On this week's telecast, I'm meeting with Matt Campion from
Spirit Studios, one of the production companies at the
cutting edge of the digital first revolution in the UK.
You do. I'm all right.
Good to see you. Yeah, you too.
I don't think we've ever done a long chat on telecast when we've
had chats, we've had short chats around events that we've done
and we had a chat at Mipcom and but I don't think we've ever had
a sort of deep dive into into Spirit Studios.
Not a proper one, no. No, all right, well, well let's,
let's get into it then. And one of the things that I
think about spirit is really interesting, particularly for
probably more traditional TV production companies who look at
you and, you know, they see everything that you're doing.
And, and really, you know, one of the one of the production
companies at the cutting edge of the digital first space.
But actually you've been going for about 15 years, which is
really surprising, right? Because and I know that you
don't just do digital projects, you also, you know, you also do
linear shows or you're still working in linear if you like.
Is that a phrase working in linear?
I don't know but. Yeah, I don't think anyone's
working in it, but it's still happening.
Yeah, it's still happening. It's still, it's still holding
on. So why don't you take us right
back to the beginning then of Spirit and where you and Peter
met your partner in the business?
So Peter was my boss at Endemol before it became Endemol Shine
before it became Bannerjee. And he was, he ran digital media
for the, for the business and had anyone that used to work
there will remember the 6th floor Shepherd's Bush, I think
it was 2000 and, and six, they, they had a, a studio showdown in
Bristol where they used to make deal on no deal.
We launched gala bingo, had an Interactive TV channel on sky
and I was hired in to, to go and run that.
And what's, what's it? I was talking about this the
other day because what's interesting about it is this was
pre social media. Just no.
It was on the cusp of Facebook just taking off.
But we would, the channel was live 8 hours every night and we
had a team of about 40 people that would run different shifts
and people could buy tickets through the red button.
And then my job as exec would be to oversee the channel and the
games and the production model and you know, and the marketing
and all that stuff. And then what I would do is the
following day after a show, I would go in and I'd get the VHSS
of the night before and I would get the producers to write in
the ticket sales against each game at the time, against
timecode. So I could then go in the next
day. And I would fill in a
spreadsheet that would basically tell me when ticket sales spiked
or when they went up, when they dipped.
And then I would watch back to their timecodes and see what we
did and whether we could recreate that.
And what if there was something that happened then that like,
you know, and essentially I had this, I had this, I'm a bit
allergic to Excel spreadsheets And, but, but then I did get
really obsessed with it. I really like analytics, but I
got obsessed with this spreadsheet.
And essentially it was like the IT was me sort of coming up with
my own analytics in the way that we use it all the time now in
digital to see, you know, retention spikes, audience
lifts, all those kind of things, engagement.
And and so I met Peter doing that job.
And that was the thing that really sort of, I think it was
that project that when we left in the mall and set up Spirit
was sort of the idea was could we create a business that was
really future thinking and could create products, programs,
social media builds, whatever it was that really could understand
those digital audiences, learn from the results and and build
audience, grow audiences. And I've, I kid you not, at the
very beginning, 15 years ago, our sort of North Star was that
we felt the future would be about not only being able to
produce a show, but being able to how know, but being able to
know how to do all of the digital marketing around it and
build the noise around it. And it just took 15 years for it
took 15 years for the, for the, for the market to really mature.
I suppose we were very early on, but in those early days, I
suppose the 1st 10 years of spirit we built, we've built a
name for ourselves in, in becoming a digital producer.
We would spin off other people's shows.
So we do things like we do the spin off show for Made in
Chelsea and we did skins and we did Glee in in Los Angeles.
And then we helped build social media fan bases for Who Wants to
Be a Millionaire and Sony shows and all that kind of stuff.
And then a few years in, we, because we've been going back to
producing content, we, we got Trigger Happy recommissioned.
I don't know if you remember that about probably be about 10
years ago now. And we did 2 series of that
Channel 4 online. And then we did two TV specials.
And that's when we were like, oh, you know, actually the, the
market's taking a lot longer. Maybe we should go back into
linear. And then the stand up sketch
show was born, which became a long running series for ITV and
we did multiple other TV shows here and there.
And and then and then obviously lockdown happened.
We had a change of ownership and from our original investor.
And then Channel 4 came on board four years ago and Channel 4
really have helped change the the whole sort of face of spirit
and the the structure of the business and allowed us to
invest in people. And we've got our own studio now
and our own post production and we were sort of a bit of a one
stop shop for content production and that allows us to be able to
operate really seamlessly in the current market.
