Live from Los Angeles: Brands+Entertainment

Summary

On Strategy Showcase: Live from Los Angeles – Brands + Entertainment

Release Date: November 24, 2024
Host: Fergus O’Carroll
Episode Title: Live from Los Angeles: Brands+Entertainment

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Introduction and Event Overview

In this engaging episode of On Strategy Showcase, host Fergus O’Carroll delves into the evolving intersection of brands and entertainment. Recorded live in Los Angeles on November 7th, the episode features a distinguished panel from the industry, discussing how brands are increasingly integrating with entertainment to craft compelling narratives and drive marketing success.

Key Highlights:

• Fergus O’Carroll introduces the topic and panelists.
• Overview of the role branded entertainment plays within the marketing mix.
• Exploration of why brands are establishing their own production companies.
• Discussion on balancing brand presence within entertainment content.
• Analysis of various return on investment (ROI) types from entertainment partnerships.

Panel Introductions

Fergus introduces an elite panel comprising:

• Jack Verschleiser – Director of Business Strategy at Super Connector Studios.
• Zoe Fairborn – Head of Partnerships and Branded Entertainment at Reese Witherspoon's hello Sunshine.
• Isaiah Longawa – Global Partner Executive Strategy Director at Anomaly.
• Mark Gilbar – President of Brand and IP at Imagine Entertainment.
• Jen Costello – Global Chief Strategy Officer at TBWA Chiat Day (hosted by Tbwa Chiat Day).

Defining Branded Content vs. Branded Entertainment

Zoe Fairborn initiates the conversation by defining branded content and branded entertainment, highlighting their nuanced differences. The panel agrees that while both aim to blend brand messaging with engaging content, branded entertainment tends to be more integrated and less overtly promotional.

Notable Quote:

Zoe Fairborn [16:04]: "We call it brand partnered entertainment because we are partnering with them to create a piece of entertainment that stands on its own."

The Role of Brands in Entertainment

The discussion revolves around why brands are increasingly venturing into entertainment. Mark Gilbar emphasizes that storytelling has always been central to Imagine Entertainment, evolving from feature films to premium TV and now to branded content.

Notable Quote:

Mark Gilbar [10:43]: "Our storytelling lens has always been defined as inspiring stories of human achievement."

Jack Verschleiser shares how Super Connector Studios connects brands with consumers through innovative entertainment strategies, citing collaborations like Drop of Sunshine, a wine brand partnered with hello Sunshine and Treasury Wine Estates.

Balancing Brand and Entertainment Goals

Panelists discuss the delicate balance between embedding a brand within entertainment without overpowering the narrative. Mark Gilbar explains that at Imagine Entertainment, the focus remains on creating authentic stories, with brands financing projects that align with their values rather than directing content.

Notable Quote:

Mark Gilbar [21:36]: "We're looking for partners that align with our core mission. We want to partner to tell a story we would want to tell even if the brand wasn't involved."

Jen Costello highlights that branded entertainment offers an emotional connection that traditional advertising often lacks, arguing that even smaller brands can leverage authentic storytelling to resonate with audiences.

Notable Quote:

Jen Costello [26:22]: "Entertainment is emotion. Entertainment makes people feel something and emotion is what builds brands."

ROI and KPIs in Branded Entertainment

A critical aspect discussed is the return on investment (ROI) for branded entertainment. Jack Verschleiser outlines both direct and indirect ROI metrics, using the example of "Day Sports Stood Still" where his company profited from co-producing content with Imagine Entertainment.

Notable Quote:

Jack Verschleiser [09:45]: "when Imagine Entertainment was able to sell it to Max, Waffle Iron Entertainment actually made a profit on that project."

Fergus O’Carroll emphasizes the importance of aligning branded entertainment initiatives with clear business objectives, ensuring that investments yield measurable outcomes in brand awareness, consumer engagement, and sales growth.

Case Studies and Examples

The panel references several successful branded entertainment projects:

• Uncle Drew – Initially a TV commercial, later expanded into a feature film demonstrating the scalability of branded content.
• Ted Lasso – Originated as a short branded entertainment piece before becoming a widely acclaimed series.

Mark Gilbar reflects on these examples, stressing the necessity of protecting intellectual property (IP) and maintaining creative integrity when brands are involved.

Notable Quote:

Mark Gilbar [34:21]: "You need to have some protection over the IP that your people are creating."

The Role of Agencies in Branded Entertainment

The conversation shifts to the evolving role of agencies like TBWA Chiat Day. Jen Costello discusses how agencies are redefining their services by integrating branded entertainment into their offerings, positioning it as a strategic tool alongside traditional advertising.

Notable Quote:

Jen Costello [15:50]: "Entertainment is just another tool in the toolkit to solve a big problem."

Isaiah Longawa from Anomaly highlights the necessity for agencies to adapt their business models to accommodate the creative and strategic demands of branded entertainment, ensuring they remain integral in the decision-making process.

Strategies for Implementing Branded Entertainment

Panelists offer strategic insights for brands considering entering the entertainment space:

• Define Clear Brand Values: Alignment between brand values and the narratives being told is crucial.
• Partner with Creative Talent: Collaborating with talented producers, directors, and storytellers ensures authentic and engaging content.
• Leverage Existing IP: Brands with rich histories or archives can repurpose existing IP to create compelling stories.
• Balance Control and Creativity: Allow creative partners the freedom to craft stories that resonate, while ensuring brand messaging remains consistent.

Notable Quote:

Jen Costello [57:10]: "Celebrity and entertainment can help expand your brand's perspective and allow people to experience it in a different way that marketing and advertising simply can't."

Challenges and Considerations

The panel addresses several challenges in branded entertainment:

• Maintaining Authenticity: Ensuring that brand integration does not overshadow the storytelling aspect.
• Measuring Impact: Developing robust KPIs to assess the effectiveness of entertainment initiatives.
• Long-Term Commitment: Recognizing that branded entertainment often requires a longer investment horizon compared to traditional advertising.
• Risk Management: Balancing creative freedom with brand protection to mitigate potential risks associated with content.

Notable Quote:

Isaiah Longawa [19:20]: "Branded entertainment is a high bar to clear. It has to resonate and stand out in a saturated cultural environment."

Audience Q&A Highlights

The live episode features a dynamic Q&A session where audience members pose questions to the panelists:

1. AI in Branded Entertainment:

   • Angela inquires about the use of AI to manipulate old IP. Mark Gilbar responds by highlighting ongoing discussions about AI's impact on talent and content creation, noting that while AI is a hot topic, its integration into branded content remains cautious.

2. Brands as Entertainers:

   • Reza asks whether brands themselves can act as entertainers, citing examples like Duolingo and Ryanair. Mark Gilbar and Jen Costello affirm that brands can indeed adopt entertainment roles, provided they maintain authenticity and align with their core values.

3. Trading Long-Term vs. Short-Term Entertainment Efforts:

   • Luis questions how to convince brands to invest in long-term entertainment strategies. The panel suggests starting with smaller, quicker projects like documentaries to build trust and demonstrate ROI before committing to larger-scale initiatives.

4. Impact of Political Involvement on Branded Content:

   • Stephanie raises concerns about brands’ political stances affecting their entertainment partnerships. Zoe Fairborn emphasizes the importance of maintaining an inclusive and neutral stance to foster diverse voices within branded content.

Conclusion

The episode wraps up with Fergus summarizing the key takeaways:

• Branded entertainment offers a powerful avenue for brands to connect emotionally with audiences, differentiate themselves, and build lasting cultural relevance.
• Successful integration requires clear alignment of brand values, strategic partnerships with creative talent, and a balanced approach to control and creative freedom.
• Measuring ROI in branded entertainment encompasses both direct financial gains and indirect benefits like brand love and increased engagement.
• Agencies play a pivotal role in navigating the complexities of branded entertainment, acting as strategic partners to brands aiming to evolve their storytelling capabilities.

Fergus invites listeners to join the upcoming live show in Chicago on December 5th and encourages exploration of branded entertainment as a strategic component in modern marketing.

Final Quote:

Fergus O’Carroll [85:00]: "Branded entertainment is about building a universe that resonates with your audience and stands the test of time, much like the iconic stories we all love."

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Note: Timestamps in brackets indicate the approximate position of the quoted segments within the transcript.

Transcript

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Welcome to OnStrategy Showcase. I'm Fergus O'Carroll in Chicago. And in fact, our final live show of the year is actually going to be here in Chicago on Thursday evening, December 5th at the Merchandise Mart, which everybody knows if you're in the local area. It's our holiday ads special. We were going to do something meaty and strategy ish, but we were thinking it's the holidays and we just want to have some fun and chill out. So what we're going to do is we're going to bring together some people and we're going to talk about the best holiday ads from the US and the UK from the last number of years. And each of the panelists is going to pick a few ads that they love, and we're going to play them on the big screens and we're going to talk about them, we're going to get audience feedback from them, and we're going to have a couple of drinks, some apps and some holiday cookies. So it's going to be a really fun evening and I'm really excited to get people from the Chicagoland area in the industry to come along to this. Our hosts are the amazing folks at High Dive Advertising. And the event is going to be taking place at the Merchandise Mart, which is going to be their soon to be, I should say, their new home. So it's going to be the office holiday party you wish your office was having. And in fact, you should just make this your office party. You can get tickets now on our website under the live tour tab. It's Thursday, December 5th from 6 to 8, and our website, of course, is onstrategyshowcase.com now, today's episode is part of our live tour series. It was recorded in Los Angeles a few weeks ago. It was actually November 7th. And here's a clip from that episode.

