There's always a first time
MIPCOM took place over a month ago, but its effects can still be felt – particularly by those who had never been to an international market. James Boyce, on behalf of Dog Money World, shares his first experience with Encore.
It was not just any other Sunday afternoon in Sydney. Our hearts beating with excitement at the prospect, ‘this time next week, we could be touching down in France for MIPCOM’. Our decision was made, after months of working on our cross-media concept Crime Plays and a great response from a pitching panel, it seemed that this project would be the one that would take us to our first international market.
From the get-go we felt we were onto something good with Crime Plays, an immersive cross-platform experience that puts a crime world in the palm of your hands. Most aptly described it’s The Amazing Race meets Mafia Wars.
In the months preceding MIPCOM, we’d been developing this idea at Metro Screen surrounded by a group of fellow ‘transmedia’ producers. In this non-competitive, safe environment sharing was not only encouraged but necessary to work through ideas and decide what had legs and what didn’t.
Despite this, nothing can prepare you for your first MIPCOM. It is a truly an incredible journey. As they say success is where preparation and opportunity meet. MIPCOM was our opportunity.
After a mad week of logistical organization, we found ourselves a day from the market start, again refining and perfecting our pitch. Flung by train along the spectacular Cote de’Azur, we were still navigating the ideal words to bring our concept to life.
We arrived to be thrown straight into the First timers Orientation which Natalie Apostolou, our incredible guide throughout the whole market, had advised us to attend. The nervousness in the room was palpable, but once the champagne began to flow everyone loosened up and got to talking.
A quick tour of the Palais de’ Festival, still under construction, was daunting to say the least but we made friends with people that became our buddies throughout the conference.
DAY ONE:
On day one of the Market we had our first meeting with Australian Producer Guy Gadney from The Project Factory. His advice was invaluable and we cut a co-production deal on the couch in the VIP lounge. We now had our production partner and so began the process of marketing our concept.
Step one in this process, given that we had made a last minute decision to attend, was to work out whom to approach. We made a list. It was long list and we aimed high. After several come-back-laters we got our first shot with a big multinational.
Although this was not our most successful meeting at the market it was enormously productive. It forced to us to review our pitch angle. The great thing about being so prepared was that we could be fluid in our approach.
We learnt that the most important thing about each meeting was the debrief. We were extremely blunt with each other about our performance and that openness and honesty allowed us to craft our pitch to perfection. I remember at one point watching Claire whilst she pitched to a major player and being absolutely captivated by her performance. Not only did we believe we have an exceptional product, but we felt we were gaining momentum with every meeting.
We attended the glamorous MIPCOM Opening Cocktail party at the Martinez Hotel, however not before sitting in on the Mad Men preview and interview that followed with the dreamy John Hamm and exquisite Elizabeth Moss. I think this was certainly a highlight for the women in Dog Money World team.
The wine glass pitch was just as important as the meetings we managed to book at the stands. As anyone who has been to MIPCOM before will tell you, half of any success is luck. We were certainly open to chatting to new people and this paid off in gaining us access to people purely through the virtue that we were standing next to each other and open to conversation.
DAY TWO:
Day two provided the spotlight on Australia, it was particularly interesting given that we had travelled half way across the world in order to meet people who could potentially be our neighbours. It was a great opportunity to be able to chat with the funding bodies about our project and its potential.
Having secured meetings with a few big multinationals, a Danish distributor and a UK network, this was probably our busiest day. Even so, we managed to slip into the ‘Focus on Transmedia in Australia’ hear big players talk about the need to think differently about content and revenue streams and catch the launch of the exciting new online mash-up tool Smashcut.
That evening, we were swept off to the Australian Producers Party put on by Screen Australia; a fantastic opportunity meet like minded Australians and to find out about some of the incredible advances we as are nation are making across all forms of content production.
DAY THREE:
After a relatively heavy evening on the Rosé, we attended the digital breakfast to be accosted by a Russian entertainment Lawyer who shouted at us to “interact” with the talk she was chairing. Despite this, it was interesting to hear a global telecommunications giant, Deustche Telekom, speak about their foray into entertainment production.
The Market was beginning to slow down, given most people had packed out their schedules at the front end of the week. This worked in our favour as people were becoming available and we managed to get in front of a few more major studios and setup promising meetings for the last day.
We secured a last minute invitation, courtesy of a few favours, to the VIP digital media lunch at the Majestic across the road from the Palais de festival. This was great to be in a room of such innovative thinkers, working in the same space as us.
Dinner on Wednesday followed a few drinks at the Screen Australia Cocktail Party, a small contingent crossed the road to have dinner together, Dog Money World and Guy Gadney, Norm Wilkinson, Gregor Jordan, the Viner Brothers from Liquid animation, and handful of other Australian producers enjoyed a quiet night of conversation and a little respite from the adrenalin of the market. The rest of the night is a little hazy but there was dancing involved and there most certainly was Rosé.
DAY FOUR:
Day Four saw us hold the last of our meetings, and despite exhaustion, actually attend some the talks on the changing face of production around the world and the need for innovative and lateral thinking, as well as making a quick pit stop to the ice-cream parlour with Quentin Kenihan.
One of the highlights of the Conference was actually our last couple of hours at the market, Gavin McGarry from Jumpwire Media in NYC gave the Mipcom ‘Cross-Media Wrap Up’ to a captivated audience. It was so refreshing to know that we were not alone in our quest to tell stories across different mediums.
Primed and excited we consolidated on the last night and took ourselves out for a well-earned private dinner toasting our trip, and the bright future ahead.
Since that final dinner of Champagne and escargot in the old town of Cannes, Dog Money world has being bouncing forward in leaps and bounds. The contacts we made and the consequential follow-up meetings for ‘Crime Plays’ have proven to be both incredibly positive and fruitful, providing new briefs to build cross-media concepts for some incredibly loved and sacred international media properties.
Our experience at our first MIPCOM was an incredible one that we will remember for a long time as the moment all three of us, young, hungry producers realised that if you have a good idea nothing will stop you from reaching the right people.
We couldn’t have made what at the time felt like such a speculative decision to travel to Cannes without the support and guidance along the way from people like Gary Hayes, Tim Wilde, Jennifer Wilson, Bethany Bruce and Marcus Gillezeau.
If you are honest, genuine and believe in what you are creating even the biggest players in the business will hear what you have on offer. For myself, Anna Bay and Claire Evans of Dog Money World it is an experience we will never forget.
Was a pleasure to kick off the project with you guys. Looking forward to many more MIPs to come…
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Metro Screen is proud of its participants and their storytelling prowess. Go get them guys!
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Really glad Mipcom worked so well for you.
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