And why did Channel 4 invest in you then?
I mean, what was it that you know, that that stood out about
spirit that perhaps, you know, if we put ourselves four years
ago, you know, the start of the decline or the noticeable start
of the decline started to happen when it came comes to linear TV.
But what is it? What is it that they saw in you
that made them wanted to invest in you?
I think it was the, I think it was the fact that we were really
multifaceted and that we still understood the traditional
world. We we could operate in the
traditional world, but we really were all about the new.
And I think I think it's really difficult to make money in
digital. And so if you're an entrepreneur
that has to be able to survive off digital revenues, then you
clearly know what you're doing. And I think the fact that when
they they looked at under the Bonnet with spirit and they
could see the size of some of the platforms and the brands
that we've built over the years, some of the big brand podcasts
that we've done. When I talk about brands, I mean
the brands that we've created ourselves.
When you look at the Lion Whisperer, when you look at our
ability to spin content off into the social world, we're able to,
we're able to make money in that in that space.
And we we do it all the time for actual brands as well.
And so I think we felt like a grown up version of of of a
business from the new world. So well, let's let's talk about
the business then and the the key pillars of revenue.
Because one of the reasons I created an event or one of the
reasons that I get one of the things I get asked most is like,
yeah, but how do you make money in digital, which is why I
create an event called that you must get asked that all the time
as well. So can you just talk us through
your different pillars of revenue where you generate
income? Yeah.
So we do four things. We're called Spirit Studios
because we run a number of different studios, which are
essentially different disciplines in the business.
So we make television, we call it originals.
I think that's becoming more of the norm now.
And originals really is sort of longer form single or serialized
content that can sit on a broadcaster, can sit on a
streamer, it can even sit obviously on YouTube.
So we make originals we then and in that and in that department,
we were predominantly known for comedy for a long time, but now
we make a lot of documentary. This year, I think we are, we're
going to be doing, we've got a big order on true crime this
year. We are doing a lot of weekly
shows for Channel 5. We're doing drama.
We we're entering into reality this year.
And so the business on the television side is, is growing,
but it's growing in, in the new world.
And I'll come back to that in a minute.
We then make podcasts. We produce a number of podcasts,
but again, podcasts are shows that are becoming the new
television in some ways. And and we have a a multi camera
studio with a team that is really knowledgeable across
digital and television. We have, you know, we've
invested in a set studio with multiple sets and, and all that
and all that stuff so that we can produce end to end quality
visualized podcasts day in day out.
And we also do post production in house for that as well.
We even do the online that allows us to sort of that allows
us to be really cost effective, but to also change the business
deal with the broadcaster. And I'll come back to that in a
minute as well. Then we make brand new content.
We do a lot of brand new content.
We work with third party agencies and we do a lot in the
sports arena, in football and in Formula One.
And then the 4th studio is we run a number of YouTube
channels. So we've got round about 500
YouTube channels and growing in our multi channel network.
So that's distribution, that's digital distribution.
And so for us there we are working with third party
producers like exploiting all catalogues.
We're working with people that create original content.
We obviously have a number of our own channels in that, in
that MCN and we have we have channel managers that help us
grow those channels, get them into monetization.
And and then obviously it's run like a professional network.
And for anyone that doesn't understand what a multi channel
network is on YouTube, it is a professionally run network of
YouTube channels. There's not many of them in the
world. We are very lucky to be one of
the few. 50. Others about 50 of us yeah yeah
we Little dot everyone on there who Little dot are are the
biggest in the UK if not the world and they are a phenomenal
business one of all three biggest businesses.
We hadn't really ever thought about doing that even though we
had the the the functionality and the capability because we
were producer. But as we really move now, as
the industry rapidly changes, we see ourselves having to be able
to do all of it. Really, you've got to be able to
do production through to distribution to be a real one
stop shop of the future. You know, our ambition really is
to be a is to be a next generation super indie and even
a destination in the end where we could be the hub that people
come to watch spirits content. Could we reinvent the sort of
the, you know, the, the streamer model and, and be a one stop hub
for everything we do? And so those 4 studios, they
sort of feed into each other in lots of ways.
And then obviously now there's the vertical content world
that's come along, right? So you could say it's a fifth
studio. We're doing micro drama.
We're also about to start in reality in that space.
And that space really has come along.