[Jack Verschleiser]

You asked a question earlier that I think ties back to roi, which is, can small brands do this or is it just big brands? And I think one of the things is for small brands, it's not just always about money. So Mark made a mention of archives. So there are brands that have incredible archives. They have incredible history. And while they might not have the massive budgets to go allocate a ton of money to getting a script written or offsetting the production budget of a TV show or movie or podcast, they may have other things that provide value either to a distributor or a producer or a director or. Or a screenwriter. And so when it comes to roi, then there's kind of this direct and Indirect difference. And for the indirect side, it's the share voice, the conversation, the brand love, what are the impressions? How much site traffic are you seeing? Are sales growing in X amount of time after the launch of that piece of content? And then there's also the direct roi. So for brands that are investing and co producing in the content. An example that actually at Waffle Iron we did with Imagine called the Day Sports Stood still, which was on Max, that was about the COVID and racial justice movement in the NBA and around sports holistically, there was direct money that Waffle Iron put into that film. But when Imagine Entertainment was able to sell it to Max, Waffle Iron Entertainment actually made a profit on that project. So they're able to that marketing leaders that are able to turn around to their cfo, to their CMO or if they are the cmo, to the board and they're able to say I did invest this money, but not only did I get it back, I also made money on it. Which is very different conversation traditionally than what advertising has been historically because it's, you know, you're banking on increased sales in exchange for writing the check. And so you have two different types of ROI that marketers are able to go forward and bring to the table when they're doing entertainment.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That's Jack Verschleiser. He is director of Business strategy at Super Connector Studios in Los Angeles. He's joined by Zoe Fairborn who is head of partnerships and branded entertainment at Reese Witherspoon's hello Sunshine. Also we're joined by Isaiah Longawe, global partner Executive Strategy Director at Anomaly and Mark Gilbar, president of Brand and IP at Imagine Entertainment. Now our host in LA was Tbwa Chiat Day and the wonderful Jen Costello joined us on the panel. She's global Chief Strategy officer. The topic was brands and entertainment. And so we're going to be hearing about the role that branded entertainment plays in the marketing mix. Why many brands are creating their own production companies, which is pretty fascinating. The limitations of these types of partnerships. We're going to be talking about striking the right balance, balance between the brand and the entertainment in these branded entertainments, which I know is a big issue for a lot of strategists as well as for companies getting that balance right so that the brand is getting credit for that partnership in terms of how it appears within the content. And we're going to be talking about the various types of returns that come from entertainment partnerships. So really it was a great episode. This is actually one of the episodes that if not the episode that I have actually edited the least throughout the 250 plus episodes that I really enjoyed it. I think our editor really enjoyed it too. So we're really excited about it. I wanted to thank our our sponsors for our live tour, Tracksuit, WARC and the Effie's and to the marketing leads at each of these companies for recognizing the value shows like ours bring to the industry and to their businesses. So thank you to Mikayla, Connor and Sam at Tracksuit, to Juliet, Tracy and Nev at the Effie's, and to Mawa, David and Paul at WARK and Essential. We really do value these partnerships. We really do appreciate you supporting our show. So thank you all for being wonderful partners in 2024. So here is our live show from Los Angeles. Enjoy. I'm Fergus O'Carroll. This is on Strategy Showcase. We are live in Los Angele. So we have a great panel here and we have. So typically we don't have five people but we had such amazing opportunity to get talented people like you guys that we were like, okay, we have to put a fourth, we have to put a fifth. So this is why we are here. So I want to introduce these guys to everybody. For those who don't know, Jen Costello is Global Chief Strategy Officer at tbwa. Isaiah Longawa is Global Partner at Anomaly here in la. Zoe Fairborn is head of Branded partnerships and Branded entertainment at hello Sunshine. I asked her if she could text Reese Witherspoon but we couldn't make that happen. So thank you for that. Anyway, we have Jack Verschleier. Schlaser. Excuse me, I keep screwing that up. I'm so bad at that. Forgive me. He is Director of Content and Business Strategy for Super Connector Studios here in la. And we have Mark Gilbar as President of Brands and Intellectual Property for Imagine Entertainment. Thank you for being here, Mark. Appreciate it. So let's start off. This idea of brands in entertainment is not new. I mean, you go back to the 40s, to the 50s, there's always been that sort of collaboration between brands. But it just seems that the landscape has changed so much which sort of led to this topic. We were going to come to LA and we were thinking, well, what do we do in la? And then of course it was like you got to do entertainment or some version of that. So it's a whole new landscape compared to what it used to be. In some ways the connection is as intimate as it's always been. But it just seems that there's a higher level of Intensity that's beginning to happen in terms of that connection and what's possible in branded entertainment. So I thought to begin with we could just go around and maybe tell us a little bit about what your company does, because we may not all be clear about what it is that Super Connector Studios does, for example. And we'll just quickly go around. We know the agencies, but maybe not the other participants. Do you want to start us, Jack?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, absolutely. So Super Connector Studios is about a year and a half old now and we really focus on three separate work streams. Being a management consultancy for marketers, helping brands build entertainment studios, and then lastly helping launch talent accelerated brands. And really our thesis is to connect brands, consumers and entertainment in new and innovative ways.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And so when you talk about the accelerator, what's the accelerator program?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, actually a great example. We just launched the first product that we have worked on with hello Sunshine called Drop of Sunshine. And it's a wine that partners the IP and female storytelling behind hello Sunshine with Treasury Wine Estates, the largest wine owner group in Napa Valley.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Nice. How are for you, Mark, with Imagine?

[Mark Gilbar]

How long have I been there?

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, how about what you guys? How do you find what it is.

[Mark Gilbar]

That you guys do? Well, imagine is 40 years old. I did not found it myself. It's founded by Ron Howard, the director and Brian Grazer, the producer. It's an entertainment company. The storytelling lens has always been defined as inspiring stories of human achievement. And I think in the 80s and 90s, that was primarily through feature films. And then as the sort of turn of the millennium, premium TV started to bubble up. So the iconic movies of Imagine's past are Splash and Backdraft and Ransom and Apollo 13, Beautiful Mind and so on. And then TV in the early 2000s, 24 Friday Night Lights, arrested Development. These started to become the more bingeable shows when tv you could start to get it on DVD and it was just sort of a different kind of thing. Then about seven years ago when I started Imagine, we started our documentary division as well as our branded division, Kids and Family and International, a couple of others. And it was in large part because there was a moment of disruption in streaming where the value of a TV commercial was arguably less at that point. It's changing again now than it was when we were all growing up and brands were looking for partners to tell longer form stories at a premium level. And for our lens specifically and inspiring stories of human achievement, that works well for a lot of brands. It's just the type of stories that brands want to tell. So we started partnering with brands and doing a lot of documentaries, which were red hot at the time, still doing fairly well, and then some scripted short films and now a lot of scripted post Barbie, which I'll mention no fewer than 100 times tonight, I'm sure a lot of scripted feature film development in partnership with brands.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So an Anomaly. Isaiah has some history in both advertising, but also in producing branded content. So tell us about how would you define what Anomaly is today?

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, Anomaly, the name is the idea. So it's always trying to be a deviation from the common order formal rule. I think we're trying to solve business problems creatively and because people and culture and the categories keep evolving, advertising is one way to solve it and it still can be an effective way to solve a business problem. But we found over time that we've had to evolve the way that our toolkit, the kinds of people that we have within the agency and the types of solutions that we're bringing to people. So right now I'd say that there are three ways in which we intersect in the entertainment world, where a buyer firstly. So again, working with buying talent on behalf of brands. So your super bowl campaign all the way through to partnerships with influencers on social.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So when you say buying talent, meaning what, alliances with production companies to produce specific content or something different?

[Isaiah Longawa]

No. So acting as a buyer for talent would be. For example, we worked with Bulgaria at LVMH to help build out what that brand was all about, how we bring that brand to life. We felt talent would be a really a big differentiator. So we were the buyer on their behalf to bring Zendaya on board to be the global face for that brand. And so that is where we are commonly. We will interface with the talent community on behalf of brands to help buy talent and create relationships between good talent and interesting brands.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So is there a percentage of your work that is based upon more branded content versus what might typically be categorized as advertising?

