Ursus Magana and Raf Luzi

Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets Podcast. My guests today are Ursus mcgona and Raf Lousey of twenty five to seven Media. Gentlemen, what is twenty five to seven Media?

Whose place to work? Man?

Okay, just so people can distinguish the voices, this is Raf.

Hello, guys. Twenty five seven Media is a company that's entranced in digital and internet culture. We work with influencers, musicians, and we try to create different moments on the Internet than now. We're starting to spill over in real life, and people like Bob and people in the music industry have taken kind of interest.

Too, versus something to add to that.

That's second all that, and I'll say it again, it's the coolest place to work. And yeah, I'm really happy that best friends just really believed in each other and believed in the Internet.

Well, how long have you guys known each other?

We've known each other for about five six years now. And then the other founder, Andrew, I've known him for twelve years. So yeah, it's it's a trio. But right now it's just me and Raf.

Okay, you guys are experts on social media. Let's talk generally, what do people not understand about social media that you guys.

Know, I think people are trying to overcomplicate it. There's kind of three different people that don't get it. It's either unfortunately an agism thing. There's people that don't think it's a tool that they can use. They think it's only for celebrities or for people that have a nick on it. And then thirdly it's businesses that aren't really

Okay, let's go through the varying social media platforms. Snapchat, to what degree does that mean anything in terms of business?

I mean, I'm sure that they're looking at that billion and they might have want you know, they might have wanted to take it, but Snapchat is actually very underrated right now. It's very underrated, and we actually have experimented a lot with it. I'll let rap talk about it a little bit. But the way that I see social media platform when it's dying is people tend to think like, oh, you know, it's no longer there, da Dad, Like, let's

Yeah, go ahead.

Yeah. So Snapchat is it's more in an authenticity tool. So every platform has its own thing. Instagram is a resume, so you have to cheat your Instagram like a resume. Snapchat is about authenticity. TikTok is about a lot short form videos that we're supposed to be on YouTube, but you're doing trailer videos on TikTok to then hopefully take themto YouTube, and then YouTube to this day is still

Okay, let's get back to YouTube, Twitter and thread Twitter X they mean anything in your world.

Absolutely well Threads Unfortunately it doesn't. But I think, like, what was the statistic they released the other day, like eighty two percent or something of the people that created the threads account and no longer using it. It's dropping off even more. I think the point of threads was just for Instagram to show the world that, like, hey, if we launch a product, people are going to sign up. I think that that to me, that's what the statement was.

Okay, but conventional wisdom and I'm talking to the experts. That's why. One of the truth is younger generation is not participating on X. Is that just untrue?

No, that's untrue. A lot gen Z is participating on X because the memes are just really.

They're they're they're participating, but they're not spending time on it. Yeah, they're not spending So they're reading headlines on X or they're creating headlines which then they can use on other platforms. So all the all the platforms where there's video is pushed insanely like Instagram and uh YouTube and TikTok, that's where the young generation is spending their most time.

That's where they're spending the most time. That's huttering.

Yeah, correct, But the headlines are created at X.

Yeah.

Well, just to be clear, that's where you're harvesting things as opposed to starting things.

You're no, you're discovering things on the video platforms, because the video platforms have the most discovery reach. Right now, okay, all platforms, including X, they're all adopting video more and more because watch time is king, so not views anymore. A lot of people, you know, probably five years ago, views mattered a lot, Subscribers mattered a lot. Followers and

And X's video has not gotten to that level where people are sitting there and consuming video on next they are consuming though though the means the title of the.

Titles, the memes, the articles.

Yeah, okay, you know, that's a word we've heard for over a decade. Not everyone is sophisticated. They might ask, what is a meme? Can you tell us.

No?

I mean, well, you know, let's say the need let's say the meme has blood, has nudity, has something that is against the guidelines. On the traditional platforms, you're going to find the worst memes in the in the planet hilariously on X, you know, so, that's where you're going to find that. And also gen Z loves the edginess about it. You know, they love how edgy it is, how they can share something with no repercussions. If you say a curse word or two on the other platforms,

And then a meme is just the inside jokes that you have with your friends, but made into a public that other people can consume and understand.