And it's really like, I don't think anyone ever saw that to,
you know, saw that come in. And that's, that's sort of like
come, I remember once working with a, a mental health expert
on our IM hole, a mental health brand.
And he, we were talking about how when people have breakdowns
and it's when they let their problems stack up like a imagine
like a stack of pancakes. And then all these problems
build up. And if you don't keep on top of
your problems, if you don't keep that sort of self-care and all
that, then eventually you'll have a stack and then something,
a juggernaut will come from nowhere and knock it over.
And that's why people have like these meltdowns.
And that's pretty much what I've seen.
A vertical drama, like the industry's gone.
Shit, that's fucked. That's Oh no.
Oh, and then all of a sudden this come along and bang, and
then even the streamers are gone.
What? And and so you're seeing this
thing explode, generating billions and billions of
dollars, being one of the like wildfire across devices.
And then what we're seeing now is like the streamers and the
social platforms all rush to try and get in on this market.
And then if you look at now at like a Netflix, Netflix has like
really high end super like films and amazing series.
It has podcasts now that we're seeing them really go into the
market on it's got mobile games and verticals come in.
And so really like the future is this sort of one stop
entertainment hub and which is about retaining that customer
all day long and giving them the best value for their
subscription money. And so no wonder they've rushed
to add verticals to it. And so as a, as a business, we
do those 4 disciplines or there's five things.
But actually IP 360 is our, is our business model.
And it has been for a long time, but it really makes more sense
now than it's ever made before. And people actually understand
what we do because I think for a long time people didn't really
understand what we we were saying these words and they were
like, what IP? What?
But IP 360 really means that you can create a brand that can
serve its purpose as a linear show.
It can serve its purpose sit on a streamer, it can go onto
YouTube, it can go as a podcast, it could be a drama.
You know, it can do lots of different things all at the same
time because audiences are, we are in an attention war.
Like it's, you know, the attention economy is, is all
anyone's talking about. And us as users have been pulled
in so many different directions that actually like what you're
going to do is hit them with your brand everywhere they are.
And that's what we do and that's our aim.
And so our business models changed.
We still, we still do commissions obviously like you
know, like we are here to build revenue.
That's what that's how business works.
But at the same time we we also want to work with and are
working with a number of broadcaster, streamers, content,
finance talent to build always on three to five year builds.
We're we're looking long term like how do we create a brand
that can turn into a big juggernaut?
You know, you look at The Lion Whisperer now, our biggest, it's
been going for 12 years. It's huge.
It's done billions of views. It's got millions of followers
and subscribers. It it's it's own business.
And so for us, what we're doing now is working with lots of
partners. We've managed to unlock that
world because people now see us as that future production
company that really has a safe pair of hands that goes OK, We
know we've seen you do this for the last 15 years.
We know that if we invest our money in you, you're going to
you're going to return on it. So what is it about creating
that IP? What you know, how can you tell
what IP to create that's going to live across all those
platforms? Well, you can't.
You can't. What you can't do is just stick
your finger in the air. Pick an idea and, and go with
and go with it and hope for the best because there are lots of
factors that change the shape of what works all the time.
And I'll give you an example of what I mean by that is like a
couple of years ago, we had some big insight that creators were
starting to really work in the podcasting space.
And, and that food was an area that lots of brands wanted to be
in and to sponsor and to spend money in, but wasn't very well
served. And so there's a, there's a gap
there in the market, right? And so we launched a couple of
projects in that space and really popular with its
audience, really high retention rates, but couldn't get them to
break out. And then and then within that 12
months of that of that, of that show not really getting to the
levels that we wanted it to, you get new insight, which is we've
seen now that the podcasting space has become so crowded that
only really big names work. So names that are really massive
broadcasters that you've spent years listening to their voices
maybe as radio stars or as chat show hosts, They're the ones
that have only got the real chance of breaking through.
And So what you see there is a maturity in the podcasting thing
where podcasting has become like ATV chat show now.
And actually it's become so mainstream that it's it's, it's
sort of really similar to television.
And then you see that actually. Podcasting has suddenly flipped
like that within 12 months to being more consumed on YouTube
than any other platform. And so now your monetization
models changed because previously it was all about
listens and listens would give you a higher CPM would so cost
per thousand listens would be would be more than in video.
And so you would operate in a way that would allow would,
would, would mean that your show would do lots of different
things in audio in order to make more money.