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I mean, I'd say that we've had so much of it that we built a separate business that spun off called Ace Content and Entertainment. It's called Ace, which is Anomaly Content and Entertainment, where we've focused our efforts on being able to build new IP on behalf of brands as well as build new brands on behalf of talent. So we've worked with chef Eric Ripert, who owns Le Brenna Den in New York. We've helped build his platform. So what is his brand? We've produced a show with him that's run for three seasons that's on Netflix, as well as a kitchenware brand that we've been able to kind of help build a business around. Separately, we also have an originals business, so there's a show called Maggie on Hulu that we help to produce. We worked with National Geographic to create Free Solo, which is a documentary that won an Oscar a couple of years ago. So we have seen enough movement and enough conviction from the marketing community that it's become its own separate business and specialty within the Anomaly ecosystem. Just knowing that there were lots of brands that were coming to us with a direct mandate around branded entertainment being a way for them to solve their business.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So how about tbwa, Jen, what is, how are you defining what it is now as a company?

[Jen Costello]

Well, I will try not to trigger too many people by talking about disruption and those three little symbols for too long. But yeah, I mean, similar to anomaly, you know, TBWA is effectively a creative collective. You know, 11,000 creative minds around the world working in creative marketing, branding, advertising. We are united through the philosophy, but also the methodology of disruption, which is basically how we define brand platforms that kind of go against conventional experiences and conventional points of view as it relates to our intersection through content and entertainment. I mean, this is where I think the agency perspective is one that, you know, entertainment and celebrity and influencer, that is one of many tools that we will bring to bear to solve a brand's business problem. So sometimes that's the right answer for a multitude of reasons, and sometimes it's not. And so we really look at it as just another tool, sort of in the toolkit, if you will, to solve a big problem, a big gnarly business problem. And then we keep lots of partners sort of around the world that have the ability to help us make that real.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Zoe, hello Sunshine. How long has it been around and how would you describe its purpose?

[Zoe Fairborn]

I suppose well, first I have to apologize to your wife that I'm resistant tonight. So sorry about that.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So maybe a pic later? Maybe send her a photograph.

[Zoe Fairborn]

So hello. Sunshine has been around for about seven years. This is the brainchild of Reese Witherspoon. But essentially we're an entertainment and consumer facing company and we all, we center all of our stories around women, female leadership at the company. And we, you know, we have scripted unscripted YA storytelling on our studio side of our business. And then we have a whole direct to consumer side, which is where we launched our drops of Sunshine wine. We have Reese's Book Club and we've really built a community now of, I would say, like, we reach about 150 million women on our platform between Reese's channels, our community channels, our book club. We also own the Home Edit, which is a brand that we've built. So really kind of using our media and entertainment company. And that flywheel to partner with brands is what I do specifically.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So when we talk about branded content, because there's different terms that are used. Branded entertainment, branded content. What is that? How would you define entertainment? Branded entertainment versus branded content? Because it seems like this is sort of a muddy gray area. Isaiah, what's your thought on it?

[Isaiah Longawa]

Damn. I was hoping you were looking at someone else, but I think I would file that under the what is an insight sort of dialogue. That can also happen in strategy land. But, you know, I think it's. It's a tension of both things, branded and entertainment. Right? Because I think, as we've talked about, branded entertainment is a way to solve a brand's problems, but it's not the only way. I think that brands can. The entertainment has to feel. The entertainment has to do its job on behalf of a brand that still needs to grow its business. For every Barbie, there's a bunch of other companies for whom the dynamics of their business don't support how entertainment might work. And also, you are a brand competing with companies that only do entertainment. So it's a high bar to clear. I think branded entertainment is everything because everything is entertainment these days. It would be weird to not talk about the fact that news is entertainment, politics is entertainment. Everything is fucking entertainment these days. And so I think in good and bad ways, branded entertainment is about how we can create the best attention. People spend more time in culture than they do in your category. However, what they spend time with in culture is everything from squirrel memes to the hoc to a girl to Barbie. And so the point is, you have to find a way in which your brand can get credit and can stand out in that environment. But at the same time, CMOs have 18 months. Do you know you have 30 minutes? It's just like you don't have that much time in order to make impact. So entertainment is a good tool, but it's not a strategic one unless you're, you know, it can be really blunt. So you've got to be really conscious about how to use it. So just like the insight question, I didn't directly answer your point, but I think that there are lots of ways in which you can kind of center around what branded entertainment can be.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, jack for you, what kind of problems can branded content, branded entertainment Solve for brands.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah.

[Jack Verschleiser]

I think for us, when we talk about the difference between branded entertainment and true brand entertainment, for us one of the big differentiators is when you look at branded content, most of the time you see the brand everywhere in it. It's all about the brand. And it's about responding to exactly what they are trying to bring across to the consumer. They usually have to pay 100% of the cost to produce it, and frequently they're also buying the media space that it then runs in. When we talk about true brand entertainment, what we like to categorize that at is as is you're moving forward with true entertainment partners. People like imagine like hello sunshine. Companies that spend every day pitching TV shows and movies and have a real sense of what kind of entertainment a consumer is looking to watch. And frequently in that model, you're seeing the distributors or production companies helping offset the cost to the brand to create that content. And then it's being bought by a true distributor. And so Instead of buying 93 minutes, 6 minutes of airtime on a premium network, for example, instead you're potentially making money or at least breaking even on the investment that you're making into the content. And the reason we advocate brands to invest in that space is because nowadays people are turning away from ads. They're turning away from, you know, screens in general. Like people are watching TV and at the same time they're on their phone and at the same time they're on their laptop typing an email. And so while advertising still accomplishes a lot, think about how long people have been talking about Game of Thrones. Entertainment just breaks through into culture and becomes this touch point for such a long period of time and influences the conversations that people are having in their friend groups, with their families, around the dinner table. And thus when brands are trying to become that major part of culture, there doesn't seem to be anything like entertainment that accomplishes that goal.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So as for you, Mark, I mean, how do you strike that right balance between what your goal is and what the brand's goal is? Because it's sort of, you've got to be careful that entertainment doesn't become to what Isaiah said, which is it just feels like branded content. So how do you strike that balance?

[Mark Gilbar]

Well, I came up agency side and that, you know, agency side, your core business is to help brands that are your clients solve some sort of marketing problem and you're paid for that. And that's sort of how the business runs. Then coming to an entertainment company imagines job is telling Stories. Our company is about creating entertainment first and foremost. And that's those are the breadwinners of the company. And I sort of run the partnership division. So brands really aren't our clients. And a lot of times we have agency partners that are thinking through the marketing objectives or that's not really my job. It's a conversation we may have. But really my remit is to create more entertainment for Imagine, more stories that we would want to tell even if the brand wasn't involved. So we're looking for partners that align with our core mission. And we're looking for stories that would be stories that would excite our feature or documentary or TV departments. And sometimes brands come to us. But there's at least five or six brands that we have cold called because we had a meeting with a writer and they had a really interesting story to tell and we all thought we should go to that brand. They would love this. And fortunately from imagine that call coming in is welcome because it's not us searching to try and make money. It's more like give us access to these archives, give us access to these people locations. We want to partner with you to tell this story. And then the trade off is maybe you come in and finance that screenplay, which is an investment that you can recoup when we set it up. And for us, we're hedging our development costs, which is the cost we have to bear over the course of a year. And you can only make so many bets. So if I can bring in an alcohol brand to come and finance a screenplay, one that we're again we're excited about, it helps the balance sheet and that when it goes the distance, the brand benefits because their stories in there, they make their money back and we benefit because we make our fees on production.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

We'll be right back. I'd like to share a report I recently read from Tracksuit and TikTok. The report proves what marketers have known for decades, that performance and brand marketing achieve better business outcomes. Together the report is titled the Awareness Advantage. And it backs up a long held theory that having a stronger brand helps your performance marketing perform better. Specifically, high brand awareness advertisers drive 2.86 times more lower funnel conversions than lower awareness advertisers. What's more, if your brand is known by 4 out of 10 consumers, your performance marketing is 43% more effective. It's yet more evidence from Tracksuit to support the value of brand building and is a great resource for marketers trying to nail that tricky balance between Performance and brand to get the most out of their advertising activity. You can download the Tracksuit and TikTok report. It's titled Awareness Advantage and you can download it for [e-mail] awarenessadvantage. That's gotracksuit.com awareness awareness advantage. And if you need a way to measure your brand health, such as your awareness, then Tracksuit is a beautiful, affordable and always on tool that tracks these fundamental metrics over time so you can prove the impact of marketing to business stakeholders. Now back to the show. How do you manage that storytelling? Because you've got to be very careful. Because I think we've all worked with clients who feel that their story is not being told in the subtle way that we want to tell it. So how do you. How did they or how do you manage that dynamic of what they want?

[Mark Gilbar]

Again, I've been on both sides of it. I take advantage of the Imagine brand not having. I had nothing to do with Apollo 13. Right. But I can be in the meeting and Ron and Brian will join and there's just a degree of trust in that. That's what they've been doing for so long that I didn't get that same benefit when I was agency side. Again, the same person, but they would just look at me a little bit differently. So there's a little bit more creative deference there, which is great. And then I think, you know, again, in the, in the post Barbie world, it's like these brands are way more open, I think, to just experimenting, to be a little bit more self aware and to try and do something, take a risk, you know, and that. And we were just the beneficiaries of that.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Is it, Jen, is it only big brands who can do this? Because I mean, it does, it does require investment, particularly if you're involving a celebrity of any note.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah.