Another way that I like to explain memes is that they're hieroglyphs. If you think about the Egyptians, right, Like, you go to Egypt and there's a bunch of hieroglyphs on the wall, their images, but each image represents like a huge story, and that's what a meme is. It's basically an image that you can attach to a headline and it's an inside joke, whether it's from a movie, whether it's from something that you and your friends were discussing,

Okay, to what degree is Facebook important or is that just boomers and gen xers.

It's boomers in the United States, but Facebook is really important in Mexico and Europe and in other Third world countries because Facebook is beta for what China is currently now with we Chat, and so Facebook is incorporated more into a lot of different apps and utilities and games and video games that people use. Facebook groups are also very very popular in Mexico and in Latin America. They're used almost to the popularity of Reddit threads here in the United States.

And Reddit is a cornucopy of information. Does that figure in your world?

It is Reddit. Reddit is basically Twitter on steroids steroids. If it works on Reddit, then it will take the world by store. Those people spend a lot of time on the Internet, and it's a lot of people that have a lot of pool on the Internet. So they start the joke or the meme on Reddit and then they use every other platform to spread it.

Okay, you talk about Facebook being like we Chat. We Chat is a super platform with payment and everything. This is what Musk's vision was with PayPal, and they squeezed them out and it is still his vision at X. Do you think Facebook has a chance to be that super app?

I think that Facebook is already ten years ahead of that, more than X. But I don't think that. I don't doubt that Elon can do it as well. Facebook is already fifty percent there. I mean Facebook has your age, it could store your payment settings. If you've seen the shop function on Instagram, Instagram is meta and if you've bought anything through the Instagram function, you've already made a transaction. If you've submitted your information to get a bonus when

Yep, that's what I was going to think exactly, Like they've tried. They just can't get the hardware exactly, and I don't think they will. It doesn't seem.

Well, let's snap our fingers and they get the hardware, right, what would the hardware be? What would that look like?

It's an AR it's a it's an AR tool. This yeah, it should have been the phone. I think it's too late for the phone. I think it's too late for

You're talking about a headset here.

Yes, and so in a world where you get the headset for fifty dollars, well, you're gonna get that headset for fifty dollars because it's going to come integrated with a bunch of tools that you are going to be using for your everyday life. And so that's the way that they get the hardware to be adopted by, you know, essentially the masses.

Okay, will we eventually get there or is it going to stall out?

That? That's something that we ask ourselves every day.

Yeah, that's that's the that's the tough that's the tough question. I mean, we had a chance to get there quicker with COVID, just because people were inside they had nothing to do, and then the moment the world opened up, it almost people just threw away a lot of those habits, right. So yeah, I don't think we're going to get there.

I don't.

I don't think we're getting there my lifetime.

Yeah, Okay, just to be clear, when we had Pokey Mond augmented reality, that was missed like the first video game leading into something, or it was just an anomaly and means nothing.

No, people are still obsessed with Pokemon Goo. My brother in law plays plays that every single day. There will be pockets, and there will be hobbyists and there will be early adopters, the same way that for the last five years people have been playing with VR headsets. But I'm talking you know. When to answer the question, when does Facebook actually turn into a competing we chat? I think that Facebook is ten years ahead of X. However, if X focuses on that, I don't doubt that they'll

Okay, just moving on through the platforms. Instagram. Instagram had its moment for about ten years. It became the platform of those who were image based. Then they said they were going to go to video. They have reels. Reels is a competing product with TikTok. How do you assess what's going on at Instagram?

Love reels? Man?

No, I mean, the the what they did initially is they put it on the main feed and people got really upset. Now that they have an extra tab for it, so you're specifically just looking at reels. It's it's performing well for our creators and for their platforms. More and more people are using reels and they already they already got it right with with stories. When Stories came out, people are like, I already have Snapchat, I don't need

Like, until gen Z came around. But that's because so.

