Creatives Grab Coffee - Producer Qualities (ft. Route Eleven) | Creatives Grab Coffee 14

Episode Date: March 9, 2022

Today we welcome our guest Sam Sferrazza. Sam is a producer and founder of Route Eleven, a Toronto-based production company that makes music videos, commercials and content for brands, artists and agencies alike.Producer QualitiesDuring our chat, we discussed a wide range of topics in relation to video production. A key topic was the key qualities that producers needed to have. It does not matter what type of content you are creating. All great producers have mostly the same qualities that make them and their productions successful.Covid-19 ImpactThe coronavirus posed a particular set of questions and challenges. We asked Sam whether production moved forward with the new restrictions in 2020. He shared that Route 11 was able to continue to push through the pandemic where so many other companies were unable to.Music Video ProductionSam outlined to us the challenges you face when creating music videos, managing creative people and working closely with directors. He also shared how to select the right directors for the projects depending on their unique needs.Creativity and Keeping ClientsHappy We chatted about the business of selling creativity and how important it is to make sure the clients are happy.Sometimes sacrifices need to be made in order to achieve this, even if it means some key creative decisions need to be altered. Egos are always a tricky thing to manage in the creative world. People get attached to their work and will find it difficult to make necessary sacrifices. A great producer will be able to tackle this challenge and know when it is necessary to make these tough decisions. Subscribe and follow for future episodes!To learn more about the show, visit: https://www.lapseproductions.com/creatives-grab-coffee/Subscribe and follow for future episodes!Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/2vHd8BdbkMQITFZmDJ0bo9Apple: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/creatives-grab-coffee/id1530864140 Instagram: @CreativesGrabCoffee https://www.instagram.com/creativesgrabcoffee/Produced by LAPSE PRODUCTIONS – https://www.lapseproductions.comInstagram: @lapseproductions https://www.instagram.com/lapseproductions/

Welcome to Creatives Grab Coffee, hosted by Kirill Lazarov and Dario Nuri. CGC is a show where we invite business professionals to discuss industry topics and share experiences. dario if you want to kick us off yeah how was your weekend it was good it was um nice i finished like two we had like two shoots last week and it was just, it's been really busy since like the summer, honestly. And that was kind of like the last of it. And so I just kind of enjoyed myself and now I was taking a DC today. we did get work october was the month where all the production was kind of happening and now everybody's kind of shifting into post work especially since the first snowfall was yesterday i believe so kind of hectic eh yeah that's true um i was also juggling a lot of posts this month which i i thought like october would be like a breather and then uh yeah a bunch of stuff was in post and i was like oh this is just as stressful in a lot of ways i forgot post was like this i had like three videos in post and

i was managing all of them it was just like too much were they music videos yeah we've been doing a lot of music videos um all of the post-production stuff was music videos and then the one shoot last week was like a small commercial fun digital thing just like product shots um that was cool that was different uh but yeah a lot of music videos who are you doing it for who yeah like the artist the artist yeah so we just did two music videos in October for Savannah Rae. She's really talented, really good music. I'm excited about that one. We did one that just came out a few days ago for Mono Whales. They're like an indie rock band from Toronto.

It's called All or Nothing. It's directed by my friend Evie Stamatoff. And the Savannah Ray music videos are directed by a really talented director and friend, Alicia K. Harris. And we represent her at Route 11. And then before that, it was just like a bunch of other stuff. Some stuff, again with alicia for coffee um we did like a coffee video for her song pressure and then a remix video for coffee again

with buju um i don't know if you ever heard of him he's like really famous in dance hall which like i myself i'm not familiar with but it's a really big deal in Jamaica. So we shot, we had like a another crew in Jamaica do that. Yeah. And then actually later in the summer, I had a really good shoot with this independent artist called Tara jam and I'll plug her just cause she's so nice. She was so nice and like warm and like so flexible to work with and I was so scared because it's kind of just us and the artist and I was like oh this could really

go any way when it's like just you and the artist but she was great and the video was like stunning and we did that with uh Keisha Chung who's like a really young up and coming director who I met through doing like these Zoom check ins for like black and like woman identifying people of color. And I met her. And then like when Tara phoned us or contacted us, it seemed like a good fit. So that's kind of been everything I've been busy with to answer that very long. So because you do, you tend to focus a lot on music videos, right?

Is that like your, your niche? Yeah, that's just like what we have. That's just what we have been coming in now. And with coronavirus, we're just kind of like taking it as it comes I don't know if it's a long-term thing for us necessarily but it's what we've been busy with so that's what we've been doing so it's a fairly new kind of project type that has been kind of coming through route 11 right music videos you mean yeah because you said that you haven't done as many before but until recently

now you've kind of been doing a bit more of them no we've always done a lot of music videos and it's kind of been our bread and butter um it's just always kind of been the plan to like move on to more commercial stuff after that uh and that and we have done that but uh yeah like i said just um especially now we're just like, this is what's coming in. Let's do it because, you know, it's weird time. Has it been affected? Has the music video scene been affected at all by COVID? Because it doesn't seem like it would be, right?

No, a lot of music videos are non-union. And you just have to do your best as a producer to make everyone safe. Without putting any of my clients on blast, I kind of wish there was more lax timelines and more resources allocated to keeping people safer. But to be honest, I found during coronavirus, the standards our clients expected, like, it maybe went down for, like, a month. And then they were like, okay, back on it. We need content because we're, like, because we, like, can't shoot, like, this big thing. Or, like, I don't know. There's just, like, the standard at which they expect didn't really change much, which is, like, kind of disappointing.