[Jen Costello]

In some way. Are you going to keep us on a really tight leash? I kind of want to wander a little bit.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

No, no, go, go, go.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Okay.

[Jen Costello]

I mean, look, I think part of what we can't. What you were just talking about, the difference between brand content and branded content, I think is in some ways almost the more important question here. Because, you know, from an agency perspective, we cannot deny the fact that the vast majority of what we make is emotionally bankrupt. Like go to Peter Fields, most of what we make makes people feel nothing.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah.

[Jen Costello]

It's dull, it is numb. I mean, it is just literally nothingness. And that is where branded entertainment gives us a different opportunity, a different out, a different outcome. Where we get to actually find a version of this. And it can be film, it can be content, it can be a game, it can be roadblocks, it can be many things. But at the end of the day entertainment is emotion. Entertainment makes people feel something and emotion is what builds brands. And that's where I think what we are talking about here is available to everybody. It does not matter if you are a big brand or a small brand. In some ways I think smaller brands have more of an advantage. I don't know that I want to watch a 90 minute commercial from Amazon, but I kind of, you know, people are doing it on Telfar TV all the time at the moment. That's not a small brand, but I think it is a brand that's doing something that feels far more disruptive and lateral than most of what we expect right now from.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So do we use branded content and branded entertainment as a way to make advertising better? I mean why can't we just make the advertising better? Because it's true, most of it sucks. Nobody would doubt that. But how can we do. Do we have to use somebody outside of the agency world to make what we're producing?

[Jen Costello]

It's like a sergeant horse. I mean you sort of just said it. It's the same person, you're getting a different response and a different interaction. You probably have a lot of similar ideas that have evolved over time based on your ability to be in this environment. So I do think it is a Trojan horse. I think quite frankly different rules apply when you start talking about a different format and something that needs to spark conversation or create engagement. The rules just are different. And I think that's where as agencies we get to take advantage of that.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So is the new format the new thing? Is this? Because, I mean because it's very, I mean Zoe, when you look at the role of celebrity, you think about celebrities back in the day versus now. They just sort of appeared in ads. They weren't creating brands, they weren't creating their own production studios, they weren't involved in that. Is celebrity the new thing?

[Zoe Fairborn]

I think it's always been there. I don't think it's in new ways. Yeah, but in new way. Well, I think we just move beyond endorsements in a lot of cases and, and brands want a connection and a partnership with talent and that looks a little more 360. Whether it's CO creating products, creating content. I mean I think they're multi year partnerships. I mean when we partner with brands, whether it's with Reese personally or Hellish Sunshine. We like to create multiple seasons, multiple ways in. Sometimes we're partnering with a brand and it's, we're going to integrate you into this film or TV series, but then we're going to do a social campaign and then we're going to make something else and then we're going to create an app. So there's a lot of. I think that those touch points are what has maybe changed to your point that it just goes beyond an ad. And I think brands are a lot savvier. And when you're going to do that with talent, that talent has to emotionally resonate with their audience because you want that to carry into all areas.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Isaiah, the thing that always comes up, well, it comes up a lot of times in our conversations in the show is who owns ideas. The blurring between where does it. What is the role of the agency now that influencers, that content creators are creating content that's some of the most viral and it's the stuff that's connecting the most. Now we see celebrities that are getting involved in it. Where's the agency in all of this? We used to feel we owned the big idea.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I mean, I think that, I mean, the answer is who owns the big idea? I mean, definitely not agencies. And I mean that in the sense of if widen own, just do it. You know what I mean? It's like if some of the most enduring brand platforms that we're all aware of belong to the actual agencies that help to create them, it would be, I mean, we're all looking for, to evolve our business model as an industry. I think your specific question about who owns the big idea? I think whoever's paying for it, you know, I mean, it's like, I mean, it's a client service business. So I think it's, I think for me, my biggest thing. And it goes back to your answer, Jen. Around small and big business is, I think, really good branded entertainment. Entertainment and really good brand storytelling requires, requires a buyer, typically a marketer, to cede more control than they're often willing to cede. And I'm saying this from an advertising perspective. There's a lot of back and forth around every kind of brand attribution, timing, all that sort of stuff. Branded entertainment is a new level of challenge if you're the kind of marketer who needs to, you know, fill out boxes.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Exactly.

[Isaiah Longawa]

So I think from, you know, I think that there's a. There's a lot of opportunity, there's a renaissance because I think there's a New generation of marketers who can accredit it. But, you know, someone. Everyone has to answer to somebody else. And so I think that the big. The big idea is whomever is funding it. But I think that agencies of good agencies know what keeps the CMO up at night. If you're not a good agency, then you're not in the room, then you don't count. So I think that, like right now, the agencies that understand how to talk to a CMO, who then has to talk to a cfo, who then has to explain to a publicly held company's board why an entertainment project is going to be worthwhile, they're the ones who have the best chance of being in the room to own an idea.

[Zoe Fairborn]

But I also, can I just add, we're a production company and storytellers, but we want, like, we need and love that agency partnership. I am not. I am not wearing the brand hat. I am sort of wearing the brand hat. And that I understand what the brand is trying to do with culture and with storytelling. But you want your agency partner to come in and create all of the companion storytelling that goes around that for the brand that only they can do in a way that we're not. And so whether, if you have a hero piece of content, whether it's a TV show, a film, like all those other pieces, are so important too. And I think that's where agencies and production companies like Imagine and hello Sunshine, really, that's where the magic happens.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Right? Right. Yeah.

[Jack Verschleiser]

I think if I could add too, I think an interesting case study in that is like Uncle Drew, I mean, that started out as a TV commercial, and then they were able to develop the idea into becoming a feature film.

[Mark Gilbar]

Yeah, this guy's throwing me. Actually, the interesting thing about Uncle Drew so I made that TV commercial is why he's doing that to me is that I did it at the marketing arm tma, and TMA really had no ownership of that idea. And Pepsi took it and expanded it into a feature at Lionsgate. And in the long run, I think the lesson for agencies is that you need to have some protection over the IP that your people are creating, because down the road, I mean, you do it for the brand, but those brands disappear, especially in that case. And there was so much money made down the road on that thing that I think they were exposed. And another example, by the way, not exactly one to one, but Ted Lasso was a commercial. It was a short branded entertainment. And think about how lucrative that became. And the original creators were sort of left out, sort of, I think internal at NBC, but not an agency. But that is the sort of the new landscape where I think agencies sort of need to protect themselves.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So one of the things when Jack was going to come on this panel, one of the things that excited me about it was the fact that you've personally been involved working with others, like Jake, for example, but you guys have been working with major brands that create internal production Studios. So Nike, InBev, I mean, we see a lot of this and we see Chick Fil A's into it now, Walmart's into it now. Everybody seems to be competing against everybody else. And I'm just curious, what is the motivation for Nike to start? Is it Waffle Iron Entertainment? What was the backstory to that?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, I think for Nike, a lot of people said they were the last great advertiser. That was kind of like a title that they were given. I think for them, what they looked at is, I think Mark might have mentioned it earlier, but for example, Friday Night Lights, you couldn't watch that show without seeing a pair of Nikes. But yet Nike had nothing to do with it. And so what they were thinking is Nike is such a part of culture. When you watch tv, when you watch sports, you always see that swoosh, you see the Jordan logo. And so what they were thinking is, we have all of these stories we want to tell. We want to help motivate people to move to, you know, participate in sport. And so they couldn't think of a better way to do it other than to be able to go to producers, to go to distributors and to bring them the things that they had to bring them. The ip, the storytelling, the access to athletes. And therefore they were able to participate in these stories that were going to go out into the world anyways. But instead of those stories going out without Nike being involved in any way, they were able to help promote them. They were able to help, you know, like Zoe was saying, build a whole 360 campaign around it, create assets that weren't just the film or the TV show or the podcast. And so for them, the real motivation was let's participate in the storytelling that exists in the world about Nike, but currently without us.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So are they continuing to hire talent outside to produce the actual content, or are there teams inside that are doing that?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, they don't, you know, capture the films. They're not doing that themselves. They're bringing on the best in class, the best directors, the best producers, the best screenwriters, and they're working with Them to help provide them access to the Nike archives, to provide access to Nike talent, to the campus, to all of the media, and all of the different, you know, platforms that they're associated with.

[Zoe Fairborn]

I think most of the studios, well, all of these sort of brand studios are more like entertainment divisions because they're not running production.

[Jack Verschleiser]

It'd be way too expensive. And I think they also realize that they are not experts in that, you know, their expertise is how to sell sneakers. And so what their goal was is let's go out there and work with the people who are the best at making movies rather than investing this massive capital into trying to build that in house. Because, for example, you brought up Chick Fil A. That's what they're doing. They're building essentially a network.

