Without further ado, Factual Futures.
As I say, it's a bit of a staple of the of the event and we've
got some fantastic panellists to talk us through that and and our
moderator is Lucy Smith from Forks Digital.
So please welcome the panel to the stage.
So film your documentary on an iPhone, put it on YouTube and
make loads of money? Yeah.
Is it that simple? I am Lucy Smith, founder of
Forbes Digital Here to stay, a discussion around the evolution
of factual content and formats in the digital sphere, and I'm
joined by Titans in the genre. You're sitting in the different.
Are you sitting in the right order?
Yes. So Garrett Kemming, founder and
MD of channel operator, digital distributor and Commissioner
Quintus Studios. We have Marvin Benoit, former
commissioning Editor at Sky Originals and creative executive
for YouTube Originals and now founder of Baker's Dozen
Studios. And we have Jamie McDonald
development Don spearheading format development as head of
originals at After Party Studios.
So Bravo, pause, leave the guys. Good evening.
So we all know it's not quite as simple as just clicking upload
and then rolling in the Benjamins.
So I'm here to like at least say some of the myths to be good to
get the experts, experts opinions on this.
So Garrett at Quintus, you've spent years growing an audience
on your YouTube channel, and I think this is a theme that we
want to touch on throughout the conversation.
Is that like what is who delivers value here?
Is it people who own audience or people who own IP?
How do those two worlds interact So you're serving them with both
acquired and Quintus original Fractual content on your
channels? Why is owning an audience so
crucial to your business model? What it probably depends on what
you are, what you want to do. You can make money by for this
thing. You can make money by owning, by
by being a channel or being a distribution company.
We decided to be all of it because well, it's probably the
question where we come from. We come from being a distributor
and working in traditional television.
And for a long time we were also in the business of financing
productions like linear productions and especially
documentary series. And we did this by by going out
there with paper, paper pictures and finding pre sale money you
you needed like 5567 years ago, you needed like 3-4 partners to
be really able to fund the program that way.
And then saying from 2:20 on, it just took so long to get like 4
people on board or four companies on board.
And what it became more or less impossible to do so because when
you are #3 or 4 in the deal, number one was already either
merging with somebody else or budget freeze or out of the game
or whatever. So we decided, well, we not
decided, but we recognize our own chance in the meantime grew
so much that we can replace one or two or maybe even three of
them. And that was a lot more fun game
because we were, you know, we could decide ourselves what we
want to do. And yeah, that's why I think
it's for us, it was very important that we that we had
our own audience or still have it, because we can simply run
our own machine without being dependent on other players.
And so your audience becomes your main revenue driver, of
course, in that sense. I mean, Marvin, as a production
studio, you're coming at it from obviously a very different
angle. You partner with creators and
digital channels to get your new IP in front of their audiences.
So would you say creators are the new broadcasters?
And if so, how do you get your shows on their channels?
Yeah, As you said, you know, I come from it from a different
background, you know, tradition and tradition.
Traditional TV, you'd go to a commissioner, you'd pitch an
idea. If they liked it, they'd invest
in it and then you'd see it on TV on the screens, which would
made it, I guess when the strategy turns to bigger, fewer,
better, because the scale and the ambition of those ideas have
to compete with, you know, the global big series.
Like, you know, the shows that you might see, you know, a
squid, Squid Games, the the game show.
You know, that obviously is a huge show that takes so much
resources. And so how many shows of that,
how many, how many of those shows can a Channel 4 or BBC do
over the year? So those opportunities to try
out new formats become far and fewer between.
So I think the online community, there's, there's an opportunity
there to connect to audiences who are undeserved on
traditional TV and those communities, those, those
audiences are completely engaged with those creators.
And you know, those creators don't want to lose IP.
They don't want to lose the opportunity and the audience
that they've made. So but they're, they're
screaming for ideas. They're screaming for, you know,
ambitious ideas and innovation. And I feel like that's an
opportunity to use my skills in coming up with ideas that I
would do for Netflix or BBC and trying to work with, you know,
broadcasters that are willing to invest on these platforms and
working with creators who want to talk to the global majority.
Yeah, I mean that that feeds into my next question actually
for Jamie, which is like if creators are coming up with
their own ideas all the time and are creating their own format
already, like what's the point of a production company?
Fair enough. Family.
Yeah, there is none yeah, that is that is a that is a fair
question. Well, I guess obviously not all
creators are created equal in that sense.
