Speaker 1: I'm off my game today. No, you're not. People are
Speaker 1: going to have to start making better content. I think
Speaker 1: we're gonna be talking about this for a long time.
Speaker 1: When you program for everyone, you program for no one.
Speaker 1: I think it's that we're purpose driven platform, like we're
Speaker 1: trying to get to substance. How was that? Are you
Speaker 1: happy with that? This is marketing therapy right now? It
Speaker 1: really is? What's up? I'm Laura Coarntia and I'm Alexa Kristen.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Atlandia episode seventeen. Did you like that
Speaker 1: at Landia? It was very nice. It's like October. It
Speaker 1: felt very Halloween, Halloween. You like, yeah, that's good. Um,
Speaker 1: So we're not going to get into our usual preamble today.
Speaker 1: It was advertising week last week. Yeah, And I think
Speaker 1: if you want to know our thoughts and opinions, you
Speaker 1: can go over to Atlandia podcast on Twitter. A lot
Speaker 1: of common themes, what's the future of the agency look like,
Speaker 1: big data, data, data, data, data, conversations around data. One
Speaker 1: of the funniest things I saw was UM a twee
Speaker 1: about artificial intelligence and somebody said, I will give somebody
Speaker 1: five bucks. I AI actually means UM, which is super
Speaker 1: indicative of where our industry is. That so we have
Speaker 1: a lot of thoughts on Advertising Week, we have a
Speaker 1: lot of thoughts on industry events in general, but we're
Speaker 1: like panels, like, yeah, we're so bored with some of them. Actually,
Speaker 1: can I just say one thing. I was impressed with
Speaker 1: the I A B. They did very small UM what
Speaker 1: they were calling leadership dialogues UM, And I got to
Speaker 1: catch John Martin, who's the CEO of Turner Broadcasting. It
Speaker 1: was a really honest, great conversation. There may have been
Speaker 1: maybe fifty people in the room and we were sitting
Speaker 1: with him. And I think that that model, the format,
Speaker 1: the physical format of it was really um refreshing. I
Speaker 1: give Randall Rothenberg and all the folks over at the
Speaker 1: IB big props on that because it was just a
Speaker 1: refreshing format. And I actually felt like I got to
Speaker 1: know John a little bit, if I can call him that,
Speaker 1: Mr Martin. So it's good because the concept of panel
Speaker 1: is just sometimes speaking to an empty room or it's
Speaker 1: really tough. Advertising week, A lot of it takes place
Speaker 1: in the middle of time square and just happened to
Speaker 1: be like ninety seven degrees last week. UM, which makes
Speaker 1: for a lot of fun and dodging people to get
Speaker 1: to your panel and your sweating and your bronze are running,
Speaker 1: or maybe that was just me, but I think you know,
Speaker 1: ultimately and a lot of people were talking about the
Speaker 1: idea of moving to that sort of intimate format and
Speaker 1: I got the opportunity to speak on a panel UM
Speaker 1: with for Notch and UM. They did a gorgeous job
Speaker 1: for their connach Felt connach k and otc H, a
Speaker 1: measurement company, and Ono Ganska, their CEO, did a beautiful
Speaker 1: job putting together both her super Normal awards, complimented with
Speaker 1: a panel discussion in an intimate theater UM, which was
Speaker 1: really cool and different. It was nice to get out
Speaker 1: of UM Times Square. So I think we're gonna come back.
Speaker 1: We're gonna come back with some ideas, and we're even
Speaker 1: thinking about some things for Atlantia, So you know, I
Speaker 1: r L Anyway, with that said, I've got Ben Deats
Speaker 1: coming in from Vice UM. He is the s VP
Speaker 1: of Sales Advice and we have a really I think
Speaker 1: exciting conversation kind of teat up. So hope you enjoy
Speaker 1: it all. We'll be right back. What's up at Landia.
Speaker 1: We're back with vices. Ben deats Hi, Ben deats Hi,
Speaker 1: how are you? Ben is the s VP of sales
Speaker 1: at Vice. Welcome Ben, Thank you. So the story of you.
Speaker 1: You just told us that you were like employee numbers six.
Speaker 1: What I always tell people is when I got device,
Speaker 1: I was one of twelve people in the office, and
Speaker 1: I'm now one of here in New York. Um, in
Speaker 1: terms of global seniority, there are fifteen or so people
Speaker 1: who have been with the company longer than I. But
Speaker 1: you know that doesn't translate anything other than just like
Speaker 1: showing up at the office for the most con INU
Speaker 1: this number of days. So how many years is that?
Speaker 1: You know? It's so funny when people talk about new media.
Speaker 1: By the way, on that note, UM sometimes say Advice
Speaker 1: and I'm like, dude, Vice has been around since like
Speaker 1: I don't know, the early nineties, and I remember reading
Speaker 1: Vice and like early two thousand's saying Okay, this is cool,
Speaker 1: this is new. I can get into this. And I
Speaker 1: was a big indie music fan, and I you know,
Speaker 1: bordered in the punk world and all the stuff, and
Speaker 1: I loved the things you guys were talking about. At
Speaker 1: that point, it was a lot of like music culture,
Speaker 1: you know, content, and now you guys have evolved into
Speaker 1: you know, a full blown media company and news organization. Yeah.
Speaker 1: What I often tell people is that I picked up
Speaker 1: Vice for the first time as a twenty three year
Speaker 1: old marketing assistant at a record label on a skateboard literally,
Speaker 1: and I'm now the father of two with a mortgage
Speaker 1: and you know, a whole adult life. Vices continued to
Speaker 1: be a consistent source of culture and of news for
Speaker 1: me throughout out. That has changed from being super music related,
Speaker 1: you know when I worked in the music business, to
Speaker 1: being much more concerned about now macro issues in the world.