But now you've been hijacked by by YouTube, which is a longer,
slower burn and less money, right, until you get to a real
scale. And so you've got to change all
the time that we call it the moving sands of digital, right.
And so going back to your question, how do you pick a
project? It's really difficult.
What, what you've got to do I think is look at, well, let's
look at, let's take a good example, right.
So we've, it's been announced we, we are doing a joint venture
project with Hearst. So we work with Hearst a lot.
We make a lot of true crime documentaries for them.
But we really wanted to launch something in the history space
because we know that history is really big.
I think a big Evergreen subjects are a way you can build legacy
and brand in digital. And so with Hearst, we wanted to
work out what could we do in the history space that felt really
different. And so we went to Hearst and we
said, how do you fancy investing in a brand with us?
And, you know, they were really excited by that.
And actually you've seen they've launched their their YouTube
canvas project as well, which is going to do a suite of their own
IP in the same way. And so it was really good
timing, but part of the part of part of the sort of puzzle there
is. And I can't wait for people to
see what we're going to launch because I think it's really,
really exciting because it's actually sort of slightly more
entertaining. But it's a really big broad
subject. And it came with some real
specific insight that we felt would would be the key to
unlocking the audience. This because we know there's a
huge amount of search online for what, for what we're doing.
And So what we've got with them is a project that has a, a
legacy business that knows how to monetise history already.
We've got ATV channel, Sky history that is willing to do a
first look on any TV output from the brand.
So you remember, the brand isn't just digital.
The, the brand is digital plus linear or streaming.
So it's, it's originals plus digital.
And so from, from word from the from day one, we can launch
something that is a weekly show that builds, you know, a
consistent audience and has that consistent weekly content that
people love that they can watch and listen to and engage with
the different places. But then that brand as it
builds, can also go off and do multiple TV series at the same
time. And, and, and so like, because
there's that Venn diagram of sky history, us and Hearst, it means
that right from from the get go, there's an inbuilt audience what
we're doing. So I think you have to factor in
lots of thinking about when you launched the mink of what I
would really discourage people for doing is just go in like,
oh, I've, I've met some, I've met someone that really wants to
launch a thing and let's give it a go because you can spend a
long, long time just treading water.
And you also need patience. That's the other big thing I've
said to it. I've already said it a few
times, three to five years, like don't think think long term ATV
series might be a few episodes. These days it's 4 episodes if
you're lucky. But but in digital you've got to
think of like three to five year builds.
Because what what you do in digital, when you understand how
it works is that you, you change path constantly and you iterate
and you optimize and you, you get feedback and you see what's
working and what's not working and you tweak the system until
you get the engine really, really purring and.
It compounds over time, doesn't it?
In terms of the amount of content, you're building more
and more content in that library.
Your views never go down. Obviously you're you know it's
only ever going to go one way. Starts once you start creating
content. It's Atomic Habits.
Have you ever read Atomic Habits by James Clear?
Oh, there's a brilliant, I think it's one of the biggest
newsletters in the world, 321. I recommend that to anyone
that's watching or listening to this.
Go and go to James Clear's website.
He wrote a book called Atomic Habits, which essentially works
for anything in life. It can work for fitness, it can
work for business health. If you do, if you have, if you
build a habit into your life, you do the same thing every day.
You don't see the difference on a daily basis.
It's built against the gym, isn't it?
Yeah, I've, I've never done more than two days in a row, so I
wouldn't know what happens when you compound work in the gym.
I know what happens when you compound drinking every day.
But atomic habits are that thing of like essentially it's tiny
little atoms. Every day you're collecting
atoms and then after a year or two years or however long it
takes, that atomic explosion happens.
And that's when you get that real lift off.
And I would say private parts was, there's a, there's a graph
on the private parts podcast chart from years ago where for
the first year, I look back at it often it's the hockey stick
effect. It like did nothing for the 1st
12 months. And then in the January the year
afterwards, it suddenly went so steep and it was like all of a
sudden that that that you said compounded interest is.
Was, was that because of presumably that was because of
all the learnings, all the episodes that you've been
tweaking and tweaking and tweaking.
Then maybe one of those caught light, right?
And and and really hit the spot and then then obviously the
catalog starts to hit the spot as well.
Remember I could, I could give you a real world example of how
it happened. So when we first started it used
to be Jamie and Francis and they were it was 2 friends.
This is Jamie Lang. Jamie Lang, the Francis Ball and
they X-Men in Chelsea stars and they would talk each week about
their diary. So they would talk about what
they've been doing during that week and there'd be funny
moments and then they would talk about really funny old things.