It's like, we are in a global pandemic. We could just get like an extra week with post-production because their editor can't like edit in person. And they're like, sorry, our deadline is just really locked in. It's like,

what? So I don't know. I wish it was a little more relaxed. It would make a lot more sense, but just the reality of things can't really change much. I think, I think a lot of people have been just trying to um you know as you mentioned like we haven't been making any content for months and

then all of a sudden all those months of planning that some companies might have been doing i've decided okay you know we need to roll out everything asap because we have marketing plans that you know are set in stone and you guys got to make that happen. How do you typically manage very strict deadlines like that? How do you try to communicate with the client? I think the first thing I've learned is that you should just ask for an extension and you should do it early and the first thing. Once they send you the post-production thing, you should be like, this is very tight. we would like more time and then what you'll discover

is if they have hard deadlines you'll discover them you'll discover why and if they don't they don't but I always tell people like what I've learned especially recently is if you need more time or more money ask like you Like, you know, we have this taboo of like, well, then they're going to think I'm irresponsible. No, they'll think you're irresponsible when you run out of time and then you ask for an extension. But if you are like,

you're doing your job to manage the project, right? And if you are like as a producer like me, you look at the post-production deadline and you're like, this is insane. You know, can we have more time which is something I just had to do you know and um yeah it's good to like go to bat for people as a producer like to be like okay if I was an editor I would think this is insane and like I could see that they would have to work weekends like I wouldn't want that so you know you just like

kind of put your neck out um yeah that's how i would deal with it is ask so as a producer what would you say are like the best qualities that you should have what's one of the top qualities best qualities for a producer or you can't live without yeah i don't know. I'm trying to think of something that's, like, more interesting than, like, being organized. Time management, which is, like, kind of given. I think it depends.

Like, there's all kinds of people who are producers, and there's no set way of going about it. I think you have to have really good communication skills i think that you should have like some level of emotional intelligence because um a lot of the time producers um are dealing with yes like time and budget and those kind of things that seem like a emotional but those things are tied to people like you know if you're asking for more budget you're asking for more strain from like a person in the marketing department so like that's a person-to-person um thing that you're asking you know you're not just asking the spreadsheet for more money although I sometimes do that um uh yeah so people skills and like I think you also

have to have some of that like dad energy and that's like no matter your gender just like the no this is uh gotta put my foot down you know this is the way it's gotta be and I'm sorry I gotta play the card you know I've had to do that where it's like I want to give you this but I can't and so we're not doing it a lot of that to keep things on budget so yeah yeah you have to really manage the creative side of things with the business end of things right and yeah like what you said earlier was was correct you do need to have like I'd say like a really strong level of emotional intelligence because you're dealing with the client on one

side and then you're dealing with the creative team on the other side and you need to be able to communicate between both camps and then try to find like a happy middle ground for everyone involved and at the same time you also got to let them know that hey i'm batting for you so if i'll try to get what you want but i'm also dealing with this other stuff so yeah it's really interesting you're juggling like many hats you hit the nail on the head really like at a very high level um i sometimes feel like a double agent or something because i have to communicate from the from the client to like everybody else but then the director will have like ideas and so I have to kind of be like do we have budget for that and kind of have those negotiations but then

sometimes too directors will like doubt themselves and be like I don't have this idea so like I'll sometimes be like well what about this I'll have like my own ideas kind of like calibrating in my head like what the client wants and what the budget is like oh what about this and they'll be like that's great and I'm like okay great so it's just kind of like spinning plates like keeping things aligned for sure but um as I said there are like those hard decisions that are like really important to keeping like the client happy and like things on budget which like it sounds really boring but you kind of need to do those things at the end of the day like it's hard when you realize this the hard way with some projects and i've had that happen where you're just like well that's what the client

wants and so then like you're like and the director's like what but my name's on and it's like yeah i'm sorry they're paying for it i don't know what to tell you. And I hate it when that happens, but it does happen, you know. I don't know. Has that ever, like, damaged the relationship between you and a director where you had to put your foot down and say, look, I know, like, your creative vision is this and that, but, like, at the end of the day,

like, this isn't for you. The client is paying all our bills. Well, this is where the communication and, like, I think emotional intelligence comes in. There's a way of having those conversations where people understand the spot that you're in. And some people will do it in a way where they make it really personal for the director

or whoever it is they have to communicate with. And then that's a burnt bridge. But it doesn't have to be that way. If you're keeping in contact with the director and letting them know like where you stand and where the client stands then when that hard decision comes they'll be able to like trace it back and understand um and so i have a way of like talking about things at a very high level because it's like i don't want to get specific because it's like of course that could mean yeah yeah you know but um yeah so that's why i said like those things are important because there's a way of having those conversations where

a director is feeling isn't feeling betrayed but you know there's a reason why i think i've heard like you know producers and directors like they they clash because one's creative and the other is like money. But I think if you're falling into that dynamic of like us versus them in any relationship and creative, like you're really getting into hot water. Yeah, and I think it's definitely trickier. yeah and i think it's definitely trickier it's it's more applicable and and you with the music videos because at least with us we do corporate work yeah at the end of the day like you could be creative but at the end of the day it's a corporate video and you're not creating something very artistic so like if you do to an extent to an extent but if you have like a music video and you have a director on that like it's it's way more of a creative outlet so you can yeah and there's people that like build their whole portfolio and career around that so you do

have more uh you you'll run into more of those issues when you're trying to juggle the budget with the creative right so it's i think it's definitely a lot trickier on your end one thing i kind of wanted to steer the conversation into is you manage a team of directors kind of like a roster. I've always been curious about when a project comes through your doors, how do you typically go about selecting the right person for that job? Yeah, that's a good question. All of the times when a project does come our way, in all the number of ways it does, project does come our way in all the number of ways it does um there'll be a director already in mind by the client um a lot of the times we've been having a lot of good luck of you know our

directors are real go-getters so they will sometimes bring stuff to us like i was talking to this client or this artist and you're you're my production company of choice um so like i want to go in this together and to be transparent like we are pretty open with our roster like if they want to collaborate with other producers depending on their contract they're more or less open to do so um so yeah it'll come in those ways but sometimes we do have to kind of select a director that fits sometimes that's obvious like if it's like a food client food and drink client or even tabletop like we have tracy cox who's really um talented and fun to work with i just did a shoot with her last week um can i say the client i don't even know, but it's a fun alcohol brand.