Speaker 1: And I think it's a testament to the vision of
Speaker 1: the guys in the first place, that they set up
Speaker 1: a business that would be able to grow with audience
Speaker 1: while at the same time bringing new audiences in through
Speaker 1: exploring other topics that we've never thought of. So, if
Speaker 1: if you were to channel Shane Smith today, would the
Speaker 1: Shane Smith vision for vice Um have deviated from its
Speaker 1: original intent today as opposed to well, I think there's
Speaker 1: two things, or would I believe that the guys were
Speaker 1: so prescient in setting up in the first place. This
Speaker 1: is Shane and Serrouge, you know, bolstered by guys like
Speaker 1: Eddie Muretty who's our our chief content officer and the
Speaker 1: president of Iceland, and Eric Lavoix, who is the publisher
Speaker 1: for many years and now runs b D for our
Speaker 1: our agency group. Um, those guys wanted to tell stories
Speaker 1: to their friends in the voice that they spoke to
Speaker 1: their friends in, and they wanted to just make sure
Speaker 1: that the content was available wherever their friends wanted to
Speaker 1: consume it. So I don't think there's ever really been
Speaker 1: a pivot in terms of changing those two axioms. And
Speaker 1: then beyond that, Shane is I don't know if you've
Speaker 1: ever spent any time with him, but he is a
Speaker 1: huge personality and somebody that believes that he can uh
Speaker 1: take on the world and should because there's a better
Speaker 1: way to do it than the world, you know, maybe
Speaker 1: operating with. So I don't think it's been there have
Speaker 1: been pivots. I think it's been evolution throughout as we've
Speaker 1: gotten older, as we've gotten more successful, as we've come
Speaker 1: to the sense that possibility was more than possibility, it
Speaker 1: was achievable and it was out our grasp, and then
Speaker 1: that it was responsibility, which is kind of how we
Speaker 1: feel now. So you said something about Vice kind of
Speaker 1: having grown up, kind of gotten into its maturation years. However,
Speaker 1: many now we're in a decade too. Um. Three three
Speaker 1: of the business. If you as the head of sales,
Speaker 1: what are some of the ill kind of conceived notions
Speaker 1: about what Vice was as opposed to where it is now?
Speaker 1: And if you're kind of walking in too to meet
Speaker 1: with Alexa and I today, what would be sort of
Speaker 1: the elevator pitch for what the brand stands for today's culture. Well, look,
Speaker 1: I think to answer the misconceptions thing first, the primary
Speaker 1: misconception that we have struggled with over the course of
Speaker 1: time is that we are in it to be provocative
Speaker 1: or to be controversial in any way, shape or form.
Speaker 1: The fact of the matter is that we are not provocateurs.
Speaker 1: We are, we hope, reporters of the vernacular and and
Speaker 1: the culture of young people. UM. But it's hard because
Speaker 1: sometimes young people speak in terms that are not you know,
Speaker 1: the most palatable too big companies, and sometimes because that
Speaker 1: reporting is unvarnished and you know, is very different than
Speaker 1: what people are used to receiving. UM. So that's the
Speaker 1: bit that we struggle with the bit that I think
Speaker 1: we try to cast ourselves as now is a the
Speaker 1: most important because of the bread the stories that we
Speaker 1: cover and the inclusivity of our point of view, and
Speaker 1: be the most influential in that we are willing to
Speaker 1: take on forms and formats that nobody else uses or
Speaker 1: does to driving the media landscape forward for young people especially,
Speaker 1: but hopefully increasingly for you know, audiences generally. What does
Speaker 1: that look like, because I think a lot of people
Speaker 1: are like, yeah, VR, oh yeah, podcasting, oh yeah, this
Speaker 1: and that and that, But it's not necessarily those types
Speaker 1: of formats that you're talking about. No. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: I think it's the When we launched the nightly news
Speaker 1: show on HBO, Josh Tarangol, who came over from Bloomberg
Speaker 1: to run that and has a great news background and
Speaker 1: ironically as a it was an inspiration of mine in college,
Speaker 1: he just said, basically, look, if we want to transform
Speaker 1: the nightly news show, let's get rid of the sacred
Speaker 1: elements of it. Um. And I'm putting words in Josh's
Speaker 1: mouth here, of course, but it's like, get rid of
Speaker 1: the host, get rid of the voice of God, have
Speaker 1: it be uh, an experience that flows the way that
Speaker 1: content flows through your social feeds or through the modern
Speaker 1: content feeds, and that's going to be demonstrably different than
Speaker 1: anything else in the news space, and it's going to
Speaker 1: be more in tune with the way our audience wants
Speaker 1: to consume. And I had a really fascinating meeting the
Speaker 1: other day with some of the news producers who pointed
Speaker 1: out one of them came from radio and she's been
Speaker 1: in charge of producing a lot of segments that are
Speaker 1: animated because she's like, look, there are things you can
Speaker 1: do in the audio medium that you can't do with
Speaker 1: film medium, but I can then animate them and I
Speaker 1: can bring all of the depth of film and insight, sound,
Speaker 1: emotion to them without changing the fundamentals of you know,
Speaker 1: the moment. Yeah, the story. One of the things that
Speaker 1: an Alexa and I for years have been sort of
Speaker 1: frustrated with the way people say TV has to fit
Speaker 1: into the confines of linear and so you know, Live
Speaker 1: allows us to challenge some of that. But you guys
Speaker 1: have presumably taken on what I've enjoyed. I think we've
Speaker 1: actually talked about it on the show quite a bit.
