-
Initial Challenge

In November 2009 my wife wanted to produce a children’s program targeted toward Muslim families in North America. The last known success of such a program was “Adam’s World” by Sound Vision which was nearly a decade ago. I told her to go ahead and that I’ll support her.

As a marketer, my first recommendation was to start off by doing some preliminary research. We spend several weeks planning and researching to decide whether or not we were going to commit to this.

We started with a competitive analysis looking at each brand that was either active in the past or is currently active and seeing what their strengths and weaknesses were in the Muslim market as well as what strengths and weaknesses we had based on available resources and in what ways we could position ourselves in an effective manner.

After completing the research, we weren’t able conclude whether a venture such as this would be profitable for us or not. We decided to test the market with a pilot-program on as light of a budget as possible and dedicate any and all resources toward garnering social-capital through the use of social media and marketable publicity.

-
Tasked Responsibility

We put fort a set of objectives which were fundamentally measured by sales. The success of a business venture is determined by whether or not it meets sales objectives. All else is commentary.

We also put forth a set of values that we were going to operate under:

• In keeping with sharia principles, content produced would not have any score produced with sounds that were sourced from musical instruments.
• Content that was sold was to be produced at the highest production quality that the budget would allow
• Videos had to be educationally entertaining to the point where kids and adults would sit down for the an entire episode at least three times.
• The values and ideas that would be expressed would be aligned with Islamic principles
• We want people to relate to and like the characters on screen.

-
Approach

We realized that since were operating on a shoestring budget, our approach had to be much different from what all the others were doing.

Upon completing our initial research we realized that the success of this pilot program will depend on the level of publicity and publicity for children’s programs are usually driven by event marketing in key locations.

-
Results Report

-
First Marketing Step – YouTube

We decided that the initial marketing approach will be via the production of social media content.

My wife decided that she was going to make her own puppet using supplies from a local arts and crafts store. That night my wife went to work making the puppet while I went to bed. In the middle of the night I was woken up to the scariest, most poorly made looking puppet I’d ever seen.

Out of her excitement, she wanted me to help her make a short video for YouTube introducing the puppet. I was a bit cranky being woken up to this puppet and decided I’d express it in the character of the puppet impromptu.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Later we decided to make a second video the same way while working on a theme song for the program.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We left those two videos up online to marinate into the search engine indexes for the next month and watched the comments and views come in. Based on the overall vibe of the comments and emails we got, we decided it was time to call Milo Productions, the producer of “Hurray for Baba Ali”.

I had met AbdurRahman Milo – the main man behind Milo Productions – at a DiscoverU seminar I attended in Toronto in March 2009. I figured he’d have some good lessons to share from his experience of producing and marketing the “Hurray for Baba Ali” DVDs.

The main advice he shared with us was to minimize production cost and concentrate on event marketing.

-
Second Marketing Step – Free Full Episode & Email Marketing

We set  our sights on completing first the pilot DVD, getting the content aired on Muslim targeted satellite TV channels and then using event marketing to promote the show.

The DVD was targeted to have two or three 15-minute episodes of following Abdullah in an adventure and extra educational content for kids to follow along with.

One of the things we had found in our initial research was the content other Islamic kids’ shows had was either mostly educational with very little entertainment value or mostly entertainment with very little educational value.

We wanted to strike the balance of “edu-tainment” while approaching the delivery in a theme based story. Each story would be an adventure that the viewers would follow Abdullah – the main character – as he learns different lessons that propel him forward in the story.

In addition to the delivery form, we figured it would add to the marketability of the show if we included guest appearances by known personalities from the North American Muslim community.

Upon release of the first episode in the first month we gathered about 1000 email addresses and close to 600 fans.

If you haven’t seen the full episode yet, click the image below:

Website: http://www.abdullahpuppet.com/
Facebook Page: http://www.facebook.com/abdullahkidshow

-
Third Marketing Step – Website & Social Media Integration

With the ICNA convention approaching an opportunity presented itself to us where we could share a bazaar booth with an individual. Prior to the start of the ICNA convention, we launched the Abdullah Puppet Website.