Like TikTok though, is filling the pressure. That's why they're going very heavy on live video and they're trying to take the market now. So and the numbers are swinging it again towards Instagram.

That's correct, and again it goes back to the conversation about utility. Different platforms have different utility. Snapchat is more authentic because you can be more authentic because your older sister and your dad is not on snareat and so you know they're not gonna add you on Snapchat and see you drinking at nineteen So you know, I feel like with reels though, it goes back to the conversation

Okay, YouTube is hyping their short form videos to compete with TikTok in reels, how do you assess that?

To answer that question, we have to ask a question. So, Bob, what's the biggest search engine?

It depends on your age. If you're an older person, it's Google, If younger person is TikTok, might be Amazon.

Love it's what's the second biggest?

Well, I mentioned Google, Amazon, TikTok. Uh, you tell me.

The second is YouTube because it's integrated with Google. And so even though TikTok has an interesting search function. It's nowhere near the traffic of Google, and the second biggest

Anyway, Okay, yeah, I was gonna say that YouTube is getting shorts wrong because they're trying to fight two battles at the same time. So they're fighting the livestream space. YouTube live is becoming a very big thing. YouTube TV is going against every cable company in the world right now. And then on top of that you have the shorts. Instagram introduced reels and just focused on reels to try to attack TikTok and it's the same thing they did

Yeah. I don't think that shorts have the power of TikTok yet however.

Because they're not improving the design correct.

But they are searchable, which is crazy because now TikTok is learning how to be a searchable company, where YouTube has, you know, all the years of experience and it's easier to integrate. Like just the other day, I was we did a campaign for one of our friends, Suweko. I was able to find that right away. I looked it up on YouTube and I found we found it because I know when we did it, and it was a

It's so bad.

How do you create? How does your platform a certain color scheme and then you roll out of feature in a different color scheme.

Yeah, see that hurts your eyes. See the raff is really good at finding friction. No, I'm I'm sex, I'm just sort of no like this. These are the types of conversations. But when he finds friction, it's like, how can we make this frictionless? So I agree with him. The magic of TikTok is that your cousin can go viral tomorrow. That's the magic. And so the platform is designed for the consumer and is designed for the average person to basically feel like they could do a trend

You actually need to go to YouTube. Need to go to YouTube to learn how to do that.

Yeah, exactly, And so that's that's Raff is right. Raf is right. So you know, a nerd like me. I mean, like Bob before we started. I mean, look, look how many things I set up. I set up a GoPro timer, got a camera over there, got the camera floating, Like I'm a nerd. This guy knows that YouTube is the superior platform for technology. Raff is just like, who cares if you know how to film all this? If you can't even get the message across I get it.

Let's stop for a second. You said watch time is the most important to the ultimate platform. It's important. Whereas we've been told how many views, how many subscribers? Are you talking that watch time is the best in terms of compensation? Why is watch time king?

Watch time is king to the platforms I'll talk about too, right, So from the producer of the content to the platform. It's king to the platforms because you can't fake watch time as good as you could fake views. I mean, you know, even ten years ago, people were talking about like those like playlist farms and stuff like that. So you can buy a view, you can buy a click that's been around for a long time, but actually have a human being interact with their device while they're paying

Wait, wait just one second, Yes, are we talking about retention of one video or retention con assuming multiple videos.

Well, it's both, but it starts with one. You know. If so, if you a healthy playlist, this this statistic. You know, it's been a while since I've been at full screen, but this statistic maybe a little outdated, but a healthy playlist is if you get like one point eight one point eight videos watched, so that means that they they saw your video, they watched one more video, and then they watch, you know, point eight of another.

Okay, the elephant in the room advertising dollars where the consumer is spending the most time on yep. So if I'm watching a show for twenty minutes and I'm watching another show for ten minutes. As an advertiser, I want to go to the one that they're consuming more slower.

Are you saying the viewer is more valuable or because they're watching so much video they're seeing more ads.

The viewers more valuable because you can get your message across. You're a more valuable asset than someone that's making ten second videos. Because if someone's spending an hour listening to this podcast, you have the more hooked.

