← The Influence Factor by The Influencer Marketing Factory
The Influence Factor by The Influencer Marketing Factory
How Crunchyroll Builds and Scales Global Fandom Communities w/ Siobhan Sullivan
00:25:52
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- [00:00]
A
Steven Slayer Infinity Castle became the highest grossing international film ever released in North America. And it also set records as the biggest opening day for an anime film.
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B
Hey, Siobhan, welcome to the show. How are you?
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A
I'm great. Oh, thank you. How are you doing?
- [00:22]
B
It's. It's good. It's a lot. You know, of course it's. Now that we're recording, it's Q4. And for the, you know, agency side, I mean, brands are busy, but, you know, as an agency and multiple brands to work together, everyone is all the time in priority. Right. And emergency mode. So it is what it is, I guess.
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A
Yes. I feel you. I'm counting down how many weeks we have left to plan for end of the year, but we're not. We're busy. We're going to look back at 2026 and say, wow, all the great things we've achieved. Right. So 100%.
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B
100%. And, you know, like, today's going to be definitely an interesting episode. It's something that we didn't cover much, I'd say, in the past. I mean, we did somehow, but not as, you know, in depth as today. Now, before we get started, why don't you tell us a bit, you know, about yourself. We use this thing called the map. Basically, it's divided in three main areas. So is the mission the first one, like, what do you aim to achieve with your work achievements? So any notable milestones can be in your career, your life, or both. And the last one is the purpose. So in addition to the mission, like. Like, what do you do? Right, it's why do you do what you do?
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A
Ah, yes. I really love this framing. So thank you. I was like thinking through this of just what is that really deep core, inside perspective. But yeah, I would say my mission is to, you know, create work that really leaves people with something, whether that's like joy or inspiration or fulfillment or wonder. Right. There's so many positive emotions I think could come through our work as marketers. And so that's what I really hope to achieve through anything I do in life. Yeah, I just want to make the world a little bit brighter for. For communities, whether that's the content creators themselves or just the message we put out there. Especially with anime, it's such a huge fandom that they're just so excited for content in general. So, yeah, hopefully providing that delight and. Let's see, achievements. Okay, well, so I've been at Crunchyroll for a very long time, a little bit over eight years, which is crazy. It's such a surreal thing to think back of. When I started where anime was definitely more in a niche phase, a little bit more underground, and now where it is is massive. Like, when I started my first week at Crunchyroll, we had hit 1 million paid subscribers and now we're at 17 million subscribers. Wow.
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B
Okay, that's a big jump for sure.
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A
The big jump. And you know, through those eight years, we launched games, mobile games, events, the anime Awards, so many big things. And so I feel really proud to have taken, you know, put my hand in there at some points and getting those initiatives even bigger and shining so brightly as they do right now. But I think on a more personal lens of achievement, you know, I am a hardcore anime fan. I grew up with it since I was very young. So for me it's thinking back to like elementary school version of myself and being able to say, hey, Siobhan, you're watching anime at 5am I promise in 30 years this will be a part of your career and something that I'm sure little Siobhan would be so, so thrilled to know that she's a part of.
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B
Amazing. And I don't know if you want to add anything also on the purpose. I mean, you kind of touched base on that, but it's together, right?
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A
Maybe some other background I think your, your listeners might find interesting. So I'll go back that. I used to be a content creator. Back in my day, I was a fashion blogger and this was like right when Instagram was becoming a big thing. And so at that time, my mission was to make fashion blogging and like those, I would say, more organic creators take the stage with the fashion industry. As far as being pacemakers, it's not just hobbyists that are like putting content out there, but they really are meaningfully driving culture, driving change. So really trying to find places to empower their voices. I was able to actually talk at London Fashion Week. And at that time I explained what fashion blogging was to. To some of these industry professionals who just weren't even sure, like, what is this? Like, what is it, Graham? So that was a very. It was definitely a career highlight, but matching my purpose on like empowerment, drawing inspiration, you know, seeing that connection that I hope to have, which is advocating for fashion bloggers. But, you know, now I see it more as me empowering the anime community. So again, just finding places to really distill that joy, putting it out on the center stage of entertainment culture and just, yeah, highlighting our. Empowering our anime fans is a part of it. So Maybe that's the angle I'll put on my purpose.
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B
Amazing. No, it's very funny. Also when you mention about like you know, fashion blogging, I. I did the same all about fashion. But blogging, like before it was a thing and people thought it was either crazy or why are we wasting time with this Internet thing that no one is looking at and you know, look at us now, right? Like we knew that it was coming, right? So you know, sometimes it's just that to believe in something and you know, continue with that. So. And you know, like you said fandom, right? So in other episodes we did cover community versus audience, right? So like going from a passive audience that just like scrolled on me like no doom scrolling to actually having like these active, you know, community that is part of your co creation. They come to your discord channels to check you know what is going on and do a B testing of your thumbnails and so on. How do you go to even again? Like you know, these even extra step right in the fandom, like how Crunchyroll is helping with that. How do you build fandom?
