Is it Time For the Return of the MCN?

Machinima, Maker Studios and Fullscreen could have been ahead of their time

An interesting question came up last week at the Future of Television event in Los Angeles: now that creators are becoming that much more prominent, and crucial to marketers, do we need to return to the days of the MCN (“multichannel network,”)?

As more creators have to think about consistent production schedules, rate cards, and the need to interface with media agencies and marketing execs, how much do they need third-party support - versus building out their own mini-companies (with ad sales, business development and all that)?

How realistic is “the fantasy of the person being a one-man band making billions?” as Variety’s Andrew Wallenstein put it.

So is it worth asking whether the MCN was ahead of its time? Is the business model due for a comeback?

That really depends on who you talk to. There were many attendees and panelists who balked at this idea, and several used the phrase “MCNs are a bad word.”

You may or may not recall, but in the early 2010s, a spate of companies emerged promising to bring some organization and business acumen to the YouTube sector. Companies ranging from Maker Studios to Stylehaul to Machinima raised millions. Some were straight up ad sales networks, others hybrid production firms, and some even tried to launch consumer brands. By the middle of the decade, many were snatched up by big media companies, where they generally proved a bad fit or economically unsound.

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Yet there may be a resurgence underway, albeit via different forms and models. Take Cookit Media, founded by former Bon Appetit executive Laurie Buckle about a dozen years or so ago. The company exclusively works with about 20 to 30 food-focused creators, assisting with everything from brand introductions to programming slates.

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Feels kind of MCNish to me. To get at just how Cookit works, I had Buckle on my new Next in Creator Media podcast this week, and she talked about how she built the company through first consulting with several creators.

“The creators were kind of coming back to me and saying, ‘these brands, they're reaching out to me, and I don't know what to say to them.’ But having been an editor who has a sales team and an editorial team, I was really comfortable in that space of talking with brands, and kind of better understanding how to build that component into an opportunity for them.”

“So at that point, we really did become an agency. We became an influencer marketing agency.”

Some would quibble with that definition, as 'agencies' don’t usually have stables of creators who make shows - or at least not historically. And other media agencies don’t always love the idea of working with other agencies.

Could the creator world use more aggregated demand mechanisms on the sell side of things? Isn’t navigating the vast creator space super challenging?

“It is and it isn't,” said Crossmedia CEO Kamran Asghar. “There are ways to do it in a consolidated fashion, where you don’t have to go one by one." Asghar mentioned Influential, which was acquired by Publicis earlier this year. “It’s when you try to craft the perfect campaign, that is extremely time consuming.”

There’s that agency word again. It seems there is just a lot of line blurring in this space in general, and no one likes the idea of being seen as just some middleman.

Kevin Kurtz, CEO of the Bold Baking Network said he sees an opening for an MCN-like rebirth, but with better execution.

“There is an opportunity here that is different from how the original MCNs were created and what happened over time,” he said.

With his company, the focus has been on building a curated collection of niche star baking creators, rather than rolling up thousands of channels.

“We help our creators with execution, strategy, commerce, things they don’t have time for on their own,” said Kurtz

After starting with his wife Gemma Stafford’s YouTube channel, Bold Baking Network has amassed a collection of creators from across the globe, even partnering to bring content to Delta Airlines.

One big difference this time around is that TV distribution is possible. Bold Baking Network launched a FAST channel early this year. That sort of thing just isn’t very likely for any one creator.

“Together we can be so much more powerful,” Kurtz said. “So I think you’ll see new models emerge.”

For Cookit, the model right now is to help serve as translator between brands and creators. “Basically we are working with two clients,” Buckle told me on the podcast.

“It's a lot like a magazine. You have readers and you have advertisers. And it's the same thing here. We have an exclusive roster of food creators that we have very carefully created that, and we understand who they are…And we are able to connect them with brands that align and create partnerships that really succeed.”

“We talk about ourselves as an influencer marketing agency because that's the work that we do and a talent management company simply because those two things exist under the same roof.“