Okay, let's pull the lens way back. In the pre Internet era, people got their information from traditional newspapers and television, magazines and books, but there was a hierarchy. Then let's just say there are many places to get your information today. So if we are talking about the younger demo, let's just call it under twenty. I don't know where you want to break it. Under twenty one, under eighteen, even under eight fifteen? Can you reach them with any of

I'm gonna think on that, man, I got it, go for it.

We use traditional media to validate where you've already put on social media. So we run a company. Right, the Wired article came out, we could do a million views on digital, but everyone that was under fifteen s physical magazine and they matched the views that we do on digital to that magazine has said, these guys are legit.

Okay, but you guys are out of the demo. Yeah, okay. So the La Times, which a rockstar referred to me as a pamphlet today, has very little information and seeming I get it, but seemingly almost nobody I know still gets it.

Yeah.

So I see these articles and you might feel good at home. Okay, But if you're under twenty and there's an article on you, other than trying to reach a different audience, the older demo might give you a movie deal. Whatever, does it help your audience at all?

Yeah? Let's let me answer the question. And I didn't want to recycle an answer, but since it wasn't published in the Washington Post, I'll say it here. What I told them when they asked about traditional media is I said that traditional media has a very good opportunity at just completely owning live And I'll give you an example. I mean, look at me. I don't play sports. Right.

And that's why TikTok was able to take off right away because you didn't need experience. But now all there, the real create are coming in and it's turning like every other platform where you need to be able to storyteller, you need to be able to have production value to even compete.

Okay, so let's talk entertainment outlets let's talk specifically the music business. Music business was controlled by distribution. It's hard to get your record in the store. And even if you got in the record store, unless you had a continuing line of product, you couldn't get paid. Then there was terrestrial radio. Needless to say, there are many outlets today. If you are let's just talk one of the three major labels in their subsidiaries. This is a two sided question.

Oh raft takes a stand ins set of the guillotine.

Okay, So it all depends on the genre. So yeah, look at a country right now. Country music is having an enormous rise. That doesn't happen without without TikTok and social media being involved. But all the artists that are doing well right now, they also have a huge touring history. There's only one breakthrough country artist this year, which is Zach Bryan. He told his story on social media, got a couple million views right away.

He hit the road.

So country, you still need to hit the road. You still need to touch the fan base and then from there use that piece of content on social media. Now,

Okay, let's focus on hip hop that you just mentioned. You say you can look at what's happening and recreate it. We live in a world it used to be prior to fifteen years ago or so if you did something great, it would surface. Not today. I can point to things that are phenomenal in everything, whether it be streaming, television, music, whatever. There's just so much product. Are you saying? With hip hop, there's a way to analyze social media such that you know you will get attention.

Same thing with the same thing with the sound and hip hop as well, because in hip hop there's they're typebat producers, so they can create exactly the sound of another popular artist, and then they can create the exact vocal chain in your house. So you can go from I've never made a song to I just sound like my favorite artist. And the consumer on the other side, they're like, if I listen to I don't know a little TJ, I'm also gonna like this artist as well because they sound alike.

Well, let me let me ok, I get all that you have the successful artists. I'm at home, I've replicated and I've made something reasonable.

How do people find me easy? You just the exact artists that you're replicating. You hit up their fan pages and let's.

Be a little bit slower. Okay, you are the new artists. How do you hit up their fan base?

You open up Instagram, say hey, I also sound like the artists that you're a fan of, as you have three thousand followers, here's my snippet of this song. Are you open to posting it on your story? That story gets two hundred, two hundred new listeners, right, so that story post is going to give that new artist from

Okay, a little bit slower. I'm doing everything you can. I see the followers of the big artists. I reach out. How many do I have to reach out? How many are gonna play with me? And what do you have to do to incentivize them to play?