Speaker 1: Is about creating stickiness in formats that don't necessarily lend
Speaker 1: themselves to innovation. And one of the things that I appreciate,
Speaker 1: and I think a points i'd like pulled us to
Speaker 1: the front of your presentation was it was the first
Speaker 1: time I had heard somebody talk about using commercial pods
Speaker 1: or breaks in shows to create more sticky content. And
Speaker 1: I don't even think you refer to them, Commercius. I
Speaker 1: think you say interstitials and so kind of challenge. And
Speaker 1: I know that we talked. We talked about this a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago, and I was like eight hundred
Speaker 1: months pregnant. We were talking about what Yeah, it was
Speaker 1: eight hundred months pregnant, and it was hotter than hell,
Speaker 1: and it was in Brooklyn. You guys maybe walk up
Speaker 1: a lot of that was it? Because it was before
Speaker 1: the elevator was done. We talked about this and it
Speaker 1: was the major differentiator than any other conversation I had
Speaker 1: had at the time. And we were sitting down and
Speaker 1: I had just been in like China like five months before,
Speaker 1: talking to some of your counterparts Advice China and talking
Speaker 1: about how, um, you had no rules that I mean
Speaker 1: to me, it was that simple, right, It was like
Speaker 1: we don't have rules in terms of like thirty second
Speaker 1: time limits. We don't have We're not locked into something
Speaker 1: badcast or thirty minute exactly the broadcasting Laura and I
Speaker 1: were like, yes, this is what we're talking about, and
Speaker 1: I think it's cool, Like there's a very small group
Speaker 1: of people today that we can talk to or put
Speaker 1: into this sort of club that is taking the format
Speaker 1: of linear or just broadcast television and saying why does
Speaker 1: it have to exist in thirty or sixty minute programs?
Speaker 1: Why can't be a bunch of twelve minute, thirty second
Speaker 1: to you know whatever, minute pieces strung together to tell
Speaker 1: great stories. So can you talk about sort of where
Speaker 1: the inspiration of that has gone post HBO and into
Speaker 1: the Iceland world. Yeah, I mean, I think the interesting
Speaker 1: thing is to go way back actually, and I don't
Speaker 1: know if either of you saw the episode of Epically Later,
Speaker 1: which is the our long standing, like since literally two
Speaker 1: thousand seven skateboard show, But we just brought us to
Speaker 1: Iceland and we did an episode on Spike Jones, who
Speaker 1: is of course the co president of the network, and
Speaker 1: then also one of our creative eminence is from back
Speaker 1: in the day and a partner and a friend and
Speaker 1: somebody who kind of look like Spike Jones. Noone never
Speaker 1: tell you that. Yeah, I've heard it once, it's twice.
Speaker 1: I take it as an incredible, incredible commum. Spikes a
Speaker 1: very handsome and very life young man. Um. But if
Speaker 1: you go back to the culture that Spike came out of,
Speaker 1: the d I y culture, that Shaneon Serrouch came out of,
Speaker 1: the filmmaking culture, that Eddie came out of, what I
Speaker 1: think you find is this common um, you know, approach
Speaker 1: to storytelling, which is very iterative, which is not terribly
Speaker 1: concerned with format um, but is more concerned with experimentation
Speaker 1: and fun, and which is kind of always on right.
Speaker 1: And so when you come out of those worlds, the
Speaker 1: idea of this super segmented experience of linear or of
Speaker 1: any medium feels a little stunted, right. And And even
Speaker 1: if I think about skateboard magazines when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: and I grew up reading them and looking at Spikes photos,
Speaker 1: and we've got to know each other a little bit
Speaker 1: over the course time, it's like the ads were content,
Speaker 1: the content was ads. It was all the same experience.
Speaker 1: It was all seamless. And I think that what what
Speaker 1: they wanted to create with Iceland was just that experience
Speaker 1: of constant voice and um an interest that extended through
Speaker 1: the advertising and extended through the content went back into
Speaker 1: the advertising. Because the truth matter is brands Cannon should
Speaker 1: operate in in every media platform so long as they're
Speaker 1: adding value and as so long as they're they make sense,
Speaker 1: they're right. Like I don't read Vogue for the articles
Speaker 1: in Vogue. I read Vogue for the ads. And that's
Speaker 1: not because I work in sales, it's because I want
Speaker 1: or in media. It's because those ads are giving me
Speaker 1: the full spectrum of viewpoints, not just what an editor
Speaker 1: has picked out for me. To know. It's a really
Speaker 1: really interesting point to Yeah, like the fact that it's
Speaker 1: not what the editor has curated. It's kind of this
Speaker 1: bifocal kind of intersection of culture and content. And I
Speaker 1: guess what else somebody would care it for you. I've
Speaker 1: never actually thought of it that way. I think you
Speaker 1: have to, and I think you have to part of it, right,
Speaker 1: and part of setting up an ecosystem like that, or
Speaker 1: a consumer experience like that audience experience, is that you
Speaker 1: are really giving the audience full credit for being able
Speaker 1: to know what is valuable to them, what is authentic
Speaker 1: to them, and what is not. Whether it is picked
Speaker 1: by an editor and highly especially curated, or whether it
Speaker 1: is placed there by a publisher who is either Kenny
Speaker 1: or not Um, the audience ultimately makes the decision about that,
Speaker 1: and I think I think, you know, the more you're
Speaker 1: able to create a native environment for content and advertisement,
Speaker 1: the more credit you're giving to the audience. I also
Speaker 1: think you're giving a ton of credit. And I have
Speaker 1: been like dying to say this as we're talking, like
Speaker 1: you're giving it a lot of credit to brands that
Speaker 1: they actually should be there, and it's weird. I actually
Speaker 1: think brands have like a little bit of a self
Speaker 1: deprecating attitude nowadays where they don't actually think they belong
Speaker 1: at the same level as content. Well, you know, it's
Speaker 1: like editorial. I just finished recently Um Andrew Essex's book
Speaker 1: The End of Advertising. I think the point that Andrew
Speaker 1: makes very sharply and and cleverly, maybe not even cleverly,
Speaker 1: just effectively, is that the entire model has been based
Speaker 1: on interruption to this point, and because we have now
Speaker 1: the effectiveness and some of the placements of advertising breaking
Speaker 1: down with TV viewership decreasing, with you know, all of
Speaker 1: the fraud and and and spoofing that goes on in
Speaker 1: the digital world. Um, it's easy as an advertiser, I
Speaker 1: would imagine to look at it and go, yeah, people
Speaker 1: kind of don't want me here. I mean I've been
Speaker 1: interrupting them, and I've been you know, serving them crap
Speaker 1: in places that they didn't expect to see it, and
Speaker 1: so I should occupy this position of liability. I don't
Speaker 1: think that's true. I think I think they. I think
Speaker 1: I think brands need to step up and go I
Speaker 1: need to be a contributor here because if I'm not,
Speaker 1: I'm nobody's going to pay attention. That's right, I agree.