We used the convention as a means of getting more people aware of Abdullah Puppet by interviewing people as well as passing out business cards with a web address link to the website. But more as an opportunity to record content to syndicate over social media to drive traffic to the website which in turn would continue to grow the list of email database subscribers.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

We figured this step would also allow us to also give more life to the Abdullah Puppet character where he can have his own voice outside of his TV show adventures.

At this point in time we also had a review about the first episode’s release published by MuslimMatters.org:
http://muslimmatters.org/2010/06/08/review-abdullah-kids-show/

-
Fourth Marketing Step – Complementary Book

One of the challenges we had yet to address was how to do events with a puppet. I’m am not the best puppet master when it comes to being in front of people nor do we have the budget for a Barney like mascot.

As part of my wife’s vision for a kid’s show, she wants to have complementary merchandise such as toys and books that would help drive the sales and marketing of the project.

Her first attempt was entertaining – read about it here:
http://egyptiangumbo.com/writing-for-kids-isnt-easy-picture-book-fail-555.htm

Her second attempt turned out a little bit more appealing.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Ideally we’d like to get the book published via a publisher, but we haven’t found one that has found the book to be in line with the publisher’s M.O. (For those who don’t know, it means “Modus Operandi” which is Latin for “method of operating”).  We used Lulu, an on-demand book printing service – to publish the book online and on Amazon.com

-
Fifth Marketing Step – Search Engine Marketing

This step hasn’t begun yet. The next month will be spent settinging up tweaking SEM (Search Engine Marketing) tactics to  drive targeted traffic to AbdullahPuppet.com to continue to grow the email database, social media engagement and sell books.

-
Sixth Marketing Step – Community Events

We’re thinking the main driver of marketing “Aliyah’s First Ramadan” will be young-family geared community events at masajid across North America.

Not many Muslim communities across North America have implemented the concept of “story time” for children as a means of bringing people to the masjid. Currently most young-families bring their children to the local library for such outings.

We believe that in theory this “story time” event approach will allow for many more people to become aware of the book as well as Abdullah Puppet. At the moment we’re still developing the event marketing process that would go into systematizing this from community to community.

More news to come as we make more progress. Do share your thoughts and suggestions here.

– –

The following message is an excerpt from an email I received recently from SaqibSaab on the image of AlMaghrib to the masses.

The IlmSummit videos. MashaAllah the experience of the ‘ilm and the summit was beautifully portrayed and I was glued to updates that came almost everyday, jazaAllah khair to the players involved.

At the same time, a lot of the image of AlMaghrib offering an incredibly high caliber retreat was put side by side with some “fun” scenes to show the great time everyone had.

I laughed and enjoyed them personally, but a brother once wrote to me:

I don’t think AlMaghrib adopts cheap tactics, overall they are slick with their stuff but sometimes things get out of hand.

The only thing I disagree strongly with AlMaghrib is the videos, and I don’t just mean the beat-boxing.

I really think some of the Ilm Summit videos will do a disservice to AlMaghrib. That is supposed to be the intense 2 week academic seminar. It just bugs me when the cheesy experience is sold instead of marketing.

It’s so weird to see Yaser Birjas talking about qawaid al fiqhiyyah in one video and then cookie monster and dinosaurs in another. Or see Wisam doing an AWESOME recitation, for it to fade out and into a groggy brother being woken up by 3 people.

If you’re wondering what this message is all about, you probably haven’t seen the videos.

You can view all the Ilm Summit videos via the index thread on the AlMaghrib Forums.

– –

TO THE ANONYMOUS PERSON who sent the email to SaqibSaab:

I respectfully disagree with you.

The videos were produced to tell the story of the students at Ilm Summit and what they experienced. Fundamentally it is part of marketing that these stories be told. However, the purpose of the video’s wasn’t to directly sell AlMaghrib or Ilm Summit.

The videos communicated exactly what was meant to be communicated, which is the atmosphere and environment of Ilm Summit. Not only on the side of brotherhood and sisterhood but also the academic side of things.