And it's like, you know, when you when you are talking about
some of the biggest ones in the game, EG the sidemen like we
are, we do work with them as a production company because we
bring expertise in certain things.
For example, the sidemen match, we've been the production
partner for the past four years. It's something that we do very
well. And as Victor was saying
earlier, it's not necessarily something they do.
So so they bring us in in in that sense and it's sort of
horses courses. It's there are lots of creators
who want to do stuff on their channel forever and ever Amen
and want to do it alone and like fair enough.
They are not invited to our Christmas party sort of idea.
But there are many out there who maybe want to pivot, do
something slightly different, want to do something bigger.
Lots of them. Very few of them, I would argue
are one man bands like smaller ones for sure.
They do have one or two people, lots of them.
But if they're wanting to do a bigger show, then often they are
coming to a production company for your expertise or we have
the piece of IP like sharing IP, like we announced a show we're
at MIP that we're splitting with a that we're working with one of
EU KS biggest talents, Nella. That is an idea where it's like,
you know, two parties coming together to, you know, make
yourself bigger than the sum of your parts would be our
argument. Whether they agree.
That is obviously a different killer fish.
We're splitting IPS up to a massive part of that.
And if it's OK just to throw to you guys and talk a little bit
about that, like with with new business models and people
thinking about how to get new format IP commissioned and out
in front of audiences, like is it more important than ever to
think about splitting IP in imaginative ways?
Marvin, maybe you could speak to that.
Me and Jamie and after party have split IP.
So we we've created don't get catfished, which is on 4 point
O. And it's been a great
collaboration of using the innovation of like the
experience that you guys have in wealth of working with creators
and, and, and the productions and the way we, the, the speed
of which we are listening to the audience and collaborating.
And I'm bringing in my experience working in broadcast
and it's a beautiful thing. It feels like what we're doing
feels fresh. And the audience are responding
as well. They're like engaged and
they're, they're seeing the, the work that we put in.
They they're seeing that the format feels different to what
they're used to, but still feels, I hate the word
localization, but when I say localization, what I really
mean, it's not just about like changing language.
It's about a culture. It's about like cut cuts and the
way it looks, it feels like it belongs on that Channel and it's
for that audience and they accept it and there's a real
time reaction to it. And that's important.
You know, I think there's something that actually all
broadcasters can take note of and say actually we should be
playing in this field. Well, it's also, yeah, as an
industry, I'm sure everyone here talking to everyone is getting a
sense of that just collaborative energy that seems to be infusing
this sector as is growing. And I think that definitely
feeds into the tone of the content, which feels optimistic
and fun and playful, you know, both behind the camera and in
front as well. I mean, Garrett, obviously you
you Commission new content as well.
Like, do you have interesting models where you're splitting IP
with the people you're working with?
Yeah, splitting IP is a bit difficult game for us because
we're from Germany and you might have heard that there's some.
Bureaucracy. Problems sometimes in Germany.
So that means splitting IP is really difficult because you
wouldn't need to set up your own like complete company and asset
for each Co production that you would that you do where you
split IP. But what we do is that we work
in different ways with producers together.
So what we usually do is so at MO creative director sitting
somewhere in the audience and there he is.
And so he he built up this amazing cool of like really
talented and highly skilled film makers and and and VJ's that are
all over the planet and they know what's working for us or
what kind of topic buckets. And whenever they have access to
a story that they think would fit for us, they reach out to
Adam and him says, yes, let's go for it.
And then what we do is we usually cover their real hard
cost so that there is no margin, there is no, no like camera
equipment that they put that they own but put in the in the
calculation. So that's not what we could do.
But what we do is we offer our channel network and the the
potential of generating money. Same for our linear and and and
and digital global distribution. And of all money that we make,
we give up to 25%. Cut to the police.
And that's the power of owning the audience, right?
Because then you have that you have that option going forward.
I mean, actually talk, talk about the money.
I mean, we all want to make money, right?
You know, as individuals, as companies.
That's how how we grow this industry.
And Garrett, you are creators, publishers, commissioners.
What factual genres make the most money for you and why?
Well, good question. So I shouldn't know my data.
Well, I mean, so it's so that how you make money is actually
on the one hand, the reach, of course, but then also where in
which territories you have what kind of reach, right?
Because that determines again, the CPM.
Like if you, if you have a big audience in the US, you make a
lot more money. Or if you have a small audience
in the US, you make more money than having a big audience in
the Philippines, for example, right.
