By Steve Jalsevac
May 5, 2008 (LifeSiteNews.com) – Confirmed reports of the movie Bella has so far saved at least 13 mothers and their babies from abortion (two more reports yet to be confirmed) has spurred its producers to recently launch their Bella 10 campaign. The campaign is an unusual, grassroots targeted promotion strategy designed to give individual fans of the movie lots of practical advice and tools to convince 10 people to order a Bella DVD who would in turn convince 10 others to do the same. The campaign asks the rhetorical question, “Can a movie really save a child’s life?” to emphasize that by promoting or even giving away purchased copies of the movie lives will be saved.
In an interview with LifeSiteNews today, Bella producer Leo Severino explained the rationale of the DVD promotion strategy. Severino related that he and the rest of the Bella team see the movie as “the entertainment ultrasound” which through its storyline and characters heightens the awareness of expectant mothers of what is living inside of them. Because they have seen the movie in fact achieve that reality they felt compelled to develop the Bella 10 campaign program and website. The website makes it very simple to purchase one copy or a bulk quantity of the DVD and provides many suggestions on how to engage others to do the same.
The Bella 10 site also provides downloadable banners to post on Myspace, Facebook, blogs, etc. and a downloadable flyer to pass out. It also lists simple instructions on how to set up a Bella Movie Night and obtain a license to show the movie and how to raise profits for a group by selling the movie.
The DVD, to be released tomorrow, May 6, had strong pre-order sales this past weekend and was the number one selling romantic movie on Amazon.com. Severino stated, “We beat Pride & Prejudice and Atonement.” He said the movie was 29th overall of all film and television program DVDs sold.
Bella star Eduardo Verastegui will record an appearance with Fox TV’s Neil Cavuto tonight which may be broadcast tonight or tomorrow and he will also appear on another FOX program, The O’Reilly Factor tonight. Tomorrow, the day the DVD is released, Eduardo will appear on the Today show at 10 a.m. with Kathie Lee Gifford who Severino says “has been incredibly supportive”.
See the Bella 10 website at https://www.bella10campaign.com/