[Mark Gilbar]

Interestingly, just to point out, for the movie air about Nike, for Ford vs Ferrari, which is a great Ford story, and for this new Guinness series that Steven Knight is doing for Netflix. In all three cases, the brand had a chance to be involved in a really sort of foundational way, but decided to keep their distance because both the creators themselves wanted a little bit of creative integrity. And the brands were a little nervous about the liberties that those creators were taking, especially with air. I've talked to the archivists there and they're horrified by the details that are left out or change. But it obviously makes for a great movie, but they benefit from it. And you know, Ford versus Ferrari, they're on billboards all over the world next to Ferrari. It's a huge win. It's a great story. But I would remember when the script came in and Ford was just very nervous about how they were dealing with certain details, but they benefit in the end. So sometimes when it's directly about the brand, they sort of try and keep their distance early on and then wait and see and maybe help out with co marketing down the road.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

In my mind, I'm thinking as the protector, the framer of the brand, and I'll go to Jen for this. How do you balance out or how do you define the role that branded entertainment will play? You know, let's take Nissan, for example. Big TV spender. Well, less than in the past, but you know, it's got to have a whole landscape of communication. So when this comes up as opportunities come up in branded content, how do you make the case for it? What role does it play in the portfolio of tactics?

[Jen Costello]

So this is one where I think there's the positive side of what this can do and there's also the dark side you know, the dark side of relying on celebrity content entertainment to this degree is that what it can never do is define your brand soul for you. And I think that is the mistake that you can see a lot of marketers and a lot of brands falling into. Unless you have a very clearly defined and distinguished point of view and perspective, celebrity and entertainment can help further. That can help expand it, it can help people experience it rather than just hear about it. But unless you have that perspective and that point of view, it just becomes an exercise in sensationalism. And sometimes that's fun and sometimes that is good. But for us, we will often talk about so disruption. Platforms are sort of the thing we do. If anyone's going to go walk through Lee's office, you will basically see some of the most powerful brand platforms in the world. Things for Apple, things for Nissan, things for Adidas. And a lot of these platforms still exist in one way or another today. It's sort of when you were talking a bit about the ownership of an idea, you know, Airbnb is a brand, for example, that I worked on for years. And the platform we created here continues to exist way beyond the, you know, the, the extent of our relationship. And so that is where the ownership of idea can, can transfer. But we talk about entertainment as a solution and as a point of view that enables you to have people experience a platform in a different sort of way, in a way that marketing and advertising simply can't. And I think for us, it's also where we start getting out of things like just film or content. It's where we will start to go to long term platforms. I know you mentioned Nissan. I actually think Gatorade's an example that's even more interesting. Like you think about Gatorade's nearly 10 year journey towards equity in sport through their partnership with Serena Williams. And so whether that is the eight bit video game that we created within Snapchat that represented every single one of her 22 Grand Slam wins to the most recent work we did that allowed her to announce her retirement, about how loving herself actually allowed her to just unmissably impact tennis and the world of sport in a way that she wouldn't have been able to otherwise, because the world did, the world of tennis did not love her. So we just always talk about it through the lens of how does it move you closer to the vision. Every brand we work with has a bigger ambition beyond what they sell. And so we just continuously talk about how will content entertainment move you closer to actually achieving that Vision.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Isaiah, when you talk about thinking as a strategist, there's the fame aspect of a lot of this branded entertainment, which is great. Everybody, there's a lot of people that are advocating for fame as a goal. Needs to be a bigger part of what we do. But is there another part of your brain as a strategist that's saying, I gotta be careful about this? Because if I think about it as a percentage to what Mark was saying, there's probably exposure within a piece of brand entertainment. You've gotta balance, you've gotta make sure maybe it's 20% or less where there's actually exposure. Like, what's the cost of that exposure? Because it becomes very expensive. And how do you think about as a strategist? Is it something that you. That. That's tough to think through about? When is it right? When is it wrong?

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I think advertising, you know, I'm a believer in the mantra of, like, people care about people only tune into what's interesting. And sometimes that's an ad, but often it's other things. So occasionally advertising has crossed into pop culture. I think in the us, the only time people care about brands is super bowl, probably in the. In the uk, it's Christmas. In terms of like the holiday stuff. I think in the UK it's interesting because advertising can trip into pop culture more often over there than I think it does in the us, which is, I just think the nature of things where, you know, where we are. I am sure, like a lot of other people have worked on things where we've had fame briefs for brands, where we've brought in partnerships with celebrities. Sometimes I've worked with celebrities who've then been cancelled during the campaign period or they were so successful in their relationship with our brand that them being in the headlines then caused an issue for us because we were so successful at merging the brand with that person's world. I think as a strategist, it's why you have to be clear on what the hell your brand is all about and also be really clear about whether the. It sounds basic, but the values, alignment between yourself and that. I think there's always the famous stuff about Britney Spears being the face of Pepsi, but being caught drinking Coca Cola offset. So I just think it's like you have to make sure, does this actually fit into this person's world? Do we actually have a genuine belief in each other? And how can we build a partnership that's meaningful and not just, you know, somebody who appears every now and then? So I think what we found more recently is when you can get strategic about talent partnerships, you can be really conscious about when somebody is going to have a breakout year. So I think that, you know, I think for example, the, the actor from the Bear and you know, for Calvin Klein, that was a very perfect moment in terms of like what a year that talent was having to be able to kind of take full advantage of the brand's intersection with him, his story and his trajectory and culture. So I think that there's a sense of, I think Gary Vaynerchuk talks about like day trading attention or like underpriced attention. I think there's a. I think it's incumbent on strategists who want to put brands into culture to be very conscious about what's going up and down in culture. I think that's probably the best way that you're able to time what can be a meaningful moment for a brand. And if there's an opportunity to leverage a property or talent, how you can get the choreography of stuff. Right. I think there's the shape of the idea, but the choreography of the rollout I think is a new and important kind of part of comms strategy for how brands have to, you know, show up and take advantage of the different elements that go into a marketing plan.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So, Zoe, for you guys, you find that when brands come to you, that for them it's mostly sort of an emotional sell. It's not so practical. It's like when you're going to be in a piece of branded entertainment when Reese is going to be possibly be a part of it. There's got to be a big CEO buy in on that. It can't just be coming up from marketing managers. I mean, it's got to go way to the top, I think.

[Zoe Fairborn]

Yeah, but, but most of what we do with brands doesn't have Reese. Right? It's not. I mean, they're partnering with hello Sunshine because we're a place that tells stories, you know, women, female centered stories. So.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

But you've got to admit it's. It's.

[Zoe Fairborn]

Yeah, no, but it's an emotional. Yes, emotional. But she's also a producer on our. So we, we kind of call it brand partnered entertainment because we are partnering with them to create a piece of entertainment that stands on its own. Right. It goes kind of back to what Mark said. And so a buyer has. The audience has to love it and it can't look like, you know, just a commercial for the brand. And Reese will put her name on that as a Producer. If like we just did it. We have side Hustlers, which is a show on Roku. We've made two seasons with Ally Bank. And that started as Ally had a brief. They wanted to talk about female entrepreneurship and supporting small business. And we had. Our unscripted team had been wanting to make kind of an anti shark tank show that was all about mentorship and what female entrepreneurs are really having to go through. And so the show is basically, can you turn your side hustle into your main hustle? And so it's a competition series and we took sort of the ethos of what Ally wanted to do. We took the show that we wanted to make and we worked with them and they had a seat at the table with us and they produced it with us and Reese is a producer on it and it's had two seasons. And like, that's something we're super proud of. Because even for Ally, like, they, they, you know, how do you measure that? How do you then, like, okay, right. So for them it was really like looking at, you know, when that show launched on Roku, it was number one. And they saw like an uptick in traffic, like by 15 to 17% to their site. Right. And so you're having to kind of measure it a little bit differently. But like, that was a great, I think really like two partners coming together, right. To make something that was entertaining.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And so what would be the actual presence for Ally in that?

[Zoe Fairborn]

They were in every episode. So they had a money wellness expert who they work with. Her name is Jack Howard and she actually does a lot of training and she, she's part of Ally's platform and she was on the show talking with each of the entrepreneurs about what their money story is. Right. So we kind of grounded the show in that. And then they have an innovation lab where they work with entrepreneurs on their business. So like very organic to have them woven in as a part of it. And they're a producer on it and we did it with Roku and they have skin in the. We all had skin in the game.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

We'll be right back. We're thrilled to be supported by the effie's. For over 55 years, effie has been the global authority on marketing effectiveness. They lead the way with the largest, most prestigious marketing effectiveness awards across 125 markets worldwide. And their coveted Effie index ranks the most effective brands, marketers and agencies globally. But Effie is more than awards. They're dedicated to helping, helping all marketers, from seasoned CMOs to those just getting started Understand what makes marketing effective by equipping them with insights, tools and inspiration they need to succeed. Learn [e-mail] that's E-F F I E.org I'm delighted to have work. As a sponsor of this series, WARC is the authority in marketing effectiveness. With warc, you gain the confidence to challenge the status quo, prove your business, and fuel the innovation needed to take your marketing effectiveness to the next level. For nearly 40 years, Warrick has helped customers around the world make more confident marketing decisions by giving them access to proprietary research, an extensive library of case studies and best practices, and robust data and inspiration. Who do the world's leading brands, agencies and media owners turn to when they want to make sure their plans are going to work? The answer is work. You can learn [e-mail] that is w a r c.com now back to the show. So Roi, I mean, what are the conversations on Roi? Because the fame side of it, the emotional side of it, producing great content comes with a big ticket price. And so what are the conversations around ROI that are happening with you guys? Jack? Maybe. What is that conversation around? What are those KPIs?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, I mean, I think it all starts with what the brand's goal and ambition is.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And is that typically clear? Because I'm always suspicious. I'm like thinking, well, they're going in because there's this great opportunity or there's a CMO or there's a CEO who wants to do something big and earn some fame. They don't necessarily have a very tight objective. Or am I wrong?