Well, you're not reaching out there to the artist directly, I understand the fans. Yeah, you're reaching out to the fan page. And honestly, it's very easy because they're used to always engaging. Because a person that's running a fan page online is also probably online twenty four to seven so they're going to see it. It's all about I can start this project with you today, Bob. We can make your favorite artists happen today, and we could probably have a million streams within a month.

Okay, just a little bit slower. I've created the snippet. How many members of the fan base might I reach out too?

I would reach out to fifty pages if those remember the artist that you're replicating has to have enough of a fan base to have a fan page too. That's the elephant in the room. So it has to be a big enough artist that has a bunch of fan pages. I'll reach out to fifty. I would tell let's say twenty of them reply back. Pay twenty bucks per story post. Then I'm getting my first ten thousand listeners. Then the algorithm will just serve me too.

Okay, but ultimately, you were compensating these people.

If you want to get a quicker, if you want to get a quicker.

But we've also been in a position where we had no money to pay anybody, and it's just a matter of See, that's the thing that see. I think the reason why Bob keeps zooming out is because we have to go deeper. And deeper into the core. Check this out. Raf said something very important, which is, you know sometimes people sign a song, but they're not signing the artists, right, Okay, so let's start there. When you have the money for it.

And in twenty twenty, we did that with an artist and we did like we did it in a hip hop yep. So we you talk about in real life and real yeah, yeah we So basically what he's saying. I had the artist message three hundred creators yep, and I was like, the artist that you're mimicking also is followed by these specific creators. These creators all play this specific video game, which is for Day. So I had him message every single creator. We had about a twenty

Okay, we signed to learn clear why does this work in pop and hip hop and not other genres?

It works in every genre and not in country because in country music they did they were slower to get on social media.

So it's just a matter of when.

Yeah, bingo, yeah, okay, this.

Is all general. You guys represent talent. How many people do you represent today? Eight that's not very many. Okay, of your overall time, how much is focused on those eight as opposed to whatever.

That's a tough question. It's it's pretty tough to scale. But we divide and conquer. So we're three founders and then we have eight managers. Well, we have twenty seven people in staff first of all, so this is impossible to do without a fucking big ass team.

Okay, everybody's on a weekly salary. What do you mean as opposed to you work and I pay it two hundred dollars when I see the work?

Oh r no, no, we well, we have vendors for different things.

All twenty seven know that they're going to get paid every week.

Oh yeah, yeah, okay, yeah yeah no, but yeah, we have vendors for different things like marketing that will will hire some of whatever. But no, like we have twenty seven employees, not all of them are managers, some of them are coordinators, some of them are just specifically social media people. You know, my brother he's nineteen, runs the editing team. Like you know, we also stratboot and we're also immigrants, so we know, you know, we make sure

No, no, no, no, no, no, different question. You have these eight artists, he.

Said, fifty eighty eight. That's why I don't know.

That's why I got confused. Fifty eight. Let me let me go to the other half of the question. Anyway, at twenty five seven media, is all your work and income based on those fifty eight or is there another business of consulting and doing what it is?

So we we've done marketing for every major label in the book for the last three years.

And are you still doing that?

No, because we still do it for like very few friends here and there, but we like to do it in the house because you know, you own the asset, like you own the music that you're putting on with the artists, so that there's a higher return there than getting someone else's record to move on the chart.

Okay, So, for whatever reason, you don't want me to be your fifty ninth artist. Is there somebody like you? Guys who I could say, well, I didn't use twenty five seven, I use three six media. Are there other people out there of your caliber?

Yeah? I would it would be ignorant to say they're not. And there's also and you know where they are.

They're a group of friends on a discord that don't even know that they're twenty five to seven yet.

Yeah, like before we got in the space, we well, I was a song promoter from labels years ago. So what I would do is I would get specific records moving in specific territories on Spotify. I didn't know that was an actual talent like they. I just thought I was just a kid making Spotify playlist, driving traffic. And then you see the song number one of the Philippines and you're a part of it, and you're like, well,

Okay, this is a side note, but now since we've had social media influencers in excess of a decade, you have incredible burnout because on one hand, you have to post every day another land that becomes very tedious no matter how much money you're making. Has this been your experience.