And other times we'll be like, okay, what's a good fit here? Or sometimes people will be like, I really like this video. And it's like, okay, well, let's see if that director is available. So essentially you have a roster of directors, but they act more like a roster of freelance collaborators that you've worked with on many projects. Yeah, and that's just because we're flexible with the industry. I think keeping them in a box would just limit their work. work and um to be honest our team isn't like doesn't have the flex enough to like be bringing in enough work to keep everyone like busy all the time that's just that's just not a reality

if someone out there knows how to do that please let me know um but uh yeah it's just uh flexible so how did you get to the point where like how did you approach them with that proposal to say, like, hey, I want you on my roster? Like, did you, was it just like, hey, you want to be on my roster and that's it? Or did you offer something else in return? Like, what? Yeah. Honestly, this is kind of, again, where I'll go back to, like, being a people person and, like, communicating. go back to like being a people person and like communicating because a lot of the times it's not like a business proposition where we're like cold emailing people and doing that although if

that's your style like go for it there's lots of sales training that I have tried to learn and have wanted to give myself a lobotomy over but um uh but But it's been a number of ways. Like Max, who's on our roster, is like a longtime collaborator and partner at Relevance. He helped start the company. So he's like on there because like he's been there since the beginning. Tracy Cox actually emailed us because she really liked our branding. And then Ryan, who used to be with our company,

kind of started the relationship there. And so she actually called, emailed us. She's a real go-getter. That's why I love her. Who else? I'm trying to think. Steven Dunn is still on there. And he, again, I think that was like through Ryan

or just like reaching out to him because we had like a cool project he would be a good fit for. So it's just kind of like a number of ways, like kind of a networking sort of thing, I suppose. And Alicia now like who's on there is because I think we got, did we get this? Oh my God.

Like, why don't even I remember? Well, we know Alicia from through Ryerson, which is a lot of Route 11 people have done the Ryerson film program. I haven't. So we always knew her. And then I think a specific project we pitched for Julie Black which didn't pan out but we were like we really need like a black female director that would be cool like oh we know Alicia and then that sort of that relationship um and then we've just been giving her pitches ever since until finally like Coffee and Savannah all came through and so she's felt really supported by us

because we were always like feeding her treatments even if they weren't like green lit um which has been really nice and now she's like you're my number one pick for producers like even still like a few days ago she was like i have another project you're my first pick and it's just like really gratifying to have that relationship because um yeah going through production can sometimes be stressful so sometimes as a producer I always worry like are we still good you know it's a it's a lot these projects um so it's nice when we come out the other side and it's like let let's do it again. Do you find that a lot of the directors you work with bring along their own production teams

or are you sourcing that for them? We generally source it for them, yeah. For the most part, yeah. But, you know, some directors will have people that they like to work with and I always look to the director first for filling certain roles for sure. I was going to say, like, is there typically like, say, for example, if a director didn't fill all those roles, like, for example, one of the next most important role that you need

to fill after director is typically the director of photography. So how do you guys typically go about that? Do you have maybe the director let you know what kind of vision he wants, and then you go and look for those DOPs that you source for him or her? Or do you just have the director sometimes source it themselves? Yeah, so the DOP is a really important team member with the director. I think that a DOP and a director have to kind of be like Tweedledee and Tweedledum. Like they really have to be a duo.

Sometimes the director will have someone in mind. Oftentimes they do just because it is so important. So it's like in coming up with the idea for the video, they'll be like, and this person who I've worked with would be great for it. Other times they maybe don't know. And what I've done in the past is just really simple. I'll make like a Google Doc spreadsheet between me and the director. And I say, okay, I'm going to put like four DOPs that I think would be good for this in first choice, second choice, third choice, fourth choice. And then you add your choices as well.

Generally what I do is if the director makes suggestions, I'll tackle those first. And then some, or sometimes they'll be like, I like your choices. And then I go down the list. And that seems to work, especially with like the commercial music video work that I do where like, we don't have a lot of time. So I'll be emailing like three DOPs, three production designers, sometimes even at once to be like,

what's your availability because everyone's so busy, especially during COVID. It's been really hard to crew harder than it's ever been in my career. Everyone's been so booked. Yeah. And it's, it's been a real challenge. So that, like practical tool has been a great use. It's interesting, you mentioned that everyone is so

booked during COVID times, because a lot of the people that we've spoken to over the last few months, they've mentioned how, you know, work has been difficult, it's been hard to find work. Whereas, you know, in your experience, a lot of the people difficult it's been hard to find work whereas you know in your experience a lot of the people that you've been speaking to are at least your go-to people are all booked constantly i mean i mean that probably might say something to like the probably on how high of a level some of these productions are and you know you certainly need a certain kind of portfolio for that is that it or and i guess yeah that does seem a little weird especially considering how because of covid you have to use more skeleton crews so yeah would be like let's say there were 10 people

on set now there have to be there can only be five so there's five people that are now out of work right that could have been on that job but now aren't so it's interesting to hear i i'm just as like confounded as you guys but but I just know from like personal experience, like everybody's been busy. And when I, like, when I talk to, when I go to pick up equipment or when I go to like talk with people and I'm like, are you really busy? They're like, they give me this look like, yes, they're so like, they're just like white in the face.

Like I was talking with a rep at, I think it was, Oh, who was it? It wasn't Vanguard. It was a place that represents the DOPs that I can't think of. And it's embarrassing. I can't think of nobody judged me, but they represent DOPs. And I was like, are you like, is your roster busy right now? Because I'm going out of my mind. I can't find people to fill a role for projects. And she was like, is your roster busy right now? Because I'm going out of my mind. I can't find people to fill roles for projects. And she was like, I have no availability.

Everybody's gone on the job. Like, yeah. Because some people will call this rep apparently and be like, who's available? And she'll be like, no one. Like everyone's out on the job. So, and I mean, I know that this is a podcast for creative so I want to like I want to say that I have a lot of gratitude for being busy right now and that's not always the

case for a lot of the creative industries right now I will say it's been hard to have that gratitude because it is a pandemic one and number two I've been very busy and would like a break and now I finally have one but i've been trying to balance those two things where i'm like people aren't working right now and you're working so don't like too much well you said you're really busy now how does uh this time period compare to pre-prepandemic did you have like were you just busy the whole year or did you have like dead zones oh absolutely had dead zones yeah so this is um this is this definitely feels like it's because of covid because it lasted like through the summer into now so generally summer would be our busy time and sometimes that would it would pick up like mid-summer and then sometimes last into September

September a bit just to like finish things off you know and then you know I would feel like a pioneer woman like I'd be like ah winter is here hopefully we have enough in the we have enough in the cellar to keep and we would just like go into hibernation like like oh god it's so cold and then like emerge again and like may like sometimes literally no work like it's embarrassing to admit but like sometimes literally like not even a peep or an inquiry and i'd be like oh my god and your self-worth gets so eroded too when you're a business owner on top of it so i'm just like yeah in my cellar uh with my bonnet on until the spring um but now hopefully it'll be a bit different okay that is probably the best analogy we've heard of what the dead season is like yeah we've had we've had that zone in the past too for us it's usually been from uh december

till end of february like those are usually the ones where we would we would probably get like a couple projects here and there but not enough obviously you know how it would definitely stop last year last year was we started the year strong yeah yeah we did we did we did start the year off strong we had a lot of stuff lined up especially but it was unfortunately all that stuff that was lined up was for after march all the planning was in january february i was in the same boat yeah for sure and then all of a sudden nothing and it's like oh just when we had a really well projected year too you know and you know it's funny like before that we're like oh so we we've been plateauing we got to do things differently this year right so we're

planning for that and then we start the year off really strong we're like finally we're breaking out of this plateau and everything and then boom yeah but the cool thing is that as soon as like the covid thing well it started i don't know i can't say dying down opening up again when the city started opening up like we got super busy it's like everyone wanted to do work again and we it was like we made like a like almost half of what we made last year just in the last two months no that's us too it's really funny because we're in the same boat i think uh we did a video for sean hook we shot it on Valentine's Day, I remember. So it's February.

So that was like, oh God, we were just on the cuff. We didn't even know the paradise we were in. We didn't even know we would be at East of Eden. We were just so naive. And then, so we're shooting Valentine's Day and then it was the same thing. Then it hit and me and Peter just thought you know what can you do like we can't shoot and then right when we

opened up in June is when we did the first coffee video and it's been like eight music videos and then here I am which is why I'm like I'm tired can you tell me a bit of what's the difference between shooting like a music video or a corporate video would you say they're kind of like the same um yeah i've done corporate videos which that's more what you guys do is what you're saying right yeah yeah um there's definitely similarities i think i think like even though corporate videos are less exciting, it depends on what your view of exciting is. If exciting is making money, corporate videos might even be even more exciting, to be honest. But there's also cheaper corporate videos, too.

It depends what price point you guys target. videos too it depends what price point you guys target um the difference is i find i find the clients actually to be a little more like lenient for corporate videos like they are i've had a lot of maybe i've just been lucky a lot of the corporate stuff that i've done like the clients have been like wow just everything we do is just like that's great i didn't even know I would be getting this like you're like and now we're gonna color the video they're like that's not it I can't believe it which um and then in music videos there's just more like levels of approval and like I don't want to sound cynical but there's like egos and

there's a little bit of vanity involved so that's like it can get trepidatious don't want to sound cynical but there's like egos and there's a little bit of vanity involved so that's like it can get trepidatious where people want to like look a certain way and they want to be cool and they want to be on the edge but like when you're doing like 3d printing like orthopedic for a client they're like we just want to show that our product is great and like look at this 3d printer and we're like we got you it's fine you know um you know i don't have to bring in yeah all the stops for that like you can kind of cover your bases but you know it has its challenges too like i you guys were talking about like managing clients for corporate stuff too and like you can really fall into some like landmine

situations where you're like, Oh, look at this great product shot we have. And they're like, the wrong finish is on the like, Oh my goodness, we can't show this because, you know, this is like, it's pink when like, we would never have a pink mold for the orthopedic thing, because that's not industry standard. And you're like, Oh, I'm learning a lot about orthopedics suddenly. You know, and you don't even know like the thing you've committed. So there's that too. Yeah, there's definitely a lot of things that are beyond your control when it comes to like corporate stuff.

One thing we've learned, we've learned to just, you know, it's part of the business. And if things need to be redone or like we will all revisit that. We haven't had that but we have not had a if i'm just i'm just saying if that happens you know it's it's an it's an easier thing to manage usually what happens though is that the client like because we always have the client on set with us right and i think at that point they kind of realize why we mentioned some things in the pre-production yeah we needed to, that, because now we're in this type of situation.

But they've usually always been like understanding and they get what it is. And I think at a certain point, they just go like, okay, we need to get this and go. Yeah, it's a standard challenge that you would typically face in the corporate world. But one thing that you mentioned that I think is a challenge

that a lot of people face in the creative world and is very, very difficult to manage, especially if you don't wanna burn bridges, is managing egos. And I just wanted to kind of get a sense of how you approach that, especially if you have, like you mentioned, some people wanna look a certain way, they want a very certain style,

or their definition of a style is very different from what the director's definition is like how do you manage that um you know if you really want to get like in detail about it there as're, as much as I said, I hate those sales trainings that I've done. They have some really great, like, if you're especially type A like me, they have some pretty great charts on managing different personality styles. So one that I have felt is helpful, and I might have gaps in my remembering it, is a disc profile. So if you can imagine like a four square quadrant and D are dominant. E I is, you know what?

I should just tell people to look it up. Google disc profile, D I S C. Yeah. And basically like there's dominant, which is D. And there's like, I was interpersonal,

I think. And basically you can kind of put people into like four different categories and it tells you how to communicate with them best. Because I think when it comes to egos, it's just a communication thing, you know? Right. Like dominant people don't want their time to be wasted. They want to hear just the facts

and they want you to do it quickly. And for someone like me, who's more like emotional and more like hey how are you I want to like make friends they find me kind of annoying they're like you're wasting my time or you're being fake with me they think I'm being fake when I'm trying to be friendly and so it's like I'm not and like they're not wrong either we just need to find a way to like mesh. So when it comes to egos, it's just a communication thing. Like when it comes to doing an interview for a corporate client or somebody lip syncing, like a track for a music video,

they're not wrong to want to look their best. So don't begrudge them for it. Just prepare for it because they're a human being and they want to look nice. You know, we make things look nice we're in video so you know don't like don't like get too cynical about it just like try to move with them uh in that case yeah especially in music especially music videos where not only do you need to sound good but you also need to look as good as you sound yeah it has to complement it and even more so because it's like you're selling more so the person almost at times right yeah yeah and that's i mean that's just like where the magic comes in you know like it's not just

the stylist it's not just the makeup person it's not just the lighting or the direction it's all those things together that make it look good you You know, I just had a video we were shooting on Thursday and like people will just ask like who came up with the visuals? They'll just ask something like that, which I totally understand. But it's like, what do you what is that really? What does that mean? Like the visuals when you're looking at a monitor, it's like, well, this is all this is all of us.

Like we had the stylist killed it. She looks amazing. the lighting is amazing we decided on these colors like on the fly or maybe even in the treatment we you know it's like a mix of everyone was it the client that asked that or it was i think a bts person yeah but they were with the artist team so yeah they were happy right right yeah no it's it's very interesting you mentioned about the the four quadrant system of personalities i've never heard anyone mention that that's how they uh go about communicating with certain types of people like typically you know you try to you know be as be as real as you can as who you are and then you know like try to

make the clients happy but that's like a very specific way to do it strategically especially as you mentioned like if one person is very dominant just wants the facts and like no bs whatsoever and then you know then someone else who's like a lot more like um like a emotional like a friendly you know like like you said doesn't always necessarily mesh at least at first glance but that's a very cool approach to to managing people we do that too but we we it's the quadrant system i'm just saying it's just interesting to see how he categorized it very simply for people to kind of uh take away from it right yeah we do it based on like vibes yeah which is the same same thing right the non-scientific version of it yeah his is the more scientific way i haven't mastered it it's i think it's from uh i'm trying to remember the sales training that i got it from i forget the name of it but

i haven't mastered it it takes like really a long time to actually adapt how you communicate and talk once you realize somebody's communication style I just kind of do it a little more like on a low level baseline um yeah sometimes me and my business partner will even joke like we'll be like definitely a d definitely just wants to pax this one you know we can just tell from an email or something um yeah but it takes a if you really want to master it it takes time because you're right. We tend to just be like, I'm just going to be myself.

And I get that. It's like, it might seem kind of phony to like adapt your communication styles, but it's really not. It's really making things easier for you and everyone. No, I think you, you a hundred percent need to adapt your communication. Like we try to be authentic, but people again like they just some people are more numbers based so you kind of adapt to that so people are more social so you you just you just be more social with them right like yeah i mean we're social enough to begin with so for us yeah

yeah yeah whatever right you just think of it like if you were putting on a presentation for that person right so if they are like i think an i or an S is more social. So you would definitely go into the presentation and be like, hey, how was everyone's weekend? You know, that's like starting off on a really great foot. But if you know it's like some business analyst who just wants the facts, you're just like, how much time do I have you for? Half hour? Great. And you just start first slide.

You know what I mean? It's funny. You mentioned that the first thing that popped into my head is that scene from the office when michael and ryan were trying to sell this business idea and it was a lot of as you said people who are just very like you know simple you know like they're doing their work they don't want any bs and then they're just doing the super social thing that you would see and it's you don't remember the scene where it's just like how's everybody doing just in the office and i remember the scene where it's uh janet or jan jan yeah jan and michael and they're trying to pitch the the guy um at the wings place and then jan just wanted to do like the numbers thing it's like okay this is what we can offer you and

everything and michael's like oh okay let's get some baby back ribs and then go from there and he did like the whole social thing and that worked out that's a good example of being adaptable actually if you want to search up disc profile and then just assign an office character to each quadrant that's probably a great way to like memorize it i've i did it on people that i know in my life so and obviously it hasn't really worked but because i'm like I forget everyone but I just did like oh this person is this kind but office characters would be great Michael would probably be more the emotional like an eye validation why don't you tell us a bit about the sales trainings you did and I guess like how they helped you? Well, when I took over Route 11 a few years ago,

basically I worked with my partner, Ryan, and then he left to start another venture and was like, now it's just going to be you and Peter. And I freaked out and hid under my desk desk basically and like kind of literally actually uh and I didn't think I could do it and um the big thing that was always hard for me is is figuring out how to bring in new work which to be honest to this day like I still haven't really hacked I don't really know how anyone can like have a sales formula in film production and I've done a lot of training to try to figure it out and that's something that I guess I'm still figuring out or have just kind of like

let go of but when I was doing when I was trying to figure that out I did a lot of self-training to try to uh remedy that um what can i say about it i know that i hate it and i know that i don't feel good at it but i know that it's also necessary what i could say about it because i would just be doing a lot of cold calls and cold emails because i didn't really know what else worked. It's really tricky in our industry. Yeah, there's no formula that you can apply and then it's going to work for every single company because every company is very different. Like we mentioned before that one thing we tried to do

about two, three years ago was bring in a salesperson, but they had a very structured kind of templated system for selling and they tried to apply it to our business. And he's like, okay, so what packages do you offer clients? You know, God, I was going to say, did they say, do you have packages? They just want a widget. They just want, this is the widget. Do you want the widget? Okay. Do you want the widget? It's like, it's not like that. We had the exact same experience a few years ago. We hired a salesperson and they just have, they just have no clue. And it's, it's true.

It's really frustrating being in production with that because even all of the sales software is like, just put in the estimate for how much you think this client is worth. And it's like, I have no idea. I can't even tell you that, you know? So then it's like, all your projections are like weird because you're like giving, I don't know. It's just, it's really frustrating. Well, there's a whole new step in the sales process in our industry that I think people don't realize. Typically they would have the product, how much it costs. And then their whole

job is just to simply communicate how much that costs to the client and how much they need it. then their whole job is just to simply communicate how much that costs to the client and how much they need it. The new phase in the sales process for our industry is that we have to first get in touch with the customers and figure out what their needs are. So it's a lot of like direct contact that we need to have before we can even figure out what the product is, how much it would cost, you know, and like, especially if you're distributing it like nationwide on a campaign, you know, like there's so many variables that go into and you have to first figure that out. And then the selling process technically comes in. So it's, it's very tricky to, like, you need to have people who are within the industry to really

understand that process. Well, yeah, I think we just had one, one, I think our last guest, understand that process well yeah i think we just had one one i think our last guest actually they they brought on a salesperson and it's been working out well for them because that person was in the video production industry so they understand the industry but even within that you need to find the right person because the guy we tried he was in he was doing sales for wedding video production companies yeah so he was trying to apply like the wedding packages template to our thing and it doesn't work like that because again we're not selling you can't blame them it works right for weddings it works yeah it works for weddings but for us it's it's almost like we're not even selling like the videos we're selling more so the talent, right?

In some ways. That and the results. It's more results of like what the content will be, right? I don't think it's results because that would be, that would be, that would make sense if you're a digital. Maybe if you're an agency. Yeah. If you're a marketing agency, then you're selling the results.

Yeah. Whereas we're just selling the content, right? Yeah. But that content is dependent on a lot of other things because, again, our content is only good if you use it in a certain way, right? I've discovered this real gap as well where people really want us to kind of do that heavy lifting and we're not a marketing agency either. So, you know, that's happened a lot of times where we're like, well, do you have a plan for implementing this content?

And, you know, I guess if you were really smart, you could develop some kind of production workflow or something where you're like proven results because X, Y, Z, you know, we have the data that this kind of production gets like responses i don't know if that's the company i want to run so i haven't really done that and i have never really seen a way to like shoot something to like get more responses or buys or like or whatever it is that they're after i can i can develop a production workflow that's like more collaborative or flexible

um I can like be open to different like formats and doing all that kind of thing but I found it really hard to to kind of say oh well we offer videos that get results and it's like i can't really i'm not a silicon valley like data farm that can like that can tell you shoot it this way because studies have shown in ab testing that like people with red hair holding your product whatever like that's just not the company i'm interested in running first of all and i don't even have that knowledge do you know what i mean yeah i don't i don't think i don't think there's i don't think any video production company could even say that right because again at that point you're no longer a video production company you're an advertising agency or a marketing agency because you do need that extra information but i actually wonder if like they actually use that kind of thing like

oh yeah like use a redhead because then it gets like more he's just giving he's just giving i was actually wondering though if that's a thing like that'd be interesting i think like the top one percent like five percent actually do like they actually do do that kind of testing but it requires such resources in time that i think 99 of like brands are just like this looks good let's try it out and then they're like that went well we don't know why but we'll just keep doing it until it stopped working that's most marketing i went to create i went to creative advertising i kind of know that a lot of marketing is just um i don't want to say bullshit because it's not fair but it's like a lot of just trying things out and being like well well, that's stuck.

So how do you handle clients that come up to you and they say, hey, we need video content, and you tell them, okay, we could do that for you. Do you have a marketing budget to promote this? And they say, no, we don't. How do you handle that type of situation? Because you know that long-term, that's not going to be good for either the client or yourself

because that video is not going to perform well well and if it doesn't perform well then they're gonna go like why do I need to get you what why do I need to hire you again because again like I tried video and it didn't work out for me I mean this might be controversial but I would definitely tell them like okay like we can't promise a lot of views or like whatever it is their goal is but frankly that is not my issue if they still want to go forward with making the video great how they use it is up to them I make it clear that I don't promise anything yeah um but sometimes it can be really disheartening

because especially when we work with like independent artists for example I think there is this idea that once they get a good video it'll just kind of pop off um and I never promised that I never promised that but I think they see our other work and they just assume um and that kind of sucks so I think in the future I would definitely have like a conversation where I'm like hey is there a plan and like let's talk about our expectations for this video especially to avoid that like sour feeling perhaps towards us because I think that has happened but honestly I I don't feel too badly about it it's not really my job to do the push out of the content I just make good content and I just make good content.

And I don't say that in a mean way. I say that as a person who like really deeply cares about their work. And I need to like make, I need to make boundaries for myself or else I'll just give everything into every little thing that I produce and I'll have nothing left for myself. So I draw the line. It's definitely hard to kind of like do all that stuff at once. Like if you know you're really good in one certain aspect of the whole process, like

keep fostering that and do it really well. But since you focus a lot on just making the content itself and none of the marketing, do you typically do mostly direct to client work or do you collaborate with a lot of different ad agencies where, you know know if a client does come to maybe say both of you or one of you um you will create the content and then you'll work with this agency to kind of push it out there do you have any of those types of relationships so i'd say that like 10 to 15 percent of our work is two agencies so not a lot we've just kind of collaborated with a few then mostly um i guess i would call direct the client for music videos direct to artists and direct a

client for corporate stuff to the actual brand or whatever so then like mostly uh direct to clients and then like some well i guess in the case of music video agencies would be labeled too so right like yeah 30 agencies and then like 70 direct to client we can say so mostly direct to clients i'm reaching out to us yeah yeah i mean especially with music videos since you're dealing with a lot of independent artists uh of different you know sizes in terms of uh out uh audience spaces and outreach outreach yeah like it i guess it really you are pretty much more so in the direct to client i like working with the agencies like we just did like a shoot last week and it's been a while since I worked with like an

agency to be honest make of this what you will we've worked a lot really well with like PR agencies that are starting to make their own content they really like us a lot of the traditional like creative agencies that I actually went to school thinking I would work there because they're like very um they're like winning all the cans lines and the marketing awards they for some reason don't give us the time of day and I just think that there's a long-standing like bond between the old school production companies and those old school ad agencies yeah I don't really know I don't really know why but the new PR agencies that are like starting to kind of eat the lunch of the traditional ad agencies really like working with us. So we just worked with one of them last week and it was this cute little fun, quick job. And I remembered how nice it was to work with someone like that.

We had the storyboards. We knew exactly what the text was going to be. They were like, here's the, when we were editing it today, like here the font here's the copy i'm like oh everything is all figured out i forgot that's how this is supposed to go some companies the reason they may not uh give content creators the time of day is because they've worked with certain people for decades and you know obviously think of it like like the directors you work with right you know how they work you're very comfortable You know they will do a good job. It's sometimes going to be a risk if you bring in someone new

that you haven't worked with before a test. And especially on these big ad agencies, when you're talking about millions of dollars in marketing dollars that go into it, you know, they're going to obviously go a lot of the time with people they've worked with before, right? Yeah.

And I mean, that's definitely part of it. It's also like these people are really busy and they're really stressed and it takes a lot of their time and effort to kind of consider their new option and i was kind of thinking of that when i was so busy and people would reach out to me for stuff like think about it when you're really busy and someone emails you with a new thing like what's your response like you're just like uh get out of the way like you're because you're like uh you know so that's like them all the time it's a busy industry so i have like sympathy in that respect um yeah i don't know and that's kind of it have they asked you like let me guess did they ask you to like do like case study videos

for them or anything like that case study videos case study oh no that's just that when i was first barking up the tree of like big agencies they were like yeah we'll try you out we'll try you out can you would you be interested in doing like case study videos for us it was basically like these videos that they would use to submit to awards. Huh. I've never heard of this. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know.

I was kind of insulted because it's like, what do you get out of that? You don't get anything. All they want is somebody to like work on a video that they submit to an award. So it'll be like if they did like a Burger King ad, like you would edit together, like the success of it and like what they did and,

you know, all of like the motion graphics and everything for it and we were just like no we want to do the actual commercials they were like bye wait would they pay you for that or is it it's free like to get your foot in the door wow that's yeah no no wonder no wonder you were like no like i don't want to do this like free work for nothing. If anyone's listening to you in the same boat, I kind of thought early on doing stuff like that would be a foot in the door for sure, doing a favor.

And in my experience, something I've learned is if people don't pay you the first time, they won't want to pay the second, the third, the fourth. They just won't. We did this fun... What do I want to say? second the third the fourth they just won't yeah we did like this we did like this fun uh i want to say i want i'll keep it general we did this fun video for like this agency and also they were like a digital i don't know like they did websites and also like vr like the technological kind of production company but like in the tech side and like agency side of

things and we thought it would be kind of like this beginning of this new relationship and I worked really hard in this video even went into their office like edit it at their offices internally to like push it out in time and the only time we heard back from them again is when they had to do that same video again the next year so it's just like oh you really don't consider me until it's convenient and it's like I'm not saying this in a way to be mad like yeah I learned a lot in the sales training to be honest it's just like that's the way people are that's the way people are groomed to behave in their jobs like they're just trying to get the job done so yeah no one appreciates anything that's free right like they're just trying to get the job done so yeah no one appreciates anything

that's free right yeah it's about it you're just you're obviously you're just managed you're just telling people that they should manage their expectations when you know an opportunity well not exactly an opportunity but when a gig or should we say comes up like that where it's you know where they want you to kind of do something for free you know you got to take it with a grain of salt it's like don't expect that you're going to have a whole lot of work after that because as you said if you do it free they're not going to pay you the second or third time as you mentioned or what a business like they they should have money if they don't have money then what the hell are they doing yeah yeah you'd think that i i mean i get like gigs like if you're gigs can lead to opportunities

like if you're working on a short film and everyone's pitching in their time sure like you make connections that it might lead to something you're working with a business like if you as a business you can't afford what you're hiring then i mean you got issues uh but you did talk about sorry you did talk about pr agencies so that's interesting because we've we know about like ad agencies marketing agencies but PR agencies entering the field with more video content is interesting right because they normally don't do that right no so what I've seen in the past it's happening been happening for a few years now is PR agencies just taking on more of the responsibility of ad agencies

so it's not even necessarily like a pr video of like an event or something like because our company wouldn't really do something like that but it's literally like i think for them it's because they're already managing the client and have the relationship going with them and so if your client's like well we also kind of want to do this push like can you manage that too you know then the PR agency is just like well we're leaving money on the table that's kind of what's happened right so because they're already managing their like holiday push-out event thing I don't know I'm not really in PR but then they're like well they also want like sponsored posts so like why don't we

just do that too because we're all doing the holiday thing for the so that's kind of how it's involved I wonder if our relationship is better with them because they have like more of like a tenacity i don't know they're they're willing to collab with yeah i wonder what like if they're gonna start evolving their services i wonder what the difference is going to be between like if you're a marketing agency versus if you're a PR agency, because if everyone's evolving what they're offering, like even us, like we're long term, we want to kind of convert into like a video production agency, but also kind of digital marketing. Right. So it seems like everything is getting like mixed together. Right. Maybe like long term, there's just going to be like one thing that's around. Right. Yeah. And it's going to be like a mix of marketing, PR and video or photo as well, right?

Well, that's something that's been happening for a long time too. And maybe they're too big to fail, but I've been waiting for the bigger agencies to really take a beating. And I think some of them definitely have with the closing of some of them. But I've seen PR agencies, yeah, become more ad agencies. I've seen PR agencies start representing influencers because they work with them so much. Definitely video production companies doing more digital marketing for sure. Yeah, it's interesting to see.

It's interesting to see these big ad agencies especially try to like re silo their departments and kind of like make new product offerings when it's like you're just kind of combining departments dude like what do you mean it's a new they're like introducing and they'll kind of like make this like helvetica font like a oh a new team it's a new it's a new team within our within our agency and it's a internal production that's like fast and we shoot shoot vertical and like look at it and it's like this whiz bang edit reel and it's like oh gosh you know i don't know i guess sometimes it works i kind of see through it a little bit you know as a little guy um there's a production but it's interesting to watch for those agencies that are trying to make a big show of it it's like yeah we got a vast production team you know

working around the clock for you our client and it's like one guy exactly it's just one guy just sitting in the corner on a laptop editing he's an unpaid intern too he's an unpaid intern too. He's an unpaid intern, yeah. Yeah, it's like, so who shoots, Susan? Who edits, Susan? You're like, oh, Susan. Yeah, it's funny. It's funny is what it is. So we all got to get a Susan and then make a big deal of it, right?

You killed me with the Helvetica. Yeah, I know. So on point. So on point. You know what i'm talking about i am we all know that font yeah i mean i mean do your thing i guess if you want you know so sam what are like some of the maybe short-term goals that you have you know like especially now with how the industry is so unpredictable even more so now than before like what are some things that you maybe have like in the works where you want to kind

of you know dive into like going forward or the type of projects you want to work on yeah um great question so i think really short term right now unfortunately what i kind of unfortunately i'm just trying to ride this wave right now. Like, like I said, I'm really busy and I'm just like, thank you. Like, that's a good thing. Even though I'm stressed, it's the pandemic and it's been really uncertain for businesses, including ours. And so we, but we've been really thankful for this work. So I'm going to do that first of all.

And then long-term with Route 11, we've been working on trying to produce our first feature. and then long term with Route 11, we've been working on trying to produce our first feature. And that's, yeah, that's kind of been in the works and that's, I know we didn't really talk about this a lot, but that's always been our long term goals to pivot away from commercial music videos and start producing more long term and narrative stuff.

What's the film about? I don't know if I can actually say, but it's a sci-fi feature film with, I don't know if I can talk about it, but it's a director that we have known for a while. And he came to us and was like, I really trust you guys to kind of help. And we sort of have been helping him with the script. And now it's kind of in the later development stages.

And we're like looking at funding and all that kind of stuff. So that's been interesting because I have never produced a feature before. So I'm learning a lot. I'm just taking it as a learning opportunity. And then this might seem like way out there because again we didn't really touch on this but like on top of being a producer I'm also a comedian uh and uh also during this pandemic stand-up comedy has like stopped which has been very depressing as well too which is part of why I'm like throwing myself into work like what else am I doing um But I want to be like writing and creating my own TV show or my own content

along those lines. So it might even be a situation where I take a break from Route 11 and start like writing or like trying to get into a writing room for a TV show or something like that. And I just have to plan for that myself too and I've honestly been waiting for this break and work to kind of re-evaluate what I want my like goals to be in the next couple years um and I'm thankful that I have like a business partner who wants me to just like explore other avenues even if that means kind of like drifting away from whatever route 11 is but yeah so those are like that's like short term goal and then like midterm will be the future and then like the big

picture is um yeah writing more and doing producing more comedic stuff because that's really what i want to do i think your your your comedy kind of shown showed a bit through this uh kind of shown a bit through this. That's so embarrassing. Do not tell me I've been funny because I've also just like talked about like disc profile personalities. So please nobody take this as a sampling of my actual comedic talent.

Thank you. Is there anything you want to plug or like any, like where can people find you guys yeah so uh brute 11 is my production company you can find us at root11.com r-o-u-t-e-e-l-e-v-e-n.com and then on instagram i think we're r-o-u-t-e underscore e-l-e-v-e-n i know it's a terrible name no one knows if it's root or route or if it's like 11, the number or spelled out. Listen, okay. I've heard it all. Also a chip company took the domain with the 11.

So this is what we're left with. So, uh, and, um, yeah, you can check our website for our latest work, uh, on our main page. Cool. And your, and your comedy website is what sorry oh my instagram is at sam is laughing uh i'm trying to get better at posting more like community content on there so yeah you can check that out too but i'm very busy i'm doing my best okay no it's all good thank you so much for taking the time to join us on the Creatives Grab Coffee show. You know, I love the discussion and you really shared a lot of interesting insights into that in your particular world of the industry. So thank you.

We appreciate it. Thanks. Bye. Thank you for tuning into the Creatives Grab Coffee podcast. You can find us on Spotify, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Let us know if there are any topics you would like for us to cover in future episodes. You can reach out to us at creativesgrabcoffee at gmail.com.