By far, everyone I’ve spoken with and my wife has spoken with who’s attended Ilm Summit 2009 agree that the videos communicate accurately what was seen and felt by the students.

You’ll notice that first week of videos contain a mix of the academic and the fun while the second week of Ilm Summit videos are much more academically inclined.

– –

The purpose behind me going to Ilm Summit 2009 was two fold:

• Gather footage that can be used in an AlMaghrib promo documentary laying forth the academic nature of the institute.

• Produce short “GemReels” for every day of Ilm Summit 2009 that tell the story of the people attending and also show the academic nature of the retreat.

– –

WHO’S IDEA WAS IT ANYWAY?

The idea of producing a daily video came about as a discussion between some of AlMaghrib’s HQ people and myself at AlMaghrib’s Ilmweek that took place in Toronto in May 2009.

We figured the idea is great especially since no other Islamic organization has really pulled off daily video blogging in an effective manner. The idea certainly gave me butterflies since I personally never produced so many videos back to back.

I’ve always wanted to do something like this ever since I saw Kevin Sites do it back in 2006 with Yahoo’s “Kevin Sites in the Hotzone.” — I just never realized how much work was in store for me.

– –

WHAT WENT INTO PUTTING THESE VIDEOS OUT?

One of the lessons I’ve learned from past projects is — In order to meet deadlines you need to set a time limit for how much footage you’re going to gather.

I set a time limit of maximum two hrs of footage to edit every day into less than five minutes. A 24-hour turn around time sounded reasonable considering my current skill level and experience – until I got down to editing.

Sleep literally went out the window. I remember having slept only four or five times in the 16 days I was there, and it was only out of exhaustion that I slept. My body would simply shut down.

– –

CHALLENGES THAT MADE ME YEARN FOR SLEEP

In an event where there is going to be filming, the attendees are usually notified.

During registration they’re suppose to be given release forms to fill out or at least have a sign saying “filming in progress” or something.

It’s been done past events that I’ve filmed at, but for some reason it wasn’t done at Ilm Summit.

For the first five days or so I was able to keep to my 24-hour turn around time schedule.

People were being cooperative and others were quite enthusiastic to be in front of the camera.

However it only took one sister’s complaint for me to receive an “executive order” to re-edit or completely take done some of the videos.

This basically led to a meeting with the heads of Ilm Summit where we decided on the policy of what to film, how things had been going thus far and how we wish to move forward.

Yasir Qadhi made it a point to announce the fact that there is filming and I’m not that hard to miss. Therefor if anyone doesn’t wish to be caught on camera they should stay behind my “contraption” and at the same time I would be making the best effort to keep certain people out of specific shots.

One of the other issues we addressed in the meeting was that not enough of the academic nature of Ilm Summit is being put out there.

The “academic nature” of “What Is Your Story: Ilm Summit Day 08″ and the latter videos was a direct result of that meeting:

From this point forward I was constantly playing catch up, however the videos that came forth were given more exposure for the academic nature of Ilm Summit 2009.

– –

Next post will be address some personal reflections I’ve had as well as what’s to come next with the Ilm Summit and AlMaghrib stuff.

Some marked their calendars to save up and prepare themselves for the release of major May blockbusters like Wolverine, Star Trek, Terminator Salvation, and Disney-Pixar’s Up.

Some saved up and prepared themselves to attend the first ever Ilm Week hosted by QMajd, Toronto’s student body of AlMaghrib Institute.

I had the audicity and excitement of doing both.

– –

:: What’s the point?

Do you wish to learn more about me, the characters I meet or something else?

It might be a good idea to discuss the story of Yusuf and compare that to the foundational elements of these major May blockbusters and apply the lessons to apply to our projects, but then I figured – most people prob don’t even fully know or appreciate the story of Yusuf-may peace be upon him in the Quran.

Sad reality is that many Muslims – especially youth – haven’t taken the time to connect with the Qur’an or any of the characters that Allah has presented to us in it.

It’s not really their fault. People just haven’t relayed who these awesome characters are.

– –

:: What connects us to people and characters?

This is a question that I’ve been asking myself for a while. What REALLY connects us individuals to people? Whether or not they’re fictitios, what makes us love them or hate them?

I saw Disney-Pixar’s UP yesterday with my little sisters. It’s about following one’s dreams, acheiving goals and keeping promises. I laughed and – almost – cried in that movie. I know there were others in the theater who did shed a tear.

It’s no wonder that Pixar’s consistantly releases hits. Their characters totally connect with the audience.

When we watch movies, TV shows, webisodes, vlogs – are we connecting with the story, eye-candy, or the character(s)?

I’m convinced that subconsciencely as human beings our goal is to connect with the character. When it comes to people, whether or not they’re real we want to love or hate, but never tolerate.

– –

:: What does this have to do with you and I?

Whether were in busines, education, dawah, or entertainment – in order for us to effectively communicate our message we need to develop our characters.

Lay out not only the character in relationship to the story we’re telling but revealing and developing them as the story progresses.

Ask yourself questions like:

• What are the character’s basic human needs, wants, desires, and aspirations?
• What are their internal and external struggles that they’re contending with?

As the story progresses, what do you want to reveal about them to the audience so that the audience can releate and connect with them?

• What do they LOVE?
• What do they HATE?
• What do they FEAR?
• What makes them ANGERY?
• What moves them forward?
• What makes them SAD?
• What makes them HAPPY?
• What makes them ANXIOUS?

The answers to these questions is what adds depth and realism to any character. If you yourself want to connect with an audience, perhaps you want to think about revealing some aspects of YOUR character to people to connect with them.

– –

:: What does this have to do with Leechon and the work I’m doing?

Coming out of my comfort zone, really excites me. It’s a chance for growth, experiencing new things, and making new friends.

After releasing my second episode of Browntourage I decided to take the time out and ask YOU what you felt that could be improved. The feedback that you gave on Facebook and Leechon Blog-post was excellent and definetly woth applying, but it was missing something.

As I had been filming for the coming episodes, I wondered what is it about me and others that you want to learn about? It’s for that reason that I posted on “Tweet-booked”,

Flying out to Vancouver mon with Sensei (Muhammad Alshareef). If you could ask him a question, what would it be? Rply n I’ll ask it for you.

I figured people would want to know more about a “character” that I would be featuring in my episode – Muhammad Alshareef in this case – but turns out the questions they asked were of a different nature…

It’s for this reason I shared a “commenty” of sort on Facebook (click the image)

This sort of brings me back to my original question – what is it about the characters on my trip that you wish to learn? What do you want to know about them? Am I the character that you wish to know more about?

It’s been an interesting trip so far. Just to sum up what’s happened so far:

• Fiqh of Love with Sh. Waleed Basyouni is definently original and eye opening
• Recording of the first weekend has been an almost complete disaster – which has led to a fairly successful start for the recording of Ilm Week.
• I had Popeye’s for the first time in Toronto – First experience was..okay. The second experience made me gag, almost puke and killed my appitite.
• Finished up “Tribes” by Seth Godin – Excellent book
• Started “The Whuffie Factor” by Tara Hunt – really good book so far
• Witnissed Yasir Qadhi’s conversion story and change of methodology – see: http://muslimmatters.org/2009/05/18/yasir-qadhi-my-conversion-admitting-ones-mistake-and-moving-on/

One of the major highlights of the trip so far has been meeting the people heading up AlMaghrib in the UK. Really nice bunch of guys. They relayed the following to me via email in the past and in person again here:

I have been meaning to write this email for a while…

I believe Belal deserves a huge amount of credit for AlMaghrib expanding at the rate it has in the UK. His trailers have captivated the UK audience and many dawah organisations call me and ask me for the details of who makes AlMaghrib trailers. And many have copied Belal’s style of trailer to advertise on the Islam Channel. Company’s call Islam Channel and ask for us to make a trailer for them like AlMaghribs Mash’Allah.

And with a viewership of over 1.5 Million in the UK and a further global audience, our adverts are viewed by Millions across the globe Mash’Allah.

Without the quality trailers that Belal has made that include, Jannah, cities, Shayoukh, TSP, TB, LOG, BOC and now TBA AlMaghrib would not have had class numbers the size we have now in the UK and we would have still only been known by the practising Muslims.

However now we are known by many who are not practising and many do attend our seminars.

Therefore this email is to really say a big Jazzak’Allah khair to Belal and all the hours he has worked to ensure adverts are completed on time Mash’Allah.

May Allah (swt) accept it from you akh and increase the talents he has given you, Ameen.

Jazak’ Allah khair.
Wa Salaam

Ameen ya rabal’alameen. Any and all success my work has had is all from Allah-swt and may Allah-swt forgive me for any and all shortcoming I’ve had along the way and will have in the future.

This post is a means of looking back to finding answers, correcting mistakes, celebrating achievements and laying the foundation of whats to come in the future.

Before I begin, I want to lay out the fact: Rizq is truly from Allah-swt and the outcome of our efforts really isn’t totally a product of our doing, but the magnificence of Allah-swt allowing for the right circumstances at the right time for opportunities to make themselves available to us.

- — -

With that said:
Top 3 ACHIEVEMENTS I’m most grateful for that happened in 2008 are:

• Getting AlMaghrib Institute as a client contract for Leechon, which has resulted in many fruits such as: IlmCast.com, GemReel.com and Superstar seminar trailers

• Setting up MessageMastery.com – an online learning system to teach people aspects of media, marketing, and communication (although its been a real bumpy and overwhelming ride – still is for me)

• Going from 700 RSS subscribers to 13,000+ RSS subscribers on Leechon.com – How this happened, I’m not entirely sure.

- — -

Top 5 LESSONS I’ve found most valuable in the process of work in 2008 are:

• Contract or hire a bookkeeper! – As you grow in your business, the frequency and size of financial transactions will increase. If you’re not a number cruncher at heart,  you’ll find the process of recording all those transactions into QuickBooks a grueling and painful process. Save yourself the agony and delegate this process to someone who’s more qualified than yourself.

• A slice of a watermelon is bigger than an entire grape. – When involving yourself in a project, think beyond yourself. Look for ways in which you or your business can benefit the client (whether that be your customers or target audience) and share in the fruits and rewards. — Instead of getting a bigger piece of the pie, make the pie bigger to involve more people so all can share.

• Know your worth and have an understanding of the market before diving in – Business is about exchanging value. Business can be conducted fairly and professionally only if you know what that value is. If you don’t know your own self worth then you cannot expect others to know either. If the value of your work is $10,000 in the market, then don’t do injustice to yourself by receiving only $1,000. You’re limiting yourself and in the end it is YOU who will suffer.

• Fail Forward - I’ve made many mistakes this year. Mistakes in areas of financial decisions, what projects or clients to take up, biting off more than one can chew, and the process developing content for Message Mastery. These mistakes have led to delays on delivery and overall performance. – Being a human being, mistakes are inevitable. Welcome and admit the mistakes. Don’t fear them. The important thing is we fail FORWARD and learn from our mistakes as they happen.

• Never let schooling get in the way of your education - It’s a quote my Mark Twain, and its so true. We all to go school to get an education. If you find a means of education superior to traditional schooling, then jump on that bandwagon. You obviously have to factor in stuff like being able to pay for life’s essentials. For me, running Leechon is my education, so much so that the principles and hands on experience of business education has been far greater than business school itself.

A bonus lesson:

• Clarity = Power : Whether you want to progress in business, home, religion, etc – having absolute clarity is essential. Gaining clarity is a process of having perspective and getting in control of what’s around you. You need to organize what’s around you and focus on what’s important (or vice versa)  and throw out the rest. Having absolute clarity will lead you to what you want on the different levels of your life.

- — -

Any and all good that has taken place in this past year is because Allah-swt allowed it to happen. The mistakes are because of my own shortcomings and for that I ask you to forgive me.

This company exists for the sake Allah and for the benefit of Ummat Muhammad-salAllahu alayhi wasallam. I pray that as we progress we keep our intentions pure and our actions clean.

My next post is going to lay out what’s to come in this new year inshaAllah.

One of the greatest benefits of having a contract with a client to produce work is the existence of deadlines, which bring about a sense of urgency for you and your team to produce something of value.

If you really wish to grow in a craft, whether its basket weaving, graphic design, video production, motion graphics, medicine, law, engineering, etc. — you need to put yourself in a position where you have the opportunity to practice and work hard to hone your talents to mastery and excellence.

Practice doesn’t make perfect, but it sure can bring about excellence — ONLY if that practice is in an area of your strengths and talents. Working on your weaknesses and not developing your strengths will ultimately land you in a career that will make your miserable, or at the very least leave you empty in a way.

I’m not saying ignore your weaknesses, rather understand them and work around them and make sure they don’t undermine your strengths. What I AM saying is develop your strengths and talents to a level that will enable your to simply dominate your area of expertise. – What ever that may be.

- — -

When you service a client well and shatter standards that were laid out, usually this ends up in the bar being raised — followed by a push of encouragement to shatter it again.

Visual Eye Candy Store

The last trailer I did was for the Torch Bearers seminar taught by AlMaghrib Institute. I ended up employing motion graphics, something I hadn’t done much before.

The issue this time around was that AlMaghrib and its base loved it so much they wanted more of the same quality.

I’m not a motion graphic artist. I’m far from it. Personally I haven’t had much opportunity to practice such a specialized craft (which by the way pays real well). I decided to look for outsourced venues to do some of the work.

For those who don’t know — RevoStock.com is an excellent source for stock footage and Adobe After Effects project files. I purchased a project file titled Particle Fractal Fly Through and began playing around with it in After Effects until I got it to be visually as I wanted it.

Personally still being new to After Effects, it took me quite a while to get myself around it. Longer than it normally would if I was editing footage shot with a camera in Premiere.

- — -

Shatter a standard continuously is harder each and every time, but that doesn’t mean you cannot be consistant. I’m not a sound designer or sound engineer by any means what so ever. I personally don’t even have the proper tools, knowledge or skill set to be an effective sound designer.

Music To No One’s Ears

I go by an Islamic standard and principle that musical instruments are not permissible in my line of work. Whether those instruments are based in string, wind, brass or percussion.

I guess this principle has been an aspect of the brand I’ve been building for Leechon. I guess you can say that’s a good thing.

Fundamentally, in Islam musical INSTRUMENTS are prohibited — this isn’t a forum for Islamic jurisprudence, so don’t start a debate

The After Effects project file came with an audio track that I had to throw out the window and face the challenge of producing another track inline with my principles.

Creating the sound score is a difficult challenge for me personally. Its certainly not a strength of my own and its a source of pain considering that I’m not a sound designer by any standard.

:: UPDATE START :: 8:52pm

I forgot to add…

One of the ideas I had for the dialog portion of the sound I got from the movie Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring. The opening lines start with a voice in “elven” language and then follows with a “translation” in English.

I thought that would be an interesting way of applying Yasir Qadhi’s voice into the sound track. Arab (a real language) followed by English.

:: UPDATE END :: 8:56pm

After about two days of intensive work, I ended up with a first cut for the trailer. This first cut is what was played at the GPU conference. Personally I find it a bit embarrassing.

Click here to view the embedded video.

After I got news back from AlMaghrib, I was basically requested to redo most of the audio and change up some of the visuals. After about another week worth of stress and facing the technical challenges I came out with the final cut which you see in the beginning of this post.

- — -

E.I.D. – Enjoyed :: Improved :: Discovered

The only facet of this project I truly enjoyed was the end result. Not so much the process. The reason for that is because I spent most of my time working on my weakness of sound design — only because it was simply undermining my strength. I certainly did improve in my ability to take sound and develop a track that sounds quite professional to the ear while keeping to my principles.

My most important discovery here is that I need to move beyond working with only myself. If I’m to shatter the standards I’ve set for myself for future projects, I’m going to need some professional assistance — especially in the area of sound design.

Click here to view the embedded video.

This video was done mostly in Adobe After Effects. Many thanks to Andrew Cramer over a VideoCopilot.net for his tutorials and products on learning Adobe After Effects. This was my seconds project involved with After Effects and I must say that I’m beginning to really like the program. The potential is beyond what I can see. So many amazing things when it comes to visual effects. I’m looking forward to learning more of this program to churn out material that complements that work I do on the editing side.

One of the biggest challenges with this project simply getting over my creative block. All my past AlMaghrib I’ve had some creative elements to work off of. Either some sort of presentation or design work to build off of and “translate” to screen. With this trailer all I really had was the club cards and the notes I was forwarded by HQ. I spent a good portion of a week simply going though the material hoping to find something of use.

What really came through for me in the end were the tutorial DVDs from Andrew Kramer’s VideoCopilot.net. I must admit, although a lot of the work was done for me in the template setups on the DVD, going in and modifying those templates in a program I’m not familair with takes a hell of a lot of time getting used to.

The approach to learning I take (and recommend to others) is that of the child. A child learns by copying those around themselves. Over time what happens is that the child has picked up a number of skills via copycat and due to the creativity of the child he/she is able to mix and match to the point where they’re able to do some impressive stuff.

With After Effects I’ve got quite a distance to go, but I can’t wait till I get really give a project that million dollar look!

HQ (Almaghrib Headquarters) called me up late last week to make a trailer for their seminar A Heart Serene coming to Toronto soon. They wanted the trailer for a conference that took place this past weekend. Normally I would say no to such a request mainly due to the short notice. The trailers I’ve made for AlMaghrib in the past take me about 80 man hours of work (2 weeks full time hours) from coming up with a basic idea to delivery.

Why did I take up this challenge considering I had about one day to make this trailer?

Simply for the challenge! (…and to focus my mind away from some stress makers in life). I don’t recommend that you do this often mainly due to the mental and creative strain it puts on the individual and the effects of partial burnout that take place afterward, but I do advise that you challenge yourself once in a while.

Keep in mind that the video below isn’t near in quality (in my humble opinion) as my past trailers, but then again my past trailers were made in over 80 hrs of work spaced out over 2-3 weeks.

Click here to view the embedded video.

You probably noticed this graphic at the beginning of the trailer:

Leechon’s stance is that sound produced by musical instruments, whether they be made from percussion, brass, wind, or string instruments of music are not Islamically permissible. All projects that have been done officially done under Leechon (2005 and later) have kept to this principal. Some people have confused sound tracks of the videos to be sourced from musical instruments, for that reason all productions will now feature this slate before every video to remove that confusion/assumption.

If you wish to use this graphic slate for your videos, you are more than welcome to. Simply click the image to download the ZIP file which contains the image.

“I am personally convinced that one person can be a change catalyst, a “transformer” in any situation, any organization. Such an individual is yeast that can leaven an entire loaf. It requires vision, initiative, patience, respect, persistence, courage, and faith to be a transforming leader.”

- Stephen R. Covey

Last year Sensei started a thread on the AlMaghrib forums titled “Imagine a world without AlMaghrib.” One of the bullet points that I responded with was “I would have never taken the GoBeyond coaching sessions, and would probably be tens of thousands of dollars in debt.”

You’re probably wondering what GoBeyond is and whats that got to do with you “the reader.”

Leechon Films is the result of the coaching that I got at GoBeyond (now “DiscoverULife“) from Sensei. The very catalyst that moved me to do something extraordinary was from what he taught. Its been a little over two years since and progress made has been great. The thing was I needed another catalyst to get me further. What got me here wasn’t necessarily what will get me to where I want to go.

My intention was to grow Leechon beyond just me. I needed to devise a system where i can train individuals to carry things forward further and faster than I have already. Truth is I cannot do everything myself. The idea for Message Mastery was born.

I approached Sensei and sought his advice on how to go about attaining what I was aiming for. He said to me, “After the tawfeeq of Allah, realize the present day success of AlMaghrib is based on NOOR, not me.” after which he told me to approach Noor to help me get to where I want to go. Three months later, after the Tawfeeq of Allah-swt, Message Mastery is where it is today because of what I got from Noor.

I have have awesome ideas MASSIVE plans for the future of Message Mastery, Leechon, and other projects that are forming in my mind.

Before moving forward its always a good idea to look back and see the lessons learned during the journey:

• Amazing ideas will not develop until you take action NOW. – If it wasn’t for the results from Message Mastery I wouldn’t be developing other awesome ideas that could help carry this ummah forward. Actions brings results. Results bring progress. Progress gives birth to new ideas. New ideas need action so the cycle continues.
• When your intentions are for the sake of Allah, He-swt facilitates you on your path to greatness and success. – You really don’t appreciate it until you move forward for His sake alone. The work done in Leechon was a means to create content to strengthen the hearts, encourage the good, and forbid the evil. Message Mastery has come about to teach people how to create that content to strengthen the hearts, encourage good, and forbid evil. The people who stepped up to facilitate this were truly a Godsend.
• Showing kindness and patience with people goes a LONG way. — To all those whom have helped spread Message Mastery further and farther. Leechon-PR team, YouTubers, Facebookies, stumblers, and everyone else that were involved…May Allah-swt make a home for you in Jannah close to Him.

If you haven’t been following the progress since the beginning, read the following posts:

• Driving Your Dawah With Power and SINCERITY!
• Baba Without a Crew -and- Three POWER Principles
• A Little Crew Worth A Lot of Attention
• Inside the Lighthouse

–

With that said, just a little bit about the launch of Message Mastery. Overall, alhamdulillah it went well. There were some bumps along the way and as we move forward we have smoothed them out and are continously improving. I’m always great full and take notes of critiques from people who are looking into how to improve each point.

The community is awesome; the people are dedicated, come from all walks of life and all have different specialties and resources to add to the group. There will be a lot of “backstage” things added into the system and it is extremely exciting. You guys will see great things coming out of this, inshaAllah.

–

The deadline to register for the course is Friday June 13, 2008. After that date registration will be CLOSED.

Remember if you register for this one course you will get into all future classes free. — which are currently in development. To register go to messagemastery.com/register

If you want to get in on free session that took place last week:

This past Wednesday I finished developing an project I’ve started called Message Mastery, where the goal is to equip 200 Muslim brothers and sisters on producing effective and profitable dawah videos. Not only produce them, but also equip them with the tools necessary to develop, write, produce, edit, market and distribute their the call to Islam.

With any sincere initiative, Allah-swt sends down tests…

Saturday, the day we decided to produce the introduction video we had thunderstorm that knocked down plenty of branches and powerlines in the neighborhood. No power, no internet, no light, no heat. Where to go to meet my Sunday night deadline? – The house of Allah-swt!

I went to the masjid for Isha, and spent the whole night finishing up development and begin editing on a client project while I pondered on how to make these videos for message mastery. I prayed fajr, ate breakfast, and went home to get some rest. I woke around duhr time, to find that dad bought a generator to get the basic functions of the house going. — Our basement began flooding since the pump was off due to lack of water.

Shooting Time!

Only having a couple hours to shoot, I borrowed my little brother’s room, put up the lights, camera, mic…and action!

That night in the process of capturing, the generator went out. I resorted to using my car’s engine power and ciggarette power converter to power my laptop, hard drive, and camera as I captured the video. When I had 30 mins remaining in capturing the footage, I decided to drive to my university where I can have power and internet access.

I arrived around mid-night, prayed isha, and burned the midnight oil. Once Fajr came in, I just had some touch ups to make. I went to work, and made the final changes and set it to render. Below is the result. Watch the video

Now that you’ve watched video…take action! Do the following:

• Go to messagemastery.com and tell me 1….2….or..3 things you want to be able to learn from this program (you can post it here if you like as well), by posting it in the comment.
• Sign up for the early bird notification list by going to: http://www.messagemastery.com/earlybird