We deal with burnout in different ways. I think that actually all three of us have different ways of dealing with it all. At Raf kind of talk about the way he deals with burnout when it comes to creators. But when they if they come to me, it's because they've already tried, you know, all the conventional things that I've already put out there on the TikTok that they can watch, right, they've already tried all the all the tutorials.

It really well, you know, we go back to one of the original influencers, Jenna Marbles. She gave up people who feel that there's so much pressure to post every day sure that they they just you know, spiral out.

Well, here's here's a couple of things. So to avoid burnout, you need a team that's always pushing your content without you click and upload. So we have one of our artists, he walks around, he goes shop, he would that would be a normal day that he would do. Doesn't have to interact with the camera at all. We shoot that and then that's what we post. He doesn't have to do anything different. He ate a burrito when I was with him, I took a video of that. Two million

Okay okay, you said to become a superstar, you have to do things you don't want to do. Give me two examples of things I might have to do to become a superstar that I don't want to do.

Okay, so right now, the live feature is massive. A person with a huge platform that wants to keep their fans engaged needs to go on live at least once a month for an hour and talk to fans, almost like you're doing a meet and greet. A lot of artists have social anxiety. A lot of artists don't want to be on live. They want to have more of their videos, you know, edit it a certain way. But a superstar needs to have a meet and greet on digital with the artist sadly nowadays at least once a month.

Okay, pull back for a second. What do I need for you to sign me? You got fifty eight people you're working with. You're always calming for new talent. What are you looking for?

Depending on who you ask?

Depending on who you ask? Like he's all about music. Yeah, I'll finish. I'll finish the concept. And I'll even touch on Jenna Marbles because that's close to home, because I love her. So the reason she stopped is because she loved comedy. That's what she loved. And in the world and the climate that we're in, you know, being you know, a white woman making jokes, it's something that you know,

So let's slow down there. Yeah, tell me more about the climate being the anti funny.

Well, that's funny, but see that's funny. But with her there are jokes that didn't age well, plain and simple.

I know that, but I'm trying to say. I'm sitting at home, I want to make it. Are you telling me that you know? Today generally speaking, we're not looking for funny. We're looking for something else.

Man, It's just that funny is it's just a dangerous territory man whatever, especially for gen zers, Like there's gen zers that I'm telling you do not care, like these kids are scary, like some of the things that they share on social.

Yeah, I mean it's what he's The anti funny thing is if a comedian set a joke or an individual set of joke, we would allow that. Right nowadays, you can't come in and thinking you're Seine Seinfeld earned the right to say that joke, and with social media they will make sure to let you know right away or whoever your boss is that hey, so and so is a teacher at this school. But it is also trying to make this type of content online. There was a teacher recently.

Okay, just to be clear, it's not that the audience doesn't want funny, it's just if you specialize in funny, it's a dangerous territory.

It's a dangerous territory because you're going to be criticized in the same way that if you think that you're a good battle rapper and you start making rap music instead of mumbo hip hop, you're gonna get cooked by the people that know how to rap.

Okay, Yeah, let's just say you got fifty eight clients, what genres? What are those fifty How many are in music? How many are only fans? What are the fifty eight?

Oh man, you're gonna have to help me with that. Well, how many music people do with?

Yeah, I mean it gets complicated. So it's fifty eight exclusive, two hundred and fifty non exclusive that we work on social media with. So you're overall three hundred. Music is about twenty four and then the rest would be a hybrid between YouTube and.

Only fans, between what and only fans, you.

Tube creators and only fans. But it's kind of everybody has kind of similar goals. Believe it or not. Everybody has to create a community. So on music right now, a big thing is a broadcast channel. So there's specific members that join there and they can either subscribe or join for free that a musician can just give them snippets or music that won't hit all platforms. And that's exactly how it works for the YouTube creators and only fans as well.

Okay, let's focus solely on only fans. Is it one hundred percent pornography or is anybody making money without taking their clothes?