So it depends on which stories work where.
But I think for us, what is definitely one that works well
is engineering, for example, nature is a good one.
And then just because of of the of the the vast interests, it's
always what we call a danger porn, which is like gangs and
beckons and drugs and and tough neighborhoods and that kind of
stuff. So different KP is that come
together to make it to make it successful.
I think it was interesting as well thinking about AI and the
discussions we've heard today, like how those danger porn
stories, like they're, they're quite difficult to tell with AI.
If you're getting into real people's hives and that real
jeopardy, like so do you, you're quite confident that that will
stay people holding cameras. After seeing the the session
this this afternoon I'm I'm not confident of anything anymore.
Well you can either doing whatever dangerous things you
want. No health and safety.
And building you can you can be prompted.
I mean there is maybe even good for.
Well, it's interesting as well because obviously you've got
your, you've got your channels, you've got your factual genres
that perform really well, but also you're commissioning
formats, right. It's a new game you're you've
been experimenting with over the last few years.
And I know that one format in particular.
And the Green Deal is really interesting one to talk about.
It's like a flavour of Dragons Den for sustainable business.
Like how do you intend to grow this series?
How did you go about getting it funded and and kind of what's
the long term vision for a format like that, how you've
exploited? Yeah, In the end, the the
currencies always reach, right. If you have vast reach, then you
will be able to monetize it. And so the question is how do
you get the vast reach? And in this case, it's, and we
heard a lot about this today. It's bringing together big
creators with their existing audiences and find the model
that works for the show that you do, but also for each creator
and for their audiences, right. And if you do the right mix,
bring them together, then in this case together with a German
like DBU, which is a German, it's I would say like
governmental institution that funds sustainable stuff in
combination with that, then brands will be highly interested
or are highly interested in the show.
Finding pots of money, guys, just find pots of money
everywhere. Yeah, that I think that is the
learning from the last 5-10 years, right.
It's not as you said, it's not like going to a broadcaster get
the money, produce it anymore. It's like Co producing, selling
afterwards, third window, second window, own audience finding
brands that funded, finding institutions that funded.
So it is that is the exciting thing, but.
That's literally our job. No, it's like, I think it I we
would have been chatting yesterday over, over a very nice
coffee and and it's like frontier territories for that.
It's like it's Darwinian adapt or die.
You got to go find the money. And I think that scares a lot of
people. But what we've talked about it
quite a bit. I think it's like super exciting
time. Like we bought a fully brand
funded 4 part doc series to to AUK broadcaster and they're
obviously they're like, yes, happy days.
We'll take that free show and it's a but it's a digital play.
So it's like this is this is the future, like all the the days of
1 funding TV is dead. It's it's like film, I would
argue of like patchwork financing.
That's the future, which is which is cool.
It's like it's not the end of the world.
Well, I think a kind of a bottleneck that a lot of
traditional TV production companies had is once they've
pitched it to X number of broadcasters, X number of
commissioner relationships, that kind of idea dies on a hard
drive, doesn't it? So if you pack it away, move on
to the next one. Whereas actually when you
rethink a model to say anyone could be a commissioner, whether
it's a brand or a toys and board or or a governmental body, it
kind of suddenly opens the playing field to getting things
funded in really different, interesting ways.
True, but the the dangers I'd argue for like for certain
brands or or or online. It's not like it's not that
online is where you get like you go to the bottom of the drawer
and pull out the dusty 1 and be like no one had this do do you
fancy it? It's like the online audience in
particular is like Uber discerning.
So they will they will smell a rat or or shit format quick.
And in the end it needs to convince the audience right?
If that so it might be maybe dusty or not.
But. If you're confident that it will
reach an audience, then you can maybe also find a way into it,
producing it, getting it out there to whoever with creators
or with a broadcaster or with a channel like us or you know
going to Jamie and they help you and then do it and then the
money comes later, right. It that is different.
It's of course more risky. It's it's more you need to be
brave and invest into something. But when you're convinced you.
I'm, I'm a believer in that in the investment, you know, the
CPMS are always changing, the negotiation and the dialogue
with these platforms are always changing.
You're going to have to look at the record industry to see when
it died and CDs stopped, there was conversations going on and
now they're happy how much money they're getting.
I mean, the artists themselves have a conversation.
But the truth of the matter is, is there is money out there.