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A
Oh my gosh. Yes, it's. Man, it's a big question for sure, right? It's like the organic creation of that micro community that just spreads, right? And how does Crunchyroll interject? Well, you know, it is really elevating their voices. But I realized too, maybe I should set the ground a little bit on what anime is maybe listeners and give them that context since it's new to some people. But I guess first off, so anime is a medium, not a genre. Amongst anime itself there are genres. So like romance, sci fi, you know, things that are very recognizable. But we also have like, like a sub genre like isekai. So it's this trope where you basically move from the normal world into some fantasy world and you're starting life from zero. I really enjoy those. And then also Magical Girls is another sub genre I really like. So you can imagine these female led stories about courage and beauty and friendship. Those are really great. But even just with those two examples, right, you can see very distinctive audiences most likely that are drawn to it. So when I think about Crunchyroll and how we can play a part is to identify all of those subgenres of fandom and creating content that speaks and resonates to all of those different types of fans that make up our community. So I see building fandom as giving back to the fans, like what is something that they would get excited about. So is it a behind the scenes, look at how animation is created. Is it a behind the scenes of how voice acting is it is, is made, things like that. That's where I see us giving back to fans in order to grow fandom.
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B
And, and how does that translate in you know, influencer marketing and also in the bigger like, you know, group of the, of the creator economy. As you said, it changed so much in the past, you know, 10 years, right. From the niche thing to, you know, now we have like we're going to also go, you know, in a second about also event in real life and so on and everything. But if you have to translate it right when it comes to specifically like social media influencer marketing, creator economy, what is happening these days?
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A
Yeah, yeah, it's a really fun space to be in. There's just so much diversity in the types of content creators we can work with that resonate. So for example, I mean one, I'm always looking for authentic anime fans, right. And it doesn't have to be that they're hardcore anime fans. They could be, you know, starting off their anime journey. They're still really valuable at speaking to those different. Yeah. Types of people. Right. And so for example, when I look at those core influencers, core, sorry, hardcore anime fan influencers, you know, I'm going to connect them with series that, you know, maybe are maybe more of those deep cut series. Whereas for maybe some more generalist content creators, we're working more with like the top, the most popular series. So let's say a solo leveling, right. Like there's all this momentum and discussion about it. So it's a good entryway for casual viewers to come to the fold. So we start to match up, you know, what are the series, what are those content creators already creating content around and then just creating that perfect fit. And I do need to highlight one cool thing in particular is that we have Vtubers. So these are virtual anime YouTubers who are personalities on themselves. I think that's really unique to Crunchyroll being able to tap into that. I'd love to see other brands tap into vtubers. I don't know, have you heard of other brands maybe tapping into that creator?
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B
You know, that is actually an interesting one because we did like three years ago, something actually a report about virtual influencers. But we didn't like, you know, cover that much because again it's very niche. There was not much interest from brands. So I think that it's like, you know, and things changes so much. Like before it was only CGI influencers. Now we have AI influencers. Like there is so much going on but I feel there is so much confusion and brands are a bit, I would say skeptical but you know, all the time they, if I feel that if they don't understand it properly, they don't want to invest and even just explain to them if you're not an expert might be very difficult because then it's healthy because you're not an expert. Telling to another non expert about this world and then you do something that if you are an actual expert you would be. What is this?
- [10:15]
A
Right, so yeah it's we, it feels like we're at this big turning point of you know, anime VTubers. Like this whole cultural momentum of fandom. Like you know, looking at, you know, the game awards and some of the winners are vtuber. Like it's amazing and makes me really excited for the next five years or we're going to look back and think about a type of creator or influencer that we could have never envisioned. So we'll see, we'll see how that changes.
- [10:44]
B
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- [11:57]
A
Oh yeah, no in person events in particular for you know, anime community are really meaningful. Since we have anime conventions, we have multiple every year. So for example, we'll invite our content creators early to get a VIP experience, allow them to create footage they can post themselves on social and allow, you know, that amplification of a specific convention. So one type of activation we've done recently that was just so exciting, something really new and fresh for me was this red carpet experience we had for Demon Slayer Kinetsu no Yaiba, Infinity Castle, the theatrical experience. So we were at the Chinese Theater with our beautiful red carpets, and we wanted to, of course, invite talent associated with the film, but we also wanted to invite our content creator partners, the influencer network that we had. Again, they are hardcore fans themselves that bring so much genuine, organic emotion to the red carpet experience. But I wasn't just satisfied to invite them. Me and my team wanted to think about what's another way we can make it feel anime. So once the content creator accepted, we gave them a costuming stipend. So what they did then was taking that to then create custom outfits that are had the flair of the red carpet. So something like a big gown or, you know, a really cool blazer or nate accessories. And so what we really were able to do is tap into that creativity that, again, is so crucial to the anime experience is enjoying, like, the beauty, the art, things like that too. So the influencers came full force. There was even a snake, if you can believe it. But it was a reference to one of the characters of the show. So, yeah, so it was a really wonderful experience on the red carpet. We were also able to then, you know, have a content calendar that was stretched much wider because we were doing interviews with the talent on the carpet. Then we created like these kind of listicle, you know, formats for TikTok. Like, you know, what is the character that you like the most? Or would you want to be a demon or not? Um, so we were having them amplify their channels. We were extending our content beat. We also did a live stream experience too. So we were really hitting. We were maximizing every. Every moment on the red carpet with them. And the results speak for themselves. I mean, not just influencer marketing by any means, but even Slayer, Infinity Castle became the highest grossing international film ever released in North America. So this is surpassing Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, if you can believe it. And it also set records as the biggest opening day for an anime film.
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B
So congratulations. That's. Wow.
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A
Still amazing, right? But it goes back to the idea of, like, how, you know, how creators are going to transform in the next couple of years, how anime has transformed in the next couple of years. It just feels like, who knows? Sense of wonder that I have as a marketer.
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B
I would Say and because of these like, you know, great achievements and these, you know, amazing, you know, crazy numbers, right, that that achieved there when it comes to like also geographies. Right. I'm pretty sure that these days it's international, right. As in terms of audience, first of all, are you noticing any geos that are like more interested in this type of world than others? And then they, you know, this, you know, like I said there also the other follow up question there would be how do you really manage? Right. Different because we spoke about this in the past, you want to be global but local at the same time. When it comes to influencers, creators, because it's creators, it's culture. Right. It's something that can go to hyperlocal, but a neighborhood in a city to a global vision. So yeah, I'm curious again, what are the audiences there, if there is anything working more than others? And how do you manage having both aspects without again either getting people confused about things or still able to get a free rouge between everything?
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A
Oh yeah, that's a great question. Well, as far as content creators go, just more broadly, I see a lot of fandom coming from Latin America. So we have some really big names out there with significant impact. And more recently I was diving further into India and the anime influencers out there too with just really engaged communities really seeking for more anime content. So Crunchyroll is bringing out dubs and like all the different languages in India which are, you know, there's many, many of them. And so it's really cool to see those different content creators within a singular country able to represent for a specific language that they're familiar with. Right. So maybe going to your question of like, how can we really specialize to that community, it is drilling down to like very, very fine detail. You know, what is the voice that this content creator is going to give to maybe this piece of content or Crunchyroll. But then another initiative that I think represents the question that you're saying is the anime awards that I referred to. So it's an event, our flagship event that's in Japan. We have creators like animators, directors on the ground in the room receiving awards that really showcase how fandom in the west really appreciates their work. And so on the one hand, my perspective is that anime is global, right? Like we all are enjoying the content, we're all celebrating, you know, the creators from Japan for example. But when it was the people that we wanted to send, we wanted to make sure we had representation from like, for example, from Italy, Brazil, you Know, also thinking about demographics within the United States. So like Hispanic Americans, things like that too. They're really trying to find again those different places for people to watch the Anime Awards and feel like, hey, this person represents me. It's almost like an event, right? Of just being like, that's my country. So that's where I saw the opportunity. And one global. We're all coming together, different languages, different countries, but we're allowing different segments of the community to shine. And then of course, they're so excited to be there, so they're creating their own organic content driving that our media together. And it's also again, going back to the red carpet. I love seeing what people dress up for the Anime Awards because it's its own like, you know, our Oscars. So it's really cool to see everybody show up at like just with the deference for anime itself.
- [18:28]
B
So I can imagine the. Yeah, the power of earned media with something like that because it's so sensational, right? It's so different from many other things that you can see. So even just I think that I'm pretty sure that just one clip about someone with a specific like, you know, things going like, you know, on the, on the red carpet, just that you get viral, right? You, you, you earn it in a, I would say easier way right back compared to maybe a boring video that you already saw a thousand times. And now it's like. And as you said, also the presentation, right? We spoke about this in the past about how you want to be, feel, right? Be part of something. And these are already right in the past with, you know, think about the Eurovision, right, For, for singing and you know, words and everything. And then you have the, the World cup and everything. I mean, the same, right? Also in other aspects and different. Like again, it's not an issue anymore, right? But I mean, something that is like that. I feel it's very important for people to feel like part of something. And so I'm curious, like, you know, you, you told me, right? What you work it on. I want to know like a bit more about what is the future for Crunchyroll and also what is the future of these like industry. Like, are you seeing something that is changing drastically or do you feel that it's a bit more like organic when it comes to, you know, changes in the, in the next year or so.
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A
So many good questions. Okay, there's two. There's two. So one.
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B
Yeah.
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A
Something that's been on my mind is just the, the blurring of the lines of celebrity versus Influencers or content creators, whatever sort of nomenclature you want to describe. But you know, we have celebrities that have massive reach, great fan bases that are driving culture in their own way, but we have influencers that are driving like the same momentum and reach, but just different types of experiences. Right. So we see like gaming influencers with so much sway that I, I just could have never conceived, you know, gamers next to maybe a big Hollywood celebrity as far as like how much draw they could, they could create on their own. So that's something that I'm thinking more and more about certainly is like how do we want to grade things differently just depending on, you know, what is, what is the impact or you know, who are we trying to speak to. But then to your other question about Crunchyroll and where I see us going in 2026 and beyond is doubling down on the co creation. So I just spoke about outfits. But beyond that there's a lot of creativity that I see from our anime content creation creator network. And so whether that's like martial artists, you know, makeup artists, nail artists, you know, illustration cosplay, a lot of these creators are just creating like you know, something that inspires them. So it's not just watching anime, but it's actually doing which is really fun. And so because of that energy that's just so organic, you know, I want to tap into that and use it as a place to like acknowledge the, the those communities that each of these creators have, have made. So one, oh actually there's two examples from the last year that I really liked that speak to co creation. So one, anime fans really love to see the behind the scenes of how anime is made. And so what we did is we got two major influencers who really wanted to experience what was the like to voice act in anime. So what we did is we took them to a soundstage. We had a voice actor from the official we were promoting at the time, which is the low leveling. So we have the voice actor, these two influencers and he went through like piece by piece. What are all of the different things you need to factor in on using your voice standing up a certain way and all those little bits and pieces that make a voice acting piece really, really special. And so you could see from those creators they were absolutely mind blown hearing their voices next to anime. And so again you're channeling that emotional energy, creating a really great cloud content piece. And then of course the creators are so excited to show their community. Right. Like I'm a voice actor, you know, so through that piece, for example, just so much attention was drawn in. Not just because it was Crunchyroll putting something out for a popular show, but really seeing that, you know, that community that's saying, like, oh, yeah, my favorite influencer, they got acknowledged by Crunchyroll. So that's one example. And then another example we did last year, also for solo leveling, was that there was a content creator that was really great at martial arts and mograph. And so what we did is we recreated a scene from the series using different characters assigned to different influencers. So there's like three characters. One character is this, the other one's that. And they're in this, like, battle mode. So you see them, like, with all the effects, they're doing their fight choreography. It was mind blowing just seeing the final result. But that's another thing, is that we get to work with these really, really creative individuals who love anime. Right? And so it was like a showdown of influencers. So people were really excited to like, oh, who's gonna win? Who's. Which character is who? So that's definitely what I want to do more of this year is just tapping into their. The different content creators, different angles, perspectives, and again, that inspiration, and see what makes them truly feel excited and tapping into that. So. So that's what I hope we do tomorrow.
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B
No, I mean, I totally get it. I'm pretty sure that they were so excited, as you said, both the influencers involved, but also the, you know, the community watching. And I think that, you know, we've been seeing this trend of showcasing the behind the scene, as you said. Right. Because first of all, I think that it's great for people to understand the world behind. Because too many times people do not realize that behind a piece of art, behind a series, behind something, the work, the people that are, you know, behind that, the. The endless hours of repolishing and retouching things. And I do think that it's great for people to, you know, even when you start asking, you know, maybe for a subscription to pay for something, I think that if you start realizing the work that is behind that, you start appreciating much more compared to this is the finished product enjoyed and then be like, why should I pay for these? Well, this is why. Because this is everything that happened, you know, behind. So I think that the behind the scene, no matter the industry where you are, I think it's a great way, right, to show the work that is behind that.
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A
Yeah, so true. I feel that it's just like it's not a CTA of download now. It's like, how do we create that folk experience by showing that emotion and making sure that's a proper stage. And of course, the brands really highlighting those people who are a part of the community, creating content for this campaign and just inviting others into a world, you know, and like you said, it's not about watching the next show. It's about how special an individual show is and then welcoming others to experience it.
- [25:15]
B
Wow. This was very interesting. I learned a lot. It's not going to lie. New world to me. And I, you know, maybe also for some of the people listening. So I really appreciate you too, you know, sharing that with you, knowing that you've been doing this for, you know, many years, it is, you know, your passion. So when you combine them together, and I can see that from your experience and case studies that you show with us today, I can definitely see that you are very passionate about that. So that, that is great to see.
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A
Yeah, I'm so glad to talk to you guys. Really great.
- [25:41]
B
Amazing. Thank you so much again for joining me today. This was the Influence factor by the Influencer Marketing Factory. And I'll see you the next episode.