context, not the lead hook.
  • Character spotlights focused on family stakes.
Execution note

Whenever a piece of content leans too far into sports-only framing, pair it with a family beat in the next post to keep positioning balanced.

Base deliverables & punch list

What we need, sorted by who creates it.

A simplified production checklist showing the core assets required to run this campaign consistently.

Repurpose what already exists into a modular asset bank.

Trailer cut-downs
30s, 15s, and 6s versions of the official trailer.
Aspect variants
Horizontal and vertical edits for the strongest trailer beats.
Standalone story clips
3–5 short-form clips that work without context.
Reaction reels
Festival reactions plus shorter audience-reaction cuts.