Oh? Yeah, we have a ton that are making money with say about like forty percent of the roster doesn't take their clothes off at all.

And what are they selling? Are they selling sex?

Some of them are, some of them are selling bikini photos, some of them are selling connection, connection, and also just live streaming like watching watching anime together, like it's all kinds of Okay.

Let me be very specific. How much are sexually oriented? That could be sex conversation, that could be bikini photos, that could be taking off all your clothes? Yea, what percentage of the people you represent are in that category as opposed to another category?

There's different levels of boundaries, I'd say, But yeah, of course it's it's risque, but there there's an art to it, like there are people.

No, no, no, no, I just want to know, is anybody making good money not in that riskue territory?

Absolutely?

Yeah, what are they doing?

Uh? They're the ones that are that are doing bikini pictures and watching anime with their fans.

Yeah, okay, let's say I'm not wearing a bikini, I'm wearing a hoodie and ben sweatpants. Can I build a business watching anime with my fans?

Yeah, you can, and that's called being a live streamer on the just chat on Twitch is just not the right platform.

Okay, but on only fans talk about only.

That's that's the issue with that's the issue only like the way the way you only fans, there's going to be a sexual component somewhere.

Yeah. For for us at least, we're not in the business of, you know, going up to someone and telling them that they can make a million dollars by doing like a cooking show, which is what OnlyFans is trying to do. Right, But it's I know that it happens for them. I don't have the day.

Yeah, I understand you answered my question. Yeah, Okay, let's assume I am making sexually oriented content and only fans. Is that the end? Or are there any opportunities that only fans might lead to?

Yeah? See, that's the cool thing about what we do is what what the only fans side of the business and digital One of the mottos is that you know, no digital girl is going to die doing OnlyFans. So the point really is to build a platform. That's the number one priority, and then to monetize on it. Once you have that money, what do you want to do with that money? Do you want to start a YouTube channel, streaming? Do you want to launch brand? Which we've done all those things.

Look at Kim Kardashian, that should I just.

From Oh, we all know Kim Kardashian and that was made on television primarily there was a sex tape before that, but then television. But let's not talk about Kim Dartian. Let's talk about the people you represent, right.

No, that's the modern day version of course, someone who is making content sexually oriented on only fans that you represent.

How much is the biggest gross per year of someone who does that?

I mean, don't want to out because everybody knows our top three. But it's it's pretty, it's worth their while.

Is it seven figures?

Yeah?

Oh yeah?

Is it eight figures?

It could be, It could be.

Okay, okay, I have a deal. We're making money twenty five to seven. What is their cut?

It depends on the creator. There are some people that are legacy that have been with us from the beginning. They're people that you know, just start. It depends if we launch the If we launch their career.

Well give me the lowest to the highest.

So in general, what we do when we launch someone's career is we do fifty fifty on the only fan side and it's a it's a three month test. And if they because this this is the thing man like, you don't want to uh commit to something that you're not one hundred million percent sure that you're going to be able to do. And part of what we do is we don't really this this sounds hilarious, it's kind of intuitive, but we don't make them do anything. We

Yeah.

Where the traffic source? Yeah? Where the traffic source or that platform.

Okay, let's say I'm in business with you. We have great success, but I think I can do it alone now, and I don't want to give up my fifty percent. Who owns the content?

They do? The creator does. Uh, the creator has to own the content because they are the ones that are producing the content in California. That's just the law. And we also represent people all over the world. But we we go.

Actually, I don't want to get into the legal elements actually being a lawyer, but you they own the content is good enough for me. Let's switch the gears to music.

Yeah, before we switch gears, I'll discuss like what leads to that. So the point of building a platform first beef before even getting an only fan, especially when we launch someone. If we launch someone, we do it three month tests. After that three month test, we give them the option to stay, and then we do a long term contract for less percentage. That percentage is determined based on you know, the outcome of the business, but we don't.

Look at who waha a little bit slower, Huh did you switch gears? Or are you saying only fans is driven by TikTok?

Uh? It is.

