Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO, Dreamworks, speaks at #CannesLions

1. “totouchyouin
themostdirectway
imaginable”
Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
It sounds creepier than it is, but not by much.
We should all pray that Vice buys Dreamworks first.

2. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
Wednesday morning’s kick-off session was a good ‘un.
Dreamworks CEO Jeff Katzenberg talked about his energetic
pursuit of the audience “wherever they may be” and his
desire to touch them (I won’t repeat the rest of the quote.)
He reeled off a litany of channels, sub channels, shows,
partnerships and content that his empire has either
recently launched or are just about to, mostly aimed at the
younger demographics which simply “don’t watch regular
television anymore” because they are glued to their
phones. His channels are using YouTube as a recruiting
platform, discovering talent (and their audiences) and
bringing the most suitable or popular into the fold.
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3. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
The zero sum game
doesn’t live here
anymore.The idea that the audience for screened content is a finite thing
has proven to be false. Dreamworks has discovered that as
channels and platforms have multiplied so too have the audiences
and the opportunities for revenue. Netflix is the number one
channel for kids in the US at the moment, followed by YouTube.
They haven’t necessarily stolen share from traditional sources.
Instead, people are just consuming more. That may be good news
for advertisers and brands, provided they can deliver things
the audience wants. Katzenberg cited Jeff Gordon’s material
for Pepsi as a good example of where it should be heading.
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4. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
All hail the new
mediakingsAs interesting as Katzenberg was, he became the support
act the moment Eddy Moretti, Chief Creative of Vice walked
on stage. It was a significant moment, underscored by
Katzenberg’s intense interest in the Vice/Time-Warner deal
that’s rumored to be in the works. (“We’re, ah, not supposed
to talk about that right now” was as far as Moretti would go
on the subject.) Katzenberg hoped that Moretti would “find
a nice little spot in the Vice empire for Dreamworks to sit
when you buy us too.”Everyone laughed, but not everybody
did so in disbelief. Remember, Vice is a 20 year-old media
startup with a widely-reported $1.4 billon valuation.
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5. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
Give the kids
thekeysIn a similar fashion to Dreamworks and YouTube,
Vice’s MO is to hire their fans as content creators, as
evidenced by their latest news channel which has half
a million subscribers 3 months after launch. Moretti
claimed that he brought the channel out of beta
early “because Ukraine happened” and described
their news style as “hardly revolutionary - just good
quality documentary news coverage, but delivered
in a peer-to-peer fashion, by people who are from
our audience. Not by someone with a toupee.”
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6. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
Don’tworryabout
thetechnology(but make sure someone does)
Katzenberg and Moretti displayed a similar attitude to technology: as
creative people at heart, they make a point of not getting platform fever
(Moretti’s terminology), but they acknowledge that their organizations
need to be up to speed. Both agree the rate of technological change is
accelerating at an accelerating rate, which Katzenberg described as “filled
with opportunities” and Moretti declared to be “kind of exhausting.”
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7. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
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BonusRant!Jacob Soboroff (host of YouTube nation) proved to
be a slick moderator, as you’d kind of expect from a
TV guy. The festival organizers would do well to hand
more of the moderating duties to people experienced
in this line of work. Some of the most disappointing
sessions have been the direct result of sponsors and
fanboys handling the interviewer duties themselves.

8. Jeffrey Katzenberg wants
“to touch you in the most direct way imaginable”
“Iknowwhatwedo
reallywell-Ijusttry
andkeepusfocused
ondoingthat.”Jeffrey Katzenberg, CEO, DreamWorks