And then and then they started realizing that the thing that
people liked on social media was when they started talking about
their awkward dating, sex, kissing, all that.
All that's kind of like funny. The sordid secrets.
That's why it was called Private Parts.
It was sort of like the stuff that you'd write in a diary, but
you wouldn't say out loud. And they realized that those are
those are the bits that were really taking off.
And then we had a producer, Pete Strauss.
You remember Pete join us. Pete was was also working on our
comedy slate. So Pete was who I developed the
stand up sketch show with and Pete started obsessed with stand
up, always going to stand up. So he suggested that we started
getting stand up comedians in as guests.
Now we started with the stand ups that were on the circuit
that we could get that fancy coming along and meeting Jamie
and Francis. Then bit by bit the word spread.
This is the compound compounding.
Bit by bit the word spread that this was a really funny podcast
to come on. So the names started getting
bigger and bigger and bigger. And so eventually we were having
really big comedian names on the show and the show became a
comedy hit. And then that was the moment
where it suddenly took off, because then we were getting big
name comedians with big social fan bases that would come on the
show and we could create really funny clips.
And that's interesting going back to the learning there is
that looking at digital first, as you know, a lot of people are
are now looking at, you know, the commissions have dried up,
all that advertising revenues gone into social video, no more
commissions. Where do we go?
Let's look at digital. Lots of people seem to be doing
well in digital. It's not the lifeboat or it's
not the immediate replacement for that loss of income, is it?
I think that's really important to.
Say, I think if you ran into the digital house, you'd be like,
yeah, what? Someone throw me some arm bands.
That's what I said earlier on. You've got to, you've got to,
you've got to kind of it's, it's an entrepreneurial play, yeah.
And you've got to, you've got to like, you've got to understand
that it, it's one of those things that takes time.
If, if you, if you are entrepreneurial and you, and you
understand about building business, then you have a one
year, a three-year, A5 year, 10 year strategy that changes all
the time. You, you re, you know, you re
update your, your strategy, but you have like, you have these
missions and these goals and you have a North Star.
Digital's the same thing. And so don't create something,
put it out and expect it to catch on fire.
I mean, don't get me wrong, we've launched things that have,
but they're an anomaly and they're difficult.
You know, that's sort of like, that's like creating a number
one hit. You know, I think I do.
It's a bit like a record business.
Think of the record business, right?
Look at how many recording artists don't make it and then
how many do. That's digital, Yeah.
And, and so as you've got, it's a mindset change.
It's also a mindset change in the money as well.
Commissioning that the traditional world is B to B1,
business pays another. The digital world is B to C It's
direct to consumer. It's business to consumer.
It's you are, you have to get your heads around.
Lots of little, little, little pockets of money, you know,
thousands of little pockets of money there rather than one big
take paycheck, isn't it? And it's, and you know, the,
the, the key to this is as you say, direct to consumer.
It's about becoming the broadcaster yourself.
You won't, that's the thing. Building that community and, and
creating the community around the content that you're that
you're, that you're creating. Look at Go Hanger.
I mean, what an incredible story.
Yeah, Go Hanger. Brilliant.
Absolutely brilliant. I'm so pleased with them.
Like they have built something that has come through pure
passion. You know, the rest is history.
I think was one of their first. It's coming through pure passion
of, you know, you know, and and obviously, like they've got Gary
alike and the rest is football. And like that's you know, it
really does help to have that Halo effect.
But they've built something that are they they really know their
niches. Don't know.
They really know their niches so well and they're really good at
finding their talent that are going to front their shows.
And then, I mean, they don't need anyone else because now
what they're doing is what the future is, is what we're doing.
You, you own your own IP and then you sell it to the
broadcasters or the streamers. Yeah, yeah.
What's their deal with? What's their deal with Netflix?
10 million or something? Yeah, and there's licensing,
it's live events. The the they're doing a big show
at the on the South Bank, aren't they?
I think this year, later on this year with a number of their
their formats. Yeah, it's very, very clever
play. So, so would you say then as you
said, it's a longer term play, it's a more entrepreneurial
play. Do you think there is a risk of
some businesses jumping feet first into this without really
the you know, without that you can spend a lot of money quite
quickly, can't you, in digital? You, you, we're already seeing
it. Yeah, we're already seeing it.
