Shane Smith Discusses Millennials, VICELAND

BALI: Shane Smith, co-founder and CEO of VICE Media, talked about the new VICELAND channel and reaching Millennial audiences at the APOS convention in Bali this morning.

Asked about how VICE evolved into a content producer for multiple platforms, Smith noted, “We do a lot of research, and one of the things we saw was that the cohort that goes out and spends the most amount of money on food is Gen Y, but how many food programs were online or on TV for Gen Y? None. We’re not geniuses. If they’re spending the most money, then let’s make some media [for them]. So we started doing Millennial food programming. And it blew up. And then we were selling it to TV and we said, we should do this for all of our verticals. So we started getting young people to make TV. Everybody says, what’s your secret sauce? Give your company to the interns, Give a 22-year-old $10 million and say, go make a TV series. Sometimes it comes back and sometimes they run away to Mexico and never come back. Sometimes you get good TV and sometimes you get a lawsuit.”

Smith talked about his vision for VICELAND. “Everybody thought we were crazy because we’re an online company and we said we’re going to do TV. We don’t look at it as a network. We say it’s a content creation engine that can go into mobile, into online, into TV.” The holy grail, he said, is three screens being programmed at the same time, “with new innovative monetization.”

Smith says he sees VICELAND as a “laboratory—we get to make a lot of great content and then auction it to the highest bidder or the best platform in any country.” The channel has launched in the U.S., Canada and the U.K. and at MIPTV announced plans to expand to France.

“We have 12 networks rolling out over the next 12 months. Those are all tied to online and mobile platforms.”

In the U.S., “it’s the fastest aging-down of a network in history. We’re bringing Millennials [back to TV]. We’re bringing in advertisers who want to get to that demographic. It’s been fantastically successful.”

On plans for Asia, he said, “Anywhere there’s a young audience, we salivate. There’s a different generation flexing their muscles now. The Baby Boomers have run media for the last 40 years. Now Gen Y is going to run media for the next 40. We’re the voice of that generation. Anywhere there’s a young population, we’re very excited.”

Smith added, “We’re about to announce a large partnership in Japan, we’ve been in China for quite some time and we’re about to announce a big partnership there. India, Indonesia, Southeast Asia are very important for us. Young populations thirsting for lifestyle content, music, travel, food, etc.”

On the advertising side, Smith said that for Millennials, “There’s dissatisfaction with the brands. And there’s dissatisfaction with the agencies that represent those brands. Spots and dots [traditional advertising] isn’t working online, isn’t working in mobile, isn’t working for young people. Young people have been marketed to since they were kids. Cartoons are made to sell cereal. You don’t have to hit them over the head with product placement or commercials. We’re going back to pre-dots and spots.”

He added, “We just had the best quarter we’ve ever had. We sold more in Q1 than we did in all of last year, because our bet on TV worked.”