So just get it out there and be, you've got to be in it to win
it. No one wants the BBC to become
blockbusters. Yeah.
Hey, Han, just know, but I think actually, Marvin, it would be a
great point to jump into this conversation about risk, right,
and about who bears the burden of risk when it comes to testing
E formats. And if you as a production
company like so believe in an idea, so believe in a piece of
IP, how do you use digital platforms to test and iterate a
new IP? Is it important to start
thinking about a development process at like as as trialing
IP on social media platforms look?
We, we need to I, I pitch ideas all the time.
Some get stolen, some people tell me no.
The reality is, is I know that I trust my process.
When you've got a good idea, if you believe in it, put your
money where your mouth is. I invest in my own shows.
I invest in my own tape. This is just an opportunity for
us to say, do you know what? I'm going to invest in it and
I'm going to pull it out and the audience are going to tell me
that it's great. And when that audience, when you
build that audience, when you can connect with an audience,
it, you'll see the traction. People will start believing in
something that exists because it's no longer in your brain and
there's an audience that love it and they will connect to it.
So I think it's just about taking innovation and taking
that. I hate the word for it because
it sounds really, you know, but like, it's that golden pillar,
like Sky used to always talk about this, which was like
content, technology, innovation. And, you know, and like, at the
moment, online is where that's at.
That's where it's happening. I feel like this is the
community where we're taking risks, where we are trying new
things. And we don't know where it is,
but you've got to be in it to win it.
You know, like if I had said invest in Bitcoin 20 years ago,
you probably wouldn't have done it, but now you'd be very happy
if you did so. Yeah.
So. Yeah.
It's also, I guess it's a, it's a question of price as well,
right? Because I think digital budgets,
a lot of people in the traditional TV space would look
at digital budgets and walk at them and go, oh, we can't
possibly create a series for 10K.
But like I think people have to be much more innovative in their
funding, their production models to think, how can I make
something as an MVP format, get it out in front of an audience,
test it, iterate it and then grow it into something
potentially bigger budget. I mean, does that speak to your
development processes and how you fund and get content in
front of audiences or not? I would argue not all online
budgets as in taking away streams are small, show us some
opportunities and we as a company be very fortunate to
work with healthy budgets. So I, I things like that is a
myth in in some ways I would argue, yeah, but then you're
just changing your, your production bottle.
You know, it's, it's not quite like, you know, stack them high
and sell them, sell them fast. But like in factual, you know,
we I would arguably say, yes, it's lower than some linear
tariffs, but there there is real ability to make to make good
money, but you are just doing it as A at a much faster pace.
It's like the spirit studios gentleman saying that that sort
of eight week turn around. It's like a catfish that Marvin
and I are doing together. It's like we we're doing that
quick from Commission to to shoot to F1 basically done is
like 6 to 8 six to eight weeks. We should best know that, but
it's. Then then second series is
commissioned before he even went out right?
Yes, that is true. Happy Days is there.
But yeah, I think it you'll be just adapting, adapting with the
times. And like obviously AI is another
Cutlerfish there that I'm not experienced enough to say enough
in, I would argue. Also, I mean there, I mean, I
agree that you guys are fortunate to to work on on like
significant budgets, but there is also and that is a good
thing, right There is the other way.
If you don't get the budget from from another player and you can
still do it and and YouTube is a place, for example, social in
general is a place where it's not all about like being the
highest quality shiny version of yourself, but maybe do it very
authentic. What we heard about is authentic
over but but I still believe it's like there is a difference
and you can do very authentic, very like basic production stuff
that is really. That is really successful and
for us, for example, so we need to decide which genres do we
want to want to go in. We we can't do on the budgets
that we work and we can't do like the big history CGI heavy
kind of documentary. That's not possible.
But excess driven where you can go like camera on your shoulder
and you the story is the is the actual success thing.
Then then it works. So you need to be smart in in
where you put your money, but there are a lot of options
because. Gary, you're arguing that the
online audience care less about the fluff in factual, more to
fluff as in the the shininess in in the factual format, the
Garner. Well, yeah.
Yeah, I mean, that works. It works like the very shiny
documentary works, but at the same time there is a big
audience for that story that you've never seen, no matter if
it's like GoPro produced or mobile produced or like big
camera produced. Yeah.
The the the tools have democratized the points to entry
and then people can experiment and take creativity from their
bedrooms and gain huge audiences and it's a very exciting time.
And it helps. It helps you prove IP very
quickly, right? It helps you prove it quickly
and cheaply without having to rely on a massive budget.
And then it didn't work. And then, well, that's gone.
The issue then being breaking through as as as there was a lot
of there's a lot of as we say there's a lot of Internet
landfill of like stuff that just piped out there and then you
have to work out how you breakthrough which is the issue
which obviously advantage for you Garrett holding having the
taps of like being able to have the distribution platform there
and. That's what we do a lot to to to
produce a pilot, get it out there, get the data, does it
work? Does it not work?
And then have something to show also to broadcasting partners,
for example, and then we do the series.
But I guess also that speaks to you Jamie, talking about the
show with Nella, right? It's like actually she owns an
audience. You're working with her to get
IP in front of her audience. So it's it's thinking very
creatively about how you can access audience with your new
IP. And if that's partnering with
the creator, that's just, you know, it's just a different type
of channel, I guess. Different.
It's like if you want to get an action movie fan, you get Tom
Cruise. It's like it's the same As for
many years before. I guess the danger is though,
that it that audiences don't always port.
I would argue when you take X person from YouTube on to
somewhere else, like 1 needs to be careful about that,
especially in factual, I'd argue.
And it's like authenticity of the person doing what they're
doing. If they're presenting a, you
know, a OBS doc or something, it's like there was some talent
to, I would argue don't, don't transition very well into that.
And I'm interested just kind of going back to the full
monetization of stuff, right? It's because regardless of
whether you've got a healthy budget or a small budget, like
we don't just want our our productions, our factual
productions to live as one series that kind of lives and
dies and doesn't go on to do anything else like it.
Would you say that digital you have to think very differently
about IP and quite imagine to be about IP in terms of taking
punts at the beginning and seeing stuff grow like for
example, like don't get catfished, amazing show,
Presuming you don't want it to just stay as one or two series
on 4.0, Like do you want it to become a big global hit?
Like what? How are you thinking about IP in
a different way? And I think that goes for for
all of you. I'm thinking about it quite
differently in the sense that I'm like, well, what is that
show that with all the bells and whistles?
And then how do I go backwards? How do I turn it into an idea
that can be made on a digital budget?
And like, what are the the parts of that show that could need a
test bed for a format? And I'm, I'm doing that
constantly in terms of all my IP now, in terms of figuring out
what at the heart is the granular about this idea that I
like and where would I love that trajectory to go?
Like if it was to go into Netflix, like we've seen what
the balloon do now, you know, like how how do you do that?
What does it look like? Yeah.
Well, the sound of catfish on Netflix sounds good.
We should, we should discuss it a bit later.
But yeah, for us I think it's like we'd like any sort of
production company. We we're looking to take
anything that we have and leverage it as in many in every
different way that we can, whether that be for a different
platform in English language and Deutsche elsewhere.
It's like for sure that is that is a lot of my time and, and our
CE OS Josh, Josh's time going out and doing that and trying to
push the long tail, so to say of our of our content.
Because as I said, there are big budgets, but all of them are
big. And you know, it is a bit of a,
it's a long term game in, in that sense.
But I think factual is very good for it as opposed to potentially
others, especially in sports. And that's something we've
talked about a bit. It's like sports is a real
growth area. I would argue in factual.
We've got 30 seconds left. So I think you'll probably just
round off with one final question, which is, you know,
digital can feel like a game where no one really knows the
rules, but you have to be in it to win it.
As Marvin said, Like what is the risk for traditional
broadcasters and factual production companies not playing
in this space? Keep it really quick.
We've got 10 seconds. Then I need to think quickly,
which is really difficult for me at least.
So I think they can play their game, go on with that, but it
gets smaller and smaller. So if they want to do so, either
they become the relevant set and they are happy with what they
what the leftover is, or they need to play the new game.
I mean, we're, we're seeing convergence ultimately where
like people are agnostic in terms of like whether they watch
on what platform with whether it's on your mobile phone or
your, you know, your, the TV screen or the tablet.
But I like the idea of like collaborate or evaporate.
Yeah, I like that. That's what you're choosing.
Yeah, I guess I see it like when they had the decision to go from
black and white to color. It's like it's an obvious
decision. They shall do it and they will
evolve. And I'm, I'm confident in that.
Yeah. No, but Darwinism in his best.
I'm here for that energy, right? Well, thank you so much, guys.
Really appreciate it. Chinese, the panel.
Thank you. Thank you.