And it's and it's, you've got to find a Yeah, that's my yeah, but
that worries me. You're going to see, you're
going to see a lot of, you're going to see a lot of money
wasted and and a lot of unfortunate.
What's the word like? I think it's going to put people
off because if they don't get instant, everyone's used to
instant success. You get a Commission, it's
gratification, you've done it, it's an instant win and it's big
money. Well, not anymore, but you know,
at one point it was unless you're high end TV.
And so like if you if you go if you go 2 two feet first into
digital and you run at it and you put and you hire a load of
people to do it, you're going to waste money real quick.
You've got to what you've got to do is find a way of investing in
it. So it feels like to begin with
like a business passion project. I think that's probably unless
look, once you're establishing what you're doing, then great,
like all the big investment because you know what you're
doing right. But even if we've even now
spirit after 15 years, we, we, we can raise significant
investment to build digital projects because we're a safe
pair of hands. But we wouldn't, we wouldn't
ever spend the money in a stupid way.
We'd still, we still go lean and mean and build things minimal
viable products. You've heard that a million
times because the things fail and things don't catch fire.
And finding that that real hit isn't the easiest thing to do.
It's the record label model, you know, like you turn up the
investment once you know, you've seen real science, but don't go
into this investing in it in a big way.
Try and find a way of of doing it cheaply and learning and
seeing how you know, like what I love the most about the business
at the moment. And the business has been
through so many different iterations over the years.
But what I love about the business at the moment is that
everyone in the office is so excited about growth.
We keep, I keep saying to me, it's funny how like Linear's
managing decline, Digital's managing growth and every day
on, on the, the group chats across all the different
projects, you can see people feeding in graphs and new
milestones being hit and the new figures go up on the board and
like, and ah, we've just hit monetization or, you know, it's
exciting. It's what it's watching
something, it's watching your baby grow and it's, and it's
seeing that success. And then that kind of, I always
had right at the very, very beginning this like this sort of
dream that the, the white coats would meet with the creatives
once a week. And now it happens.
I mean, they don't wear white coats.
So that's basically like the distribution team who's
overseeing the thumbnails and the, and the titles and the the
SEO and the discoverability and the launch process and all of
that coming together and feeding back to the creative teams to
say, you know what we did on that last episode, It's
interesting. It's that it's back to you said
the red button when you when you were back at end of morning
saying a bit that actually worked.
Yeah, it's kind of the same, right?
It's exactly the same that that was the bit where, you know, I'd
spent years in live, live TV being a studio director.
And, and then when I took that job at Endemol, that was the
first time that I'd started seeing results, audience
interaction and an audience feedback on content because that
doesn't really exist on. We didn't exist before social
media. And so like, yeah, so now like
the team, I mean, I mean, I say they mean weekly.
They, they, they talk all the time.
Like throughout the day they're talking.
In fact, just before I came here today, we were chatting about,
we were talking about one of the shows that we make for Channel 5
catching up with the Royals about how there's one bit that's
become really, really big with the audience.
And we're getting like tons of emails and comments and like
interaction comes from all over the place, the engagement.
And so this week that, you know, we've got a recording on
Wednesday and they're going to double down on on Part 1 on read
on doing more of that particular thing.
And so like, because they know that when they clip that out, it
works and it builds and they know that they're getting
subscribers off the back of it. And so like, that's the kind of
thing that like you can't do in in television, which don't get
me wrong, I love making telly. Like it's brilliant being able
to work on on a really big project and, and you know, and
have that kind of level of budget, but the one thing you
don't get Intel is that instant feedback and you can't change
anything instantly. Well, now, interestingly, the
the vertical content world, right, those apps have AI behind
them. And so if one of the micro drama
films isn't performing well or drops off at a certain episode
point, they can re edit and re upload and try and keep the
audience the audience for longer.
That's in, that's. The idea of picture lock doesn't
exist in the digital world, which isn't what's free, what's
really freeing, isn't it? And it's, and it's just
listening to what the audience says and like, and, and creating
content for them that you know, that they're that they're
commenting on and they're feeding back on.
And like, you know, like having there's so much to keep up with
algorithms you have to keep up with.
Like in, I don't know if you've seen, but Instagram now have
changed their algorithms from highly edited clips.
Like we've all sort of seen, you know, a lot of our trailers for
our pods have, you know, like are sort of really dynamic and
have lots of graphics and music and they they hooky, you know,
but they are de prioritising those edits and they're moving
more towards selfie video people being authentic and telling you
what's coming up on this week's show and actually talking to you
like a human because I suppose because of the rise of AI.