Speaker 1: I also think they need to see that they have value.
Speaker 1: That's for me, the most important part of the conversation.
Speaker 1: Laura was on a panel last week at Advertising Week
Speaker 1: and she said something I thought was really right and smart. Um,
Speaker 1: you're right, and you're welcome. You're right and welcome was
Speaker 1: moderated by my colleague Spencer. It was and she said,
Speaker 1: you know, brands are going to start um getting into
Speaker 1: this space because they have they're getting pressed to act,
Speaker 1: and that's accountability. In a post truth world. And I'm
Speaker 1: totally paraphrasing, but that's exactly what we're talking about. And
Speaker 1: it's not just no one's going to pay attention to
Speaker 1: you if you don't get in this game. It's you
Speaker 1: need to go deep and find your own value, find
Speaker 1: where your employees value you, find where your consumers and
Speaker 1: customers value you, and then bring it back into some
Speaker 1: kind of you know, I don't content or entertainment experience
Speaker 1: or something. I don't think we spent enough time in
Speaker 1: this show talking about the role of sales in our industry.
Speaker 1: And something that you said sparked a thought, and I think,
Speaker 1: you know, I've struggled with what is the role of
Speaker 1: a salesperson? And this sort of posts you know, content
Speaker 1: of the world where all the lines are blurring, and
Speaker 1: you've got programmers, you've got engineers, you've got product people,
Speaker 1: which are normally the people that I want to talk to.
Speaker 1: But I think what you just identified a minute ago,
Speaker 1: in terms of talking about the role of sales in
Speaker 1: programming the spaces that an editor in chief or or um, yeah,
Speaker 1: I guess you call it an inner chief is responsible
Speaker 1: for programming versus a publisher, versus a publisher. Um, is
Speaker 1: it fair to say, Ben Deets, in this new world
Speaker 1: we're playing in that you're really sort of an editor
Speaker 1: and commercial because I think it's interesting when it kind
Speaker 1: of take because the role and responsibility on the salespeople
Speaker 1: not just to think about making and the post sale um,
Speaker 1: but actually programming the space. And I think when we
Speaker 1: start taking sales people out of just the transactional part
Speaker 1: and start moving them into the production part, that's where
Speaker 1: it gets interesting money. I don't think all sales people
Speaker 1: can do it, but well it's it's okay, So I
Speaker 1: should hasten to say that. To call myself an editor,
Speaker 1: much less an editor in chief is a radical overreach
Speaker 1: that I would never ascribe to, but it is. I
Speaker 1: think what you've identified is that is a belief that
Speaker 1: I've held for a long time, which is that salespeople,
Speaker 1: development people, brand connections people, whatever your job title is
Speaker 1: pre sale, thinking about how to try to solve a
Speaker 1: business is problem through your platform. Is that you have
Speaker 1: to think, from an editorial point of view about what's
Speaker 1: the audience going to care the most about and what
Speaker 1: are they going to take away from this? And how
Speaker 1: if I were sitting on the other side of the
Speaker 1: screen or the magazine or the television. Um, how would
Speaker 1: I interpret this branch presence here as the most additive
Speaker 1: and the most interesting? Um? Can I Can I digress
Speaker 1: for a second, because I just want to I want
Speaker 1: to tell you a story that I found. Well, it's
Speaker 1: one of my favorite anecdotes of late It's about vice,
Speaker 1: of course, because all my favorite ancdotes are bad and skateboarding. Um.
Speaker 1: I came home the other night. This is probably a
Speaker 1: couple of weeks ago now, after you know, being out
Speaker 1: with some clients, uh, talking about you know, whatever it
Speaker 1: is that we talked about in the sales and business
Speaker 1: development world with our clients, and having had a couple
Speaker 1: of wines, shall we say? And uh, and I put
Speaker 1: on Viceland and it was the season finale of a
Speaker 1: show called American boy Band, which is a show about
Speaker 1: hip hop group called brock Hampton fronted by a guy
Speaker 1: named Kevin Abstract. Kevin Abstract and his brock Hampton boys
Speaker 1: met on the Kanye ted a website or a message
Speaker 1: board a few years ago. This is a Kanye super
Speaker 1: fans and the trolls who love to bait them, um,
Speaker 1: talking to each other about whatever it is that Kanye
Speaker 1: was working on Circle My twisted dark Fantasy, and Um,
Speaker 1: Kevin found a community of sort of like minded weirdos
Speaker 1: in that message board. Um, he is openly gay, is
Speaker 1: you know, openly going through this journey of self discovery.
Speaker 1: Really fascinating character. But he put together this crew of people,
Speaker 1: largely through sort of sending messages and and and songs
Speaker 1: back and forth, formed them into a group. They all
Speaker 1: move into a house in in l A. And uh,
Speaker 1: then they start releasing music the internet through SoundCloud and
Speaker 1: Spotify and and YouTube starts picking it up. And suddenly
Speaker 1: they have enough of a fan base that they can
Speaker 1: go on a national tour. So our guys, um said,
Speaker 1: we want to follow you on the national tour and
Speaker 1: go out as you meet your fans and you know,
Speaker 1: find all these teenagers on this journey of self discovery
Speaker 1: and this kind of stuff. It's it's a real you know,
Speaker 1: it's an it's an American youth story in that regard.
Speaker 1: But the thing that happened in the finale, because I
Speaker 1: missed the entire show and I'm going back and watching
Speaker 1: it v O D now, Um, the thing that happens
Speaker 1: in the finale is they get home from this tour
Speaker 1: energized and exhausted from all of this you know, experience
Speaker 1: that they've had, and they make something like five music
Speaker 1: videos over the course of a weekend. Every one of
Speaker 1: them has a different style, a different production value, a
Speaker 1: different narrative, a different sort of platform centric approach. And
Speaker 1: I watched the show and in twenty two minutes they
Speaker 1: blew up ad Agencies. I was just like, okay, well,
Speaker 1: that's the end of ad agencies right there. There needs
Speaker 1: to be a sound effect on that cam. It was.
Speaker 1: It was just like, right, okay, So you've got twelve kids,
Speaker 1: twelve kids in a house in Los Angeles working at
Speaker 1: you know, this prodigious level of output um with no rules,
Speaker 1: but also with this incredible sense of of of possibility
Speaker 1: and shared admission, and you're just like, okay, right, you're
Speaker 1: that's going to come through my Facebook feed the same
Speaker 1: as a piece of content from Vice that we've you know,
Speaker 1: labored over and sent somebody to to to to Antarcticle
Speaker 1: four and at the same time, the TV spot or
Speaker 1: the um you know, Native ad or whatever it is
Speaker 1: that brands produced, and I was just like, Paradigm ship,
Speaker 1: It's interesting from the first time I had our conversation. Um,
Speaker 1: and I was skeptical, by the way, super skeptical. Laurel
Speaker 1: will tell you. I was like for me, I was like,
Speaker 1: which will we'll say for the outtakes? Yeah, we're going
Speaker 1: to save that for Instagram. Um. But but you know
Speaker 1: what I was pleasantly surprised by, not only was your
Speaker 1: shared love of art and your deep knowledge of data
Speaker 1: and other things that I love. UM okay, sorry, yeah, anyway,
Speaker 1: was um, you had a different rhetoric and a different
Speaker 1: language that you were speaking a little compared to compared
Speaker 1: to other other I would say, media companies, other media
Speaker 1: companies and sales heads of sales and c r o
Speaker 1: s at other media companies. Is that something that you're
Speaker 1: conscious of? Advice? I mean, when you're talking to advertisers, right,
Speaker 1: and I was coming in as an advertiser, and you're
Speaker 1: talking to an advertiser. You weren't saying authenticity, you weren't
Speaker 1: saying pre roll all. You weren't saying and those are
Speaker 1: You weren't even talking about tone and the relationship between
Speaker 1: your company and my company the same way most people do.
Speaker 1: Are you conscious of that a little bit? The sense. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have a point, but I want to hear his will.
Speaker 1: It makes sense to me. I mean, look, there's there's
Speaker 1: kind of two way stands to that. Right. One is
Speaker 1: that at the end of the day, any business relationship
Speaker 1: is a human relationship, and if we don't like each other,
Speaker 1: the business that we're going to do is probably not
Speaker 1: going to be as fruitful as it could be if
Speaker 1: we liked each other. So what I always try to
Speaker 1: do is find um, shared points of interest or or
Speaker 1: just you know, points of human connection. Right. Um. But
Speaker 1: I think the thing that Vice does differently as a
Speaker 1: culture those of us have been around for any period
Speaker 1: of time, UM, is that we we've realized and internalized
Speaker 1: that with as many headwinds as we face, because the
Speaker 1: company is called Vice, because we have chosen a path
Speaker 1: that um is truthful and unvarnished and um not necessarily
Speaker 1: to the conscription of traditional media. Um. And can I
Speaker 1: add and some antagonistic well we yeah. I mean, look,
Speaker 1: I think we can be if we have to say that.
Speaker 1: I think we can be if we believe that the
Speaker 1: point of view opposing ours is wrong, right, Like, I
Speaker 1: don't think there's anything wrong with being antagonistic in that case.
Speaker 1: But um, it's it's not a that is not a mission,
Speaker 1: but it is certainly a byproduct from time to time. Um.
Speaker 1: The thing that we realized was that if we don't
Speaker 1: charm and uh and convince people that we are more
Speaker 1: than the sum of the printed page or um, you know,
Speaker 1: the sum of the of of the stories that people
Speaker 1: have overheard about us, UM, that we were gonna lose.
Speaker 1: And I think there's a I My favorite thing, right
Speaker 1: is that our most senior executives send notes to each
Speaker 1: other and to our clients and to our friends, you know,
Speaker 1: people that we want to work with, which are to
Speaker 1: the effect of, you don't love me anymore. And that's
Speaker 1: the note. That's like alex and and I aint given Tuesday, right,
Speaker 1: But I mean, look, that's are you you guys are friends, right,
Speaker 1: That's that's how you talked to each other. You talked
Speaker 1: to you, you talked to your friends that way. It's
Speaker 1: about signaling. Uh, I care more about you and and
Speaker 1: the quality of this relationship than I do about transacting
Speaker 1: at this particular time. And Shane, you know as a
Speaker 1: famous famous story with advice where he talked about somebody
Speaker 1: who was a dear friend of his um early on
Speaker 1: in the company, and they hired him to come in
Speaker 1: and sell ads because the guy was so gung ho
Speaker 1: and the guy couldn't get past the cold call routine
Speaker 1: of Hey, this is Ben from Vice, would you like
Speaker 1: to buy advertising at this time? And that that that
Speaker 1: phrase is memorialized in our in our culture, because it's like,
Speaker 1: that's what you cannot do. That for me, the way
Speaker 1: to articulate what you're doing, the way you talk about
Speaker 1: the relationship with the advertiser beyond the human relationship, right
Speaker 1: the actual artifacts of commercial right of commercializing something sure
Speaker 1: is different to observations that I've noticed that are clear distinctions.
Speaker 1: And if there are c r O s listening right now,
Speaker 1: there are two notes that I would walk away from
Speaker 1: the school of bend deat sales would be one um.
Speaker 1: The people that you hire are entertainers and their creators.
Speaker 1: And I think there's a fundamental difference. You came here
Speaker 1: and didn't say that you know, I'm a salesperson or
Speaker 1: I'm a business guy, or you know, I'm I'm after
Speaker 1: the hustle. It's like I'm an artist and I love
Speaker 1: fucking skateboarding. I think, well that that's totally and this
Speaker 1: is where your background comes in, by the way, you know,
Speaker 1: and I've met a ton of other people that have
Speaker 1: lots of passions that extend far beyond the advertising and
Speaker 1: marketing world, and I think that that speaks volumes about
Speaker 1: the way people conduct themselves, which goes to my next
Speaker 1: point is that people actually live and breathe the Vice brand.
Speaker 1: And I don't know how many UM people that I've
Speaker 1: met that they don't just pass through and they're there
Speaker 1: to three teen months and they're dropping into my inbox
Speaker 1: from the next you know, insert media publisher here. You
Speaker 1: guys walk around with you know, Vice gold rings, and
Speaker 1: it's sort of this cult like attitude, UM that even
Speaker 1: if it's I can't do business or for whatever reason,
Speaker 1: you know, it's not business, not the right time, I
Speaker 1: still walk away from a conversation with those guys believe
Speaker 1: in the ship that they're selling. And I cannot say
Speaker 1: that I can't even count on one hand the amount
Speaker 1: of sales organizations that I have met in this industry
Speaker 1: that I buy into the same way and buying device,
Speaker 1: so kind of shifting gears into sort of brand and
Speaker 1: media world. One of the things that you want to
Speaker 1: talk to us today about is the idea of sponsorships
Speaker 1: UM by any other name? And I think you guys
Speaker 1: have kind of stood up and defied logic in terms
Speaker 1: of form and function. But what does that mean to
Speaker 1: you as somebody who's out there selling products every day?
Speaker 1: What does that look like? Okay, So I wanted I
Speaker 1: I texted you that I wanted to talk about sponsorship
Speaker 1: by any other name, UM, shout out to Shakespeare, um.
Speaker 1: Because I wanted to. I wanted to throw that as
Speaker 1: a provocation to the two of you, because I believe
Speaker 1: in my conversations and in what I hear aback an
Speaker 1: acdotally from from members of my team, that sponsor and
Speaker 1: sponsorship are essentially bad words that we should strike from
Speaker 1: our conversations as it relates to trying to convey how
Speaker 1: I bring value to you. Um true false? Uh No,
Speaker 1: hold on. So I would say in the world of advertising,
Speaker 1: why that has become a bad and ugly word is
Speaker 1: because it's been on a lot of shitty banners and
Speaker 1: a lot of shitty media, right, and it has attached
Speaker 1: brands two things that they have no business being attached to.
Speaker 1: And I think that as the as a word right
Speaker 1: and as a um, as a mean ning, it's actually
Speaker 1: quite nice. We we're we believe in this, right, so
Speaker 1: we're putting our name on it. Now. What we've done
Speaker 1: to it is put sponsorship, sponsorship, sponsorship everywhere, and all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, you've got bud Light and I don't
Speaker 1: know sponsoring I too much. Not saying bad, I'm not saying,
Speaker 1: but it's a bad bud light whomever. It doesn't matter
Speaker 1: who you are, like a bubbly drink, right, bubbly drink
Speaker 1: against something that doesn't feel like the brand, I think,
Speaker 1: And that's a big issue the industry has, is Alexa
Speaker 1: saying bastardize the word sponsor. And when somebody comes and
Speaker 1: they sell typically say in this space, we want to
Speaker 1: sell you a sponsorship. I'm like, so if you don't
Speaker 1: sell it to me, you're definitely going to sell it
Speaker 1: to my competitor. Right. It's become this sort of um
Speaker 1: it's becomes synonymous with badging and this idea that you've
Speaker 1: got a great idea to sell just coming and you know,
Speaker 1: underwrite it essentially also and stop your shitty logo on it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And I think the the idea of bad ng or
Speaker 1: logo slapping UM has diluted, you know, the ability for
Speaker 1: brands to come to the table in an authentic, thoughtful, articulate,
Speaker 1: meaningful way. And so Alex and I are hell bent
Speaker 1: on the filter for successful partnerships UM with media companies,
Speaker 1: you know, under the title of co produced in partnership
Speaker 1: with because at least you have to things like that,
Speaker 1: because at least in our vein that filter signals that
Speaker 1: this is something we sat down at the table at
Speaker 1: we have a vested interested in collaborating on, and it's
Speaker 1: something we're going together to the marketplace with. That is,
Speaker 1: you know, showing the shared ethos between our brand and
Speaker 1: your media company. For example, you know what did I'm
Speaker 1: like when you walked in the door. I was talking
Speaker 1: to you about this the podcast Mogul that's a Gimlet
Speaker 1: and loud Speaker partnership, and I binged it in the
Speaker 1: last couple of weeks and like, not a couple of weeks,
Speaker 1: a couple of days actually, um, because I got so
Speaker 1: into it and the way that they were doing UM
Speaker 1: quote sponsorships advertising right, UM is just smart, was just right.
Speaker 1: So bud Light, they were doing some bud light um.
Speaker 1: Uh mid roles, I think, and they didn't feel like
Speaker 1: mid roles at all. It was real content. It totally
Speaker 1: made sense. It was people sitting around talking about a
Speaker 1: specific thing in UM, in hip hop music, UM around
Speaker 1: a couple of bud lights. Now that sounds really trite,
Speaker 1: but the way they did it, And a lot of
Speaker 1: this is the beauty is in the execution. I just
Speaker 1: talked to someone about this the other day. UM, A
Speaker 1: lot of the beauty in these ideas is also in
Speaker 1: the execution. So you have to have the right producers.
Speaker 1: You have to have the right people you are just
Speaker 1: sitting at the table. Yeah, I agree. You also have
Speaker 1: to have you have to have the right attitude. I mean,
Speaker 1: to me, the part of the the problem with our
Speaker 1: existing condition around sponsorship and part of which we have
Speaker 1: to solve fast as an industry, and that I think
Speaker 1: we've done a pretty good job of starting to move
Speaker 1: in the direction is that you're your creative people, your
Speaker 1: agency people, your your who whomever it is who are
Speaker 1: your words smiths and are going to represent your brand
Speaker 1: when you are a brand, when whoever is gonna you know,
Speaker 1: represent your brand in those spaces, they have to be
Speaker 1: thinking like, how do I interrupt less? How do I
Speaker 1: add more? How do I how do I avoid uh
Speaker 1: the simple tagline and think a little harder about what
Speaker 1: the real intent behind the What do I want to watch?
Speaker 1: What do I want to listen to? What do I
Speaker 1: want to be entertained by? How do I actually want
Speaker 1: to commune with these people? All all that stuff? Can
Speaker 1: I just say this? I would love it? Can you
Speaker 1: guys maybe do this that you probably will never do this,
Speaker 1: but if a media company or a publisher actually asked
Speaker 1: for a true like to brief the agency on what
Speaker 1: is your the sorry, brief the client on what's your contribution?
Speaker 1: That's a good idea. I love that, right, let's do that. Let'
Speaker 1: see that. And I also like the It's fine, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna tout one of my own sort of random ideas.
Speaker 1: I look, I think part of part of the reason
Speaker 1: we've been successful is because we're also open to random
Speaker 1: stuff like this. I wrote, Uh, one of my guys
Speaker 1: who's in charge of our podcast efforts to that, and
Speaker 1: I said, hey, I was reading. I was reading about
Speaker 1: Spotify allowing advertisers to create their own ads through their platform,
Speaker 1: which I think is really I have not explored what
Speaker 1: it's like technically, but I think as an idea that's
Speaker 1: really smart. We have on Viceland an eight a six
Speaker 1: or six number where our viewers call up and leave
Speaker 1: messages on the six or six number, and we pair
Speaker 1: it with really beautiful scenic photography shot on drones that um,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of brings us to bring, brings you
Speaker 1: out of the content moment and brings you to this
Speaker 1: kind of uh meditative place. And then you get somebody
Speaker 1: on the voicemail saying something really weird. I said, I
Speaker 1: said to John, who I sent this to you? I said, hey,
Speaker 1: why don't we set up a means by which brands
Speaker 1: can call our voicemail and leave their own ads, like
Speaker 1: literally speak into the into the voicemail and leave your ad,
Speaker 1: and then we figure out a way to to run
Speaker 1: that at some kind of should we have a promo
Speaker 1: code on this show so I can say at Landia
Speaker 1: ten and they can get temporature in any case? I
Speaker 1: like that, Uh, that thought right, And so it's interesting, Laura,
Speaker 1: you said something to me a couple of weeks ago
Speaker 1: which I love and which I I I would like
Speaker 1: to be the condition with which we work with all
Speaker 1: our agency partners and brands. You said, yeah, we shouldn't
Speaker 1: ever RFPU at all. We should just call you up
Speaker 1: and say, here's an idea that we have. How do
Speaker 1: you interpret this? And well, I mean, look, you guys
Speaker 1: are are are way ahead of the rest of the business.
Speaker 1: Although I think many people are now moving to what,
Speaker 1: as I say, fewer better partnerships and and that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. So you know, hopefully there's inertia behind that thought. Um.
Speaker 1: The The the other thing that that we don't get
Speaker 1: very often is um is brand's explicitly saying to us, hey,
Speaker 1: this is how we want to be represented. Is this
Speaker 1: authentic in in your space and then being willing to
Speaker 1: hear if the actual yeah, exactly killed by d I
Speaker 1: Y in the industry, what would you kill? What would
Speaker 1: you buy? Because it's that good? And what are you
Speaker 1: like funking? I could do myself? Um So kill is
Speaker 1: the the sense that there is an easy solution that
Speaker 1: allows everybody to just plug and play, get the optimum
Speaker 1: results with the minimum friction and uh still the entertain
Speaker 1: audiences and drive brand value. Just guys, this is work.
Speaker 1: We call it work because it's work. You gotta work
Speaker 1: at it. Um By uh, so many. I'd like to
Speaker 1: buy something that helps us fight the preconceived notion of
Speaker 1: what Vice was ten years ago as being what Vice
Speaker 1: is now. But I don't think is Atlanta. I think yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you know they're there. I don't think there's
Speaker 1: necessarily a silver bullet for that. I think that's again
Speaker 1: it goes back to the first thing. That's hard work.
Speaker 1: That's just us continuing to make our points over and
Speaker 1: over again. UM do it yourself. I wish we could
Speaker 1: do ironically video syndication at scale ourselves, right like we
Speaker 1: can do it working through the big platforms. But it's
Speaker 1: tricky to not control your own destiny and to um
Speaker 1: have to be at their you know, subject to their
Speaker 1: business strategies and not to our own. So I would
Speaker 1: love to d I y that UM, which is going
Speaker 1: to make my platform people crazy because they were going
Speaker 1: to say, Ben, We've been working on that for years,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna say, yes, I know. But at the
Speaker 1: same time, it's my fantasy, and I think it's as
Speaker 1: an industry, it's going to be an issue for every
Speaker 1: media company in every form content creators if they don't
Speaker 1: own it. And so I think eventually so awesome, Thank you,
Speaker 1: thanks so much, thank you for coming. Where can people
Speaker 1: find you? I was just gonna say, aren't you gonna
Speaker 1: ask like there's a sales guy? No, because I'm saying, like,
Speaker 1: reach out to me, especially if you like that voicemail idea,
Speaker 1: because I'm really trying to you know, ten ten percent
Speaker 1: or ten cents, you'll say, if you like, she would
Speaker 1: get gold. I'm easy to remember. I don't carry business
Speaker 1: cards anymore, so I had to get a simple email address.
Speaker 1: It's just ben Advice dot com. Perfect. Thanks Bendet's my pleasure.
Speaker 1: Thank you guys very much. So that was a good conversation.
Speaker 1: I love be He's smart, super smart, super articulate, thoughtful.
Speaker 1: Consider it. Yeah, admittedly I've gone from being a skeptic
Speaker 1: to sort of a super fan advice. Yeah, yeah, you have.
Speaker 1: It's funny. Yeah, you took me a while to come around.
Speaker 1: And I think it was that very personality and I
Speaker 1: think you were getting to it with throughout the show
Speaker 1: and just like what it means to buy into the
Speaker 1: whole thing. Yeah, And I think once you kind of
Speaker 1: get under the hood and understand the perspective that it
Speaker 1: is that they're after, which I think we've seen a
Speaker 1: great deal shine through UM in recent light of just
Speaker 1: things going on in culture. UM. I've really enjoyed their perspective.
Speaker 1: I think it's needed. Yeah, and they have a different
Speaker 1: vernacular and I think that that's really interesting and Ben
Speaker 1: is an amazing representation of that. So, you know, intelligent
Speaker 1: and uh, I think thoughtful about how he approaches clients
Speaker 1: and quote unquote selling or as he says, salesman with
Speaker 1: a capital S, which I think was really kind of funny. Anyway,
Speaker 1: So Ben Deat's big, thanks, appreciate it. Hope you um
Speaker 1: didn't miss your daughter soccer game, and uh, big thanks
Speaker 1: to Cameron Drew's our producer. You're looking a little bit
Speaker 1: shy of eighteen years old camp, so we're really proud
Speaker 1: of you that you're kind of almost at eighteen episodes.
Speaker 1: I think he's eighteen years yeah. Probably Also our friends
Speaker 1: of family of Panably, Matt Tour, Andy Bowers, Jacob Weisberg.
Speaker 1: Thanks everyone, But one more thing before we go. One
Speaker 1: more thing. It's a request out to the Atlantia community.
Speaker 1: We've had amazing reviews, we're having great conversations, but we
Speaker 1: would love you guys to review if you're enjoying the
Speaker 1: Adlandia experience. We would love you guys a review Atlantia
Speaker 1: on Apple Podcast, so please go over to Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: go to the Atlantia page, click on the review tab,
Speaker 1: write us a review, and don't forget to follow us
Speaker 1: on Atlantia podcast on Twitter. We are having so much
Speaker 1: fun going back, debating, retweeting all of the fun things
Speaker 1: that you are finding in the industry. Don't stop. We'll
Speaker 1: be back in two weeks. Within all new episode, get
Speaker 1: It get a Atlandia full disclosure, our opinions are our
Speaker 1: own and as the outro question, what does it take
Speaker 1: to get a Vice Gold Ring? So, uh, the Vice
Speaker 1: Gold Ring is given to people at some point in
Speaker 1: their tenure at the company there and I say this
Speaker 1: in all sincerity. There is not a lot of rhyme
Speaker 1: or reason to it. Um. We've started to put in
Speaker 1: some processes where you know, people who are outstanding performers
Speaker 1: get nominated by their manners and stuff. But for years
Speaker 1: you got one because you were there at the right time.
Speaker 1: And uh, I happen to be there and you know
Speaker 1: November of two thousand five, which was the right time
Speaker 1: to get So it's the real gold or gold plated.
Speaker 1: Oh no, this is gold. This is gold. And that's
Speaker 1: part of the reason that that not everybody has one.
Speaker 1: For your best brand partners have the opportunity to get
Speaker 1: one because I really want. So. You're not a brand partner,
Speaker 1: you're an agency partner. Many brands interesting you should if
Speaker 1: I hit a certain number, if we can get some thresholds, um,
Speaker 1: I will say this, we reserve the rings for family
Speaker 1: and so um. There may have been one or two
Speaker 1: partners over the course of time who come to be
Speaker 1: regarded as family and may have been bestowed something. You
Speaker 1: just gave Laura goldps but like the editive and you
Speaker 1: just gave her a goal. I'm happy. I'm you know,
Speaker 1: I like working for But by the same choken, I
Speaker 1: think we've been able to use the sort of mystique
Speaker 1: of the gold ring to create value for some of
Speaker 1: other partners. We did a huge program with Geico recently,
Speaker 1: and the team that worked on that. As a shout
Speaker 1: out to the Geico team made Geico gold rings and
Speaker 1: that team works for real goal. Uh yeah, I think so.
Speaker 1: It might have been who makes off Comma. Thanks a lot, Ben.
Speaker 1: You are welcome back anytime. You're always the show very
Speaker 1: much