And it's if I'm only fans and I'm taking my clothes off, I'm selling on I'm baking people to wear on TikTok. But there's a musical component.

There's a musical component for being being a creator. When you're a creator and you want to monetize, whether it's YouTube or only fans or whatever, you need the most amount of awareness right now, it happens to be ig reels and TikTok. And so that's why for us, the priority you know, maybe maybe you you flunk on OnlyFans and this has happened. Maybe you flunk on OnlyFans and you or you find out that it's not for you.

But just to be clear, let's say I'm successful on only fans, I'm going to TikTok to build my OnlyFans traffic or it's brand extensions.

Going it's both. You're going to TikTok to build a brand but also to get the most amount of awareness. You convert those people over to your Instagram. The Instagram is also now a really good way of discovery because of reels. You convert them ideally to your YouTube and then if they really want to monetize, they buy your merch or they continue watching your videos, or they go on your only fan.

That's why we Hugh was trying to say earlier, like people are getting away with bikini pictures and sometimes I even talk anything sexually because they've built their tiktoks and YouTube to such a large number and such an intimate level with their following that they'll just pay just to get a message back exactly, which is like, it's it's insane, Like people are paying five hundred dollars just to get a hello back, and we're sitting there like how is

And also imagine being one of the first five hundred girls to dance a dojakat song on TikTok. You're gonna get numbers and you're gonna get traffic. So the advantage that the digital girls get is they know when we're gonna heat up a song, and so imagine, you know, you're you're an artist, your your song drops on Friday.

I don't want to, you know, harp on only fans, but there are many people participating on only fans who are really not making any money. What works on only fans the.

Other platforms and other platforms, and that's why we're right.

But there are people, let me put it differently, there are people who are basically selling sexual content of whatever stripe on only fans. Does it have to be a certain level of sexual content or is it how you monetize the people.

Paying no again, and it's it doesn't have to be sexual content. It's about the traffic you bring in and the quality of traffic.

And that's why we're able to and that's.

Why we're able to do it because a porn I'll go deeper, a porn start, for example, does not make what a digital girl makes because some of their content is already out there and there's some you know, the guy already saw it. There's no need for them to engage with the talent further. And so when you get the traffic and you built an interest in an aura around you, you're bringing that traffic in and you're monetizing on the traffic by simply being a part of their

Okay, let's switch to music. Someone signs with you, guys, Hey, are you looking for numbers before you sign someone? Or will you sign with someone totally raw based on what you hear in their identity?

Well, we can't at the number factor. We can't compete on that just because all the majors and all the distribution companies. If you're doing about thirty five thousand streams a day on a cross your catalog, you're on every radar and every label is moving towards the data. So what we have to go towards is I go based off brand. So if I'm sitting in the room with someone or I'm talking to that artist, am I actually intrigued?

Oh okay, but you're in, we're in. How many people are hungry have whatever you're looking for, but really have almost no numbers at all.

Yeah, So we've done that and and again, like like Raff said, well, you know, we signed for different reasons. But I think that that's why we're a really good balance. Like he has just it's just such a good eye for talent, not only like music talent, but staff. Like I I won't hire someone unless unless I get his opinion on it. Okay, okay, But but he also sometimes coaches me to not be too caught up in the music and how good the music is.

Bob, it's the why. Like one of our biggest artists right now, he's a Mexican artist, grew up in the US, grew up in Mexico. Has that duality is figuring out himself through you know, both cultures. He's intriguing the music. Well, we'll getting there. He's had four or five songs on the Billboard charts for dance and electronic, but that started off because of his story so unique. His fans got invested in him so that when we put out the music, if the music was decent enough, he was gonna win.

Yeah, okay, okay, there's there's there are there are true I know this sounds cheesy. There are truly people that are born stars. He's good at finding those people. But I'll come in and say like, hey, this is this person. Can He'll be basically, does this guy haven't shot at music? And I'll be like honest about it. With the artists that he mentioned, Loumiatina, obviously I had a sop spot for him because he's Mexican. On Mexican, we instantly bonded.

Okay, you have signