Izzet Pinto Talks Content Marketing Strategies

In a keynote at NATPE, Izzet Pinto, founder and CEO of Global Agency, discussed the distribution outfit’s innovative approaches to launching content on a global scale.

Pinto walked attendees through the company’s launch of the Turkish drama Another Love at MIPCOM, which included print and online advertising campaigns, a press conference with the show’s stars in Cannes, social media fan engagement and media outreach. “We reached 25.2 million people around the world,” Pinto said. “Once you reach these numbers, buyers want to know more about the show.”

Global Agency also hosted a lavish party for the show’s launch, enlisting singers from the U.S. and Germany and a DJ from Turkey. “You need to plan minute by minute. If for ten minutes people aren’t enjoying themselves, they leave. You need to make sure that people stay till the very end.” The entertainment for the night was brought to the venue in Monte Carlo by helicopter so those clips could be posted to social media. “It’s all about the buzz,” Pinto said.

After the company returned home to Istanbul post-launch, the team utilized AI to dub interviews with the stars into multiple languages.

“It’s all about 360 degrees of marketing,” Pinto said.

Submitting shows for prestigious awards, and backing that up with “for your consideration” campaigns, is also key, Pinto noted. “If you make sure that everyone knows about the show, then the people on the jury will watch it. If the product is good, you can win it.”

Asked by an audience member how much a campaign like this costs, Pinto said, “It’s over $500,000, but it feels like $1 million plus.”

For individual market or regional launches, Global Agency works closely with its broadcast or streaming partners to help support the debut of its shows. “The most important thing is to bring the stars to the country. We help with that.”

Asked by World Screen how the company chooses which shows to devote its marketing heft to, Pinto said: “For dramas, I want to make sure the talents are well-known. I won’t make a launch for a daily series in Turkey where the stars are new faces. I tell producers that this project is not the right one to make an international launch. I prefer dramas with big talent.”

On how to launch non-scripted shows, meanwhile, Pinto said, “I try to attach ideas to the shows.” For example, it launched a simple quiz show with a campaign that involved giving out envelopes of real cash to market attendees if they could successfully answer simple questions. “The next day we were on the cover of a local newspaper in France.” That initiative cost between $20,000 and $30,000, the cost of a billboard, he noted.