But and and so you've got to keep on top of that all the
time. That changes.
Yeah. So finally then before we go
into Story of the Week, what does the next phase of Spirit
Studios look like? Then you've talked about you're
in branded content, you're in podcasts, you're in traditional
TV, you're in 360 creating those brands right across for every
every platform. You're in micro drama, other
vertical video projects. What's next?
Then what's what's what? What really interested me is
what you said about the Super indie and building a super indie
of the future in this sort of digital space.
I mean, is that is that, is that the future?
Is that what you're absolutely focused on and what does that
look like? Yeah, Yeah.
That is, I think that is an that is our sort of definitely our
North Star is. I think what you'll see us do
over the next few years is build out multiple brands that you see
everywhere and lots of them. Some will work, some won't work,
but really doubling down on that.
We are building more and more into scripted because I, I, I do
think that spirit has a part to play in high end TVI do I, I
kind of feel like what we're doing is creating IP that we can
scale to global success. That doesn't always have to be
like premium, high end, premium content at the at the scale
version of it. It could be that could be just a
podcast that the world loves. But as we move more into
scripted with our with our production capabilities, I think
we've got a real opportunity there because it's moving into
the formats that we know that really entertain people and, and
it's the lean back and the lean forwards.
And so if our future, I think I would say that in the next three
to five years you will see us build more brands.
You will see us move into a bigger studio environment that
has VR capability and allows us to do more as a business in a in
a self constrained studio environment.
And then maybe there'll be some rolling up of some other
businesses to, to, to, to be able to facilitate doing more of
that and to own more of that market.
But could the future, I don't know, this is really future goes
in, but like, would we become whatever the whatever the
version of the streamer is in the first place in the in the
future, you know, whether that's an app or whatever it is,
whatever that whatever form that takes.
Could there be a thing where spirit starts making sense of a
certain particular genre or a certain type of entertainment or
something? And that literally has the all
those different versions that we just talked about within that,
within that space. I think that's what's really
exciting. Like we're working on some
really, really exciting projects at the moment that do drama,
true story, podcasting, lots of digital social spin off, all
under 1 brand from a launch. That's one of the big projects
we're working on at the moment. And like that just feels super
exciting to me. And that feels like the future
where you you see this content everywhere, Everything,
Everywhere, all of the time. So finally, we're going to go
into story of the week, which is something obviously we do every
week on the show, which is essentially ATV or a content
industry story that's caught your eye in the past seven days,
Matt, So what's your story of the week?
Well, it's got to be Saturday Night Live UK because I think
that's the thing that everyone's talking about and I get the
feeling we're going to disagree on this.
Well, we might. I.
So you love it, don't you? Well, well, no.
What I'm going to say is that I am really impressed with the
launch. I'm going to be honest, I
thought the trailers and the promos weren't brilliant and I
thought, I didn't think. In fact, I think it was more my
wife, who's like not in the industry says I don't know
what's that shit? I don't know what that is, what
it means or what it's about. And I think that makes a lot of
sense. It's just a bunch of comedians
that running down the street on a Saturday night out.
There was maybe the assumption that people knew about what the
SNL brand was. Right, which is?
You know which many people do, but I think lots of people don't
as well, you know? I think I don't, I doubt that
the young age, I doubt a lot of people under 30 do, because it
feels like it's something that, like you, we only know about it
in the UK through social media really, because the sketches go
viral and we know there's a legacy brand and we might have
seen it here and there, clips here and there.
But it's not something that's on here, is it?
That you can watch all the time. And so anyway, I I had AI had a
vested interest because it's got some ex stand up sketch of
talent in it in different roles on screen and behind the scenes.
And so like I'm really pleased for them that they're getting a
really big break and there's a lot of eyes on this project.
I thought Tina Fey was an interesting, I mean, it's kind
of like passing the baton. Like that's what I felt like
that Lorne Michaels executive felt you can fit, you can feel
the heritage on it. So it felt like it had a lot of
America's backing and blessing. And then I was like, oh man,
because like the first time I saw it is like great bunch of
talent, but quite young because American American talent,
they're like all different ages, right?
I was like, it's quite a young talent base.
Am I going to be, am I going to be able to take them seriously
doing the political satire and all that?
But you know what, like Sunday morning, my socials were full of
all the sketches and I looked, when I looked at the SNL
Instagram account first thing in the morning, it was under 10K
followers. I don't know.
The last time I looked, it was 28 yesterday, like it was
rapidly growing. And then I read last night that
Donald Trump had shared the the Kier Starmer sketch.
And and then you kind of go like, actually, there's a lot
riding on this. But to pull off a live sketch
show for 75 minutes on a weekly basis is no mean feat.
That's really I've anyone that doesn't has never done works in
live. I mean, it's, it's really hard
to do that. Yeah, but they've got no
shortage of budget, have they? Let's face it, I mean, this is.
Like, you know. Huge, huge broadcaster and this
is for them a premium, premium products.
I mean, you imagine the politics getting this together, you know,
first of all, just like what's funny to Americans and what's
funny to Brits, right? That's one thing that separates
us is common language and and sense of humour.
But in most cases, but I don't know, I mean, I think it got
viewing figures for about 250,000, I think, which is
pretty good at beat Channel 4, which you would imagine with the
amount of, you know, a new launch and the amount of, you
know, hype around the show. I don't know.
I mean, I, you know, for me it's like that's, that's really
interesting to see what that drop off is next week.
Yeah, I agree with that. I don't.
I don't disagree with what you're saying, but those are the
reasons why everyone thinks it would fail because it because
it's too big. It's it's, it feels ridiculous.
It feels like the most ridiculous Commission you've
heard of in this state of the industry.
Well, it begs the question, why? Well, I think Sky are going
through some big changes, aren't they?
They're owned by the company that makes SNL in America.
So there's a legacy thing there. There's there's a globalization
of content. There's social media at play.
I keep banging on about it. IP 360, I think SNL is one of
the original IP 360 brands. Like they've got an opportunity.
Yes, it's expensive, but they've got an opportunity to build
something here that's never been done before in the UK because
we've seen so many of these late shows try and fail.
Do you remember that run years ago that ITV did on a weekly
night and they had different each week, they had a different
host take on five nights. For some reason, we don't.
We like, for some reason, we all sort of want to like the Late
Show in the UK. Like we all watch clips of all
the late, late shows from America and all that stuff, but
they just don't seem to land because we're, well, maybe
there's not enough money to be able to do it justice or there's
not enough guests. Maybe America's just a much
bigger place, right? So like here, the site that that
you know, you'd be recycling things all the time, guests,
stories, all that kind of stuff where in America it can run and
run and run. But but Saturday Night Live we,
I think, I think John is, I think it's just I, I just
expected to see the opposite in terms of the results.
And what I saw was people going, Oh my God, that was amazing.
Well done. Lots of teething problems.
Like you could tell there's a even Tina Fey I thought was a
bit nervous at the beginning, like her monologue, you know,
it's a new thing, everyone. The pressure of that is, is
really big. But as you said, they've spent a
lot of money. There's a really brilliant
writing team on it, really brilliant production team,
really great set. And you know, the live team
where, where's the training ground for live these days?
And yet they executed it brilliantly.
I mean, there was some really good moments in it.
Whether or not every sketch worked or not sort of irrelevant
for me. It's kind of like, that's a good
start. It's a really good start.
And it's now been extended to I think 8 episodes.
Isn't it from six? So and Peacocks bought it.
So distributions working already and that will have come already
off people seeing rehearsal tapes and all that stuff, you
know, And so like, I don't know, as you said, there's a lot of,
there's a lot of money to, there's a lot of money there to
fill in terms of recoup, recoupment.
But it, it does put Sky on the map and Sky, now we're doing
these, I mean, Sky is starting to do these bundles with Netflix
and everything. I mean, there's a lot, you know,
there's a lot more to play. They're they're sort of, there's
been the talks about them and ITV there's, there's like,
there's a lot to play for. Like if you're going to compete
at the top, go big or go home. Yeah.
Well, that's a good, good point
to end on then. Matt, thank you for coming on
telecast. It's been great having a chat in
your studio, which is which is great and you're great
production team who will always look after us.
So thank you for that. And, and what's what's next?
What's what's next out of the gate for you?
Then just as a what's the next new project that we're going to
see on socials or on a podcast or, or vertical or what's the
next thing to to look out for from Spirit?
Sally Lindsay's A Night In with Sally Lindsay Comes starts next
week. Channel 5, right, launches next
Wednesday. All right, fantastic.
We'll we'll take a look at that. So Matt, thanks again and all
the best with spirit. Yeah.