[Jack Verschleiser]

No, I think that's true. And I think you asked a question earlier that I think ties back to roi, which is, can small brands do this or is it just big brands? And I think one of the things is for small brands, it's not just always about money. So Mark made a mention of archives. So there are brands that have incredible archives, they have incredible history. And while they might not have the massive budgets to go allocate a ton of money to getting a script written or offsetting the production budget of a TV show or movie or podcast, they may have other things that provide value either to a distributor or a producer or a director or a screenwriter. And so when it comes to roi, then there's kind of this direct and indirect difference. And for the indirect side, it's the share voice, the conversation, the brand love, what are the impressions? How much site traffic are you seeing? Are sales growing in X amount of time after the launch of that piece of Content and then there's also the direct roi. So for brands that are investing and co producing in the content. An example that actually at Waffle Iron we did with Imagine, called the Day Sports Stood still, which was on Max, that was about the COVID and racial justice movement in the NBA and around sports holistically, there was direct money that Waffle Iron put into that film. But when Imagine Entertainment was able to sell it to Max, Waffle Iron Entertainment actually made a profit on that project. So they're able to, that marketing leader is then able to turn around to their cfo, to their cmo, or if they are the cmo, to the board and they're able to say, I did invest this money, but not only did I get it back, I also made money on it. Which is very different conversation traditionally than what advertising has been historically because it's, you know, you're banking on increased sales in exchange for writing the check. And so you have two different types of ROI that marketers are able to go forward and bring to the table when they're doing entertainment.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So I want to just open it up for questions in one or two minutes. So if you have one, you can, you can kind of prep. And I think the guys are going to be around with microphones. But I want to come back to, before we do that, I want to come back to this definition of an agency, because I hear the way that we're, the way these guys are talking, and I'm kind of like, I've got to think that the creatives inside the walls of this agency think they can do that, but they're not able. Maybe they're not allowed to or they're not able to, but they're certainly capable of it and are really kind of pissed off that these guys are doing so great and Zoe are doing so great. And is there a feeling like, God damn it, we're losing this game of owning the idea? Not from an IEP perspective, but from an originating the idea idea. It seems to be that it's, it's coming from other places now.

[Mark Gilbar]

Well, I, I have a counterpoint to it only in that because I've been on both sides. I love working with agency creatives. I was an agency creative. It's, it's just they're, they're great people and incredibly talented. What we offer is the client looks at them for a certain kind of thing. But what we're able to say is, hey, do you want to do long form? Do you want to do documentary? Do you want to make a movie. Let's do that together. We can bring on a screenwriter that's, you know, been doing this for a very long time. We can work together. It's not necessarily the agency creative that's going to write the screenplay, but maybe they came up with the idea and there'll be a story by credit or an executive producer. But it's a lot easier when we can come in and upsell, for lack of a better term for the client and say, hey, there's a synergy here. Because the Imagine brand is going to offer you guys some credibility when we go to studios. And it's going to offer you, the agency and the agency creative the ability to open doors to go to talent. Because, like, Shia to me was always like the gold standard as a name in advertising. But if you're. If you cold call, you know, Ryan Gosling and say, you're Shia, it's harder than if you. If one of our founders or producers calls because they just know them and they're like, oh, you guys are doing this great. Let's all do it together. So. So we all kind of work together as a team, but sometimes we'll put the brand in the backseat or in some of those early conversations to get those doors open and then say, hey, by the way, Nike on Day Sports stood still. I'm not even sure HBO really knew that Nike was involved until, like, we were showing them footage and they were like, this is a great film. And like, by the way, Nike's involved and they're gonna put the one sheet on Madison Square Garden and, you know, LA Live, which they did. Cause HBO never works with brand, but they were like, oh, that's kind of cool. So it's really just like, I think there's synergy there if you play your cards right.

[Jen Costello]

That's right.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Jen, what do you think about this? The role of the agency, the frustrations, if that's true at all.

[Jen Costello]

I mean, look, I think to your point, you know, everyone's got sort of a major and a minor, and at the end of the day, agencies major in advertising and representing the brand. And I think sometimes when you need to convince, persuade and influence other industries.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That'S a tough one.

[Jen Costello]

You gotta go somewhere else.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So we major in advertising. Do you feel that? Truly?

[Jen Costello]

I mean, I'm talking about the external perception.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Okay. Yeah.

[Jen Costello]

So we talk about shy a day, and I say, what do you know shy a day for? They will then tick you through iconic ads.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah.

[Jen Costello]

And look, I think every agency that is worth their salt these days has Sort of expanded the canvas and we are doing so much more than that. Obviously, at TBWA and Shia, we talk about disruptive brand platforms, however that is experienced out in the world. But at the end of the day, I think the perception is if we call Ryan Gosling, if we're calling Max, it's going to be through the lens of representing a brand or an advertising message. And sometimes, like I said, you've got to Trojan horse it in. In a different way, which is why having great partners, I think, is actually the key to happiness.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Yeah, let's take some questions. Do we have a microphone out? Is it. Am I doing this or.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Testing, Testing.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Where is it?

[Jen Costello]

He's right there.

[Mark Gilbar]

Hi.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Oh, I have a question. My name is Angela and I'm a freelance brand strategist, open for work if you guys need someone. So my question is actually about AI. I'm wondering how the conversations are going with brands and if you've had, specifically to the Imagine guy, if you'd had any brands wanting to use AI to go into some old ip, some of those classic movies, and use those with brands utilizing AI and kind of messing with some of that old content.

[Mark Gilbar]

Yeah, we talk about AI all the time. I think, just like everybody, what you're talking about, actually integrating brands and old ip, we haven't exactly talked about a lot of our. We make residuals, residuals off our library, but a lot of those films are owned by universal and 20th and whatnot. So I think that incoming question would usually come through the studio, but every brand wants to talk about AI. I mean, the most interesting conversations we've had with brands, the relationship to AI is this company Metaphysic that Zemeckis used on this new movie here with Tom Hanks and Robin Wright, which is that the future of working with talent in. In ads and in a branded capacity is that like, they don't even have to show up or if you get them for 20 minutes, you really have them for 20 days because of what you can do with all of, you know, the things that you're able to capture. So we've seen some wild stuff just behind closed doors of where that technology is going. And that'll affect our unbranded storytelling for sure. We've met with. There's Wes Walker who did that Under Armour ad that was talked a lot about, you know, all with AI. He's been in the building and we've been talking to him and some others about just how they're approaching, you know, using those tools. But honestly, that's not exactly for branded stuff, it's just. Just generally, I would say so it bubbles up everywhere in every conversation.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

I think we are at the back here with another question.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Thanks. My name is Reza, a brand strategist. We've been talking a lot about how brands are built, like historically we all read Byron Sharp and stuff like that and you guys had a fantastic conversation around branded content, branded entertainment. I was wondering, what do you guys think about brands as entertainers? Like, we see like we chase eyeballs of consumers everywhere. Now the eyeballs are on TikTok and Instagram and we see some brands being entertainers like Duolingo or Ryanair. Do you guys think brands as entertainers or as creators could be something that we can add to the brand toolbox when we're thinking about brand planning?

[Mark Gilbar]

Yes, yes, yes.

[Jen Costello]

Absolutely. I mean, look, I think the brands that you just rattled off that are doing it well are great examples of brands that are not getting so high on their own supply. Do you know what I mean? Duolingo isn't obsessed with shoving an RTB down your throat every single post. And that level of self awareness and interest in being an entertainer and I think being able to identify as that, I think makes perfect sense for brands like that. So I think especially when it is sort of part of the. What did you call it? The sort of the values alignment of the brand. If entertainment is part of that, then absolutely. And I think we would again like to go back to this point of. So much of what the advertising industry produces is a bit dull and emotionally neutral. I think that that's exactly how we get in touch with creating things that make people feel something.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Another question here.

[Jen Costello]

Hi, Adrian.

[Isaiah Longawa]

I wonder if one of the tensions.

[Jen Costello]

That we're kind of dealing with is.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

That the entertainment industry is really good at kind of crafting stories around antagonists and protagonists and love interests. And yet when you go to a brand and you want to convince the.

[Jen Costello]

Brand to actually put money behind a.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Piece of entertainment, they want their brand.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Their product to be the antagonist. And so you've got a kind of a.

[Jen Costello]

No, no, no.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

CMO wants their brand to be a.

[Jen Costello]

Supporting actor or an extra.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I, I've. There was this sometimes I worked at CAA before coming back to Anomaly to open up the LA office and. And as a result, like, I got access to a lot of understanding of the storytelling world.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Also.

[Isaiah Longawa]

I was. I quit advertising to go screenwriting. It's a good thing. It's a good, exciting thing. But on the shards of my broken dreams, I Came crawling back to Avatar. And I guess, like, the thing I learned. Adrian. Hi. Is. Yeah, it comes back to the control thing. A lot of. For a lot of marketeers. I've got a. I've just got it. There's some numbers that I need to hit, and I'm not sure if letting my mascot do that particular thing on social is going to be the right thing. So I think it's important that we hold up the Duolingo's and some of these other brand. So, Reza, I think the long question to that is the thing a strategist can do is get that brand voice right. I think. To Adrian's. To Adrian's. Question. Yeah. If you want to be in entertainment, you've got to unleash a little bit. I've had lots of times. I represent some spirits companies. I've read scripts from really awesome screenwriters who believe that the spirits brand can partake in the story. I get to page 10 of the script and it's like, interior, night serial killer turns around, swigs a bottle of this whiskey, and then kills someone. And I was like, that is just never gonna. That's not gonna work. I'm like, I get that the brand's in it, but. So I think it's like, you know, that's because there's not gonna be any control. Now was it really. Was it an awesome story? Probably. Would it work with what we're trying to do for this brand? Definitely not. So, yeah. I think the brands don't like being villains. Brands don't like being associated with negative things. In many ways, both those things are a result of control and confidence on behalf of marketing. And marketing is undergoing its own crisis as a function within most companies these days. So I find the most inspiring marketers are where the founder is still involved when it's a publicly held company. So I think small brands are where it's at. I think it can be very hard when it gets bigger and a little more complicated.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Another question back here.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Hi, I'm Kieran Smith. I'm a data analytics consultant for brand marketing and product. My question is in regards to a comment made about the day trading and culture, and I want to hear your perspectives on the changing power of celebrity and the response to the hypothesis that the power of fame is waning and how to reflect on subcultures in this whole topic of entertainment.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Ooh, juicy.

[Zoe Fairborn]

I mean, look at fast channels which are coming up. Which reminds me a little bit of just like, you know, they're capitalizing on maybe a Smaller niche or really highly engaged audience that I actually do think too the rise, like we're in this weird consolidation period and there's only so many global. You know, there's the global streamers, then there's the local. Like, you know, even when we're creating this content, you're piecing together distribution differently now. I don't know, I think, like, I think fast channels is something interesting and I think a lot of smaller brands too, smaller budgets, you could really do some cool stuff. I don't know if I'm quite answering your question. Question the right way. But like, I think there's a lot of opportunity in not just. It's like, it's democratizing a bit. That makes sense.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I think, I mean to the fame question and just it's. The nature of fame has changed. You know, there was once a time when there were, you know, it was like Michael Jackson, Michael Jordan, like there were celebrities, cap with a capital C where you had a global audience. Everyone had the same idea. But that's also because we had a narrower media landscape where people accepted what was presented to them from the culture industry. So yeah, the nature of fame has changed because it's more fleeting. There are very few genuine tier zero celebrities that you would describe. And so, and so as you. As we now understand a bigger funnel of the types of fame, I think that that provides a bigger opportunity because I think a lot of what we're talking about here is you've got some purveyors of premium entertainment here on the stage. There's a lot of un. Premium entertainment as well that brands can also partake in. That I think is also opportunities for efficiency in order to get there. I just think the thing is there's lots of different types of entertainment. You need to be clear on what your brand is because I think just because you get someone for cheap or you are able to buy a lot of eyeballs for cheap does not mean that people have walked away with a clear sense of what your brand is about. And so I think for me that's why agencies and strategists, maybe we're just, you know, singing for our supper here, Jen. Maybe we're just trying to defend the last of us. But. But yeah, I think it's just that there's a. There's a real opportunity still in defining who you are, what you do, what your role is, what your voice is, what your perspective is. Because if you don't have that, then you're out here just. You can't just treat it like day trading. You have to have a reason for understanding what, what role all this culture will do for your business. And and I think finally on that is just entertainment. Premium entertainment can be used at the top of funnel but because you can now buy things and your credit card is in with a lot of different places right now, you know, it's like through the funnel. Entertainment is useful because E commerce and M commerce being where it is right now, people can act on it right now. So I think there's a lot of up opportunity with fame at different points and how brands can partner with different levels of fame in order to grow.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Another, another question over here to the left.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Hey everyone, I'm Jeremy. I came up as a strategist agency side and been trying to be a decent client. Client side.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Now.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Check. Okay, yeah, now we're here. My question is I personally think brands can play a deeper role in entertainment. A lot of times we hear that like oh maybe that's not my brand or my client. But the soap opera was literally created by brands to sell soap. So I knowing that you four or five are very knowledgeable in this space, I would love your guys some examples from your guys point of view of brands that played a deep role in entertainment that maybe we're not as familiar with. We know the Nikes, we know the Red Bulls, we know the Barbies. But what are some other examples that could inspire us and our clients to think a little bit differently?

[Mark Gilbar]

Well, listen, I think, I think on that Mount Rushmore of feature films, you know them all. It's. It's Lego Barbie and coming would be F1 which is gonna be on Apple and theatrical. F1 is a brand and like if you're gonna make a commercial for F1, it's a pretty good one. Brad Pitt and Kosinski. But if you go back a little bit further, drive to survive on Netflix, the docu series which probably all of you guys have watched, contributed to more viewership, more ticket sales, more sponsorship. That sport that didn't mean anything for generations in the US is now wildly popular and just through storytelling. So I mean it's one you know but is maybe not obvious but it's like that did everything for that brand. And this movie that's coming out which again wasn't originally titled F1 and then they titled it the name of the brand I think is going to be a belongs on the Lincoln or the Washington of that.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, I think also actually the first film that was ever sold or first brand film that was ever sold at Sundance was by ebay. And so I think it's not that you have to be a Nike to be involved in entertainment. I think any brand can do it. It's a lot of what Isaiah was talking about with that values alignment. When Nike thinks about entertainment, for example, they say we just want to tell stories about sports because if more people go out and do sport, whether that's walking, running, you know, it doesn't have to be professional level sports, they're likely going to buy a pair of Nikes. And so if your brand has something that's meaningful to it, you know, you can be an insurance brand. But what's meaningful to you is helping people. And there are so many great stories that can be told through entertainment of people helping other people. And so it's not just that you have to be a Nike, a Red Bull, a Pepsi to do entertainment. Anybody can do it. It's just like Isaiah said, you have to have a defined point of view and stand for something and then you have to find stories that align with that.

[Zoe Fairborn]

I mean ancestry's like really good at that too. And they've had a several shows and you know all about your finding your relative. I mean, you know, so you'd be surprised.

[Mark Gilbar]

Also BMW films going way back to 99 I feel like started it all for a lot of us.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And everybody forgets, a lot of people forget about the fact that the Hallmark channel is a dedicated channel with all that content and it's, you know, it's a card company. Another question here.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, hi, my name is Luis, I'm brand strategist and my question is we are living in a world the long versus the short. We are pushing to build more long term brands and looks like entertainment can be a solution. Not a solution but a tool to expand the world. The brands VIP in the long term.

[Jen Costello]

But we are seeing a lot of.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Brands doing one offs in entertainment.

[Isaiah Longawa]

So based on your expertise, what could.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Be effective strategies to convince more brand to do entertainment? But in the lawn this is where.

[Jen Costello]

What I really like working with are celebrities that are actually creator, you know, that think of themselves less as let me lend my name as you said an endorsement and instead are makers, creators, artists. If you think about Pharrell and Louis Vuitton. If you think about Rihanna and Fenty, we work with Sephora here at Chia Day. So her partnership with, with her creation of rare beauty, her beauty brand. I think that that when we create long term partnerships, I mean you're right, you're exactly right. That is the danger of Certain uses of celebrity, it is flash in the pan or it can be a little hollow, it can be a little vapid. I mean, I don't know, you were talking earlier about financial services. I mean, you can't swing a dead cat without seeing a like Jennifer Garner Capital One credit card. And I have no idea what the two of you know, what they're doing together.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Now.

[Jen Costello]

I do think they have made that a bit more of a long term brand partnership, but I have no sense of what's creating depth or meaning there other than a beauty, you know, a famous face on the front of a commercial. So I think it gets a lot interesting when we give celebrities more of a creative director role, if you will. And sometimes that comes through their ownership of a brand or a product and sometimes it comes through how we treat them. The work this agency has just launched with Beyonce and Levi's I think is going to be an interesting example that we will see, you know, have more power and equity built into it over time. And so I do think we always have to start with the end in mind. Otherwise yeah, you're right, we're just going to run at short termism and it'll be, you know, it won't get as far.

[Jack Verschleiser]

I think one of the other things with entertainment, when you think about the duration, you know, a scripted project can take a long time. It can take three years, it could take five years. I mean, Moonlight I think took almost 10 years. And so when you're a CMO who like as I was saying is thinking 18 months max, it's very hard to try and convince someone, hey, take a big swing on something that might not make it into the world for five years. And I think the way to go about approaching that is there are other forms of entertainment that are much quicker to market. So that's why you see a lot of brands start with documentaries because they tend to be much, much quicker to make and usually lower investment. And so I think pitching them this idea of, hey, build a slate of projects, some of which we can get, you know, on screen or out into the world quicker while still being able to take that big swing to do that scripted project, which of course is kind of like the gold standard and the dream of, of everybody, I think.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Another question back here in the center.

[Mark Gilbar]

Hi Garrett.

[Isaiah Longawa]

The thing about this interesting about brand.

[Jack Verschleiser]

And entertainment and advertising in general is there's trade off between, you know, an ad is more disposable, but it's expandable. You know, you have mayhem run for.

[Isaiah Longawa]

10 years and it Develops fluent devices.

[Jack Verschleiser]

And distinctive brand assets. And brand entertainment may have a larger impact, but it's hard to expand over the long term.

[Isaiah Longawa]

You know, Barbie, huge lead up brand.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Partnerships, but nothing's really come out of it. So my question is, how do you approach the expandability beyond a launch and maybe the cultural conversations around it before.

[Isaiah Longawa]

People move on to the next piece of content and actually make that investment.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Kind of last longer? I'd say I think it's about building a world. I mean, Barbie, you gave an example, but then you could also say Transformers and Transformers has been around for what, almost 20 years now. And so it's about building a universe around that piece of entertainment, I think, which is the only way to keep it relevant and fresh for consumers.

[Mark Gilbar]

Yeah, Mattel, Lego, I mean the toy companies are sort of in a category of their own because they have all this ip. Also video game companies, it's a portfolio of IP that they can go back to. It's also Lego is one of the most brilliant ones because it's a visual language that feels like it's sustainable for a really long time. It's a documentary on Pharrell, uses Lego. So it's a good one.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Yeah, I think it's just because of the nature of this conversation, we can make it feel like things can be either or, but they're not. You know, I think, as Zoe said, I think if you treat it like there's one movie and that's it, then you're not doing the branded part because you're just doing an entertainment thing. And that's not the business model for most companies. Right. So I think that it has to. You, you have to connect it to the broader marketing plan, which sounds obvious, but I think that that's the answer if you're doing, if, if the advertising is working for you, because especially if you're working with a CMO where the advertising model has probably been proven out at an established company, the entertainment model has not. I think there are entertainment divisions that are being created at certain companies as ways to kind of incubate and protect what that investment can mean over time. But if they don't have that, then I think it's just they have to be small tests and loans before you can kind of convince people. Because I think the premium entertainment stuff can take time and longer than the quarterly numbers that have to be reported. So I think that it's a little bit of understanding the archetype of who your CMO is like, who's actually making the decision and signing checks. Are they a change agent? Are they a numbers person? Are they a. You've got to kind of get to the basics of how to communicate with them and then how can entertainment, if it doesn't exist, what's the zero to one of like how can we start the conversation around an investment in entertainment as part of the marketing plan? I just think that sometimes if you're telling a marketer to jump to a Barbie, that can be a very big jump for the majority of marketers because all they will tell you is that we are not a toy company with IP that has equity as deep as they do. So I think just even like echoing Jeremy's question, there are no low interest categories, just low interest brands and low ambition. So I think it's just you've got to figure out which marketer has that ambition, wherewithal and ability to actually sign that check and hold on to the men because that's basically what agencies are doing. We're holding onto the few that are really wanting to, to change the game.

[Jen Costello]

I think the answer to the question of what is the CMO's relationship to the CFO one of the like, if it's strong, if it, if there's conversation, if there's connection, you're in the money, you're good to go run. If they are brand new and haven't made that inroad, it's going to be a longer road to hoe.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Hi, I'm Stephanie, I'm a strategist here at chiat.

[Zoe Fairborn]

Fergus told me I can't ask you.

[Isaiah Longawa]

Who you voted for, but I am going to ask a slightly political question which is thanks. We've had some clients in the past several months and it hasn't been for.

[Jack Verschleiser]

A couple years that I've heard this question come up.

[Zoe Fairborn]

But it's not even about who you voted for.

[Isaiah Longawa]

They don't want to work with creators or celebrities that even are putting out.

[Jack Verschleiser]

There in the past couple weeks that they voted. That's suddenly a political message. And I was curious what you think, you know, let me phrase this correctly.

[Zoe Fairborn]

How politics is going to affect branded.

[Jack Verschleiser]

Content and even just figures being politically involved, how that would affect the future of or the current state of brand entertainment.

[Zoe Fairborn]

I mean, Halisa, we try to not be political at all and we try to invite all voices to talk about what's happening in the world and do that in a very even way because we don't want. That's just not our brand.

[Isaiah Longawa]

I think as we said, it's just, I mean values alignment. Right. And I think for me there's a lot of conversations with CMOs around, like, well, if we have those words in our little brand pyramid, then isn't that what we should be? You know, it's. It's like a value isn't a value until it costs you something. Right? So I do think that a strategist's role in all of this is as we're building these brands, some brands will want, like, some brands wear their values on their sleeve, right? A Patagonia, you know, that that's a brand that has, because of the nature of how it sees itself, plays a more active role. And there are other brands where they have to talk to everybody. And I think that that's one of the toughest places to be is the CMO that has that publicly held company that talks to everybody and therefore can be a bit stuck. So I think it is, again, it's like for agencies, we have to represent these brands and I think that it's incumbent on anyone who's working with any of these CMOs to get kind of get to. We need to understand better how we can help them. But yeah, I mean, I think for me, usually I will stare at the brand foundations and see if there is a value. If a lot of companies will say it. It's very hard for a lot of companies to do it. And I think that it's. I think agencies owe it to themselves to stand up for their own values as well. And I think that good brands have good and provocative relationships with culture and their consumers. So it's case by case. There's no easy answer, but I think that it's. If brands say they're about something, I do think that that value has to be brought up when you're thinking about who you partner with. I'm Desmond Marzette. I am a executive create. Is this working Executive creative director here at Chiat la. I want to be a proof point for good branded content having massive effect. I still remember The wizard from 1989, the best.

[Mark Gilbar]

I loved it.

[Isaiah Longawa]

That shit was tight.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Power.

[Mark Gilbar]

Go ahead.

[Isaiah Longawa]

And it felt. I remember ingesting that as a proper piece of content about video games and later on in life, finding out who paid for that and going, oh, that made a lot of sense. But at least to my question, gaming, you guys started to get to it. Yes, you're with it. You started to get to a little bit of the answer in terms of the long lead time in that space. But as I'm sure this whole room knows, gaming is blowing traditional forms of entertainment out of the water. So any insights into the future of gaming within this conversation of branded content and branded experiences?

[Mark Gilbar]

I'll just say that I think the definition of gaming expanding is, is one of the things that we'll be seeing. And just speaking based on conversations with Netflix in particular, I'm always amazed at the amount of people that watch Netflix on a phone or a tablet, which is an interactive device. I'm still more of like a, you know, on the couch. And it just means that they've invested a lot in this space, but it means that storytelling becoming more interactive because you can touch the screen is a form of gaming. And so like, I know it's not the traditional definition, but I think that's a space to watch and definitely a space that brands can play.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

And our last question will be here.

[Mark Gilbar]

Thank you.

[Zoe Fairborn]

Hi, I'm Eleanor, I am a strategist at kqla.

[Isaiah Longawa]

And so you talked a lot about.

[Zoe Fairborn]

The amazing things that entertainment can bring to brand.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

Right.

[Isaiah Longawa]

But would you say that the other way around is also true?

[Zoe Fairborn]

Like, can brands bring amazing things to entertainment very much?

[Jack Verschleiser]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think we work with LVMH with their in house studio or brand division 22 Montaigne Entertainment. And you're talking about a range of brands like Louis Vuitton, Dior, Moet. Like the stories and the history that they have are so rich. And I think for them to be able to showcase some of the things that as a consumer you never think of. For example, Tiffany makes like 80% of the professional sports trophies and they've been there for so many of these meaningful moments in sports, so many meaningful moments in American history. There's so much that brands can bring, first off on the IP side, but then secondarily for entertainment. You know, one of the interesting things going on in the ecosystem now is that there's just so much content. And so all of these streamers are fighting for that share of voice and their content is fighting with every consumer for what you choose to watch. And so having a brand there that's able to build a marketing campaign around it talked about the day sports did still they use Nike, used their billboards at LA Live and in New York City. And so to be able to offset some of that marketing costs that otherwise Netflix has to figure out how to allocate to hundreds, if not thousands of titles every year, there's a lot of positive things that the brands can bring to entertainment.

[Fergus O'Carroll]

So I want to thank you guys for doing this. This has been an amazing evening. And to everybody for being here with us tonight. Great to be in la. Great to be at TBWA Chiatay. Thank you for being a part of this. Appreciate you very much. What a great sold out night it was at TBWA Chiat Day in Los Angeles. I even got to walk through Lee Clow's office which was pretty amazing for me. Be sure to check out our upcoming show live from Chicago, December 5th 16th, 8pM at the merchandise Marth. It's our holiday ad special. It'll be a fun, cozy evening with a bunch of friends. Tickets available now on our website under the live Tour tab at onstrategyshowcase. Com and we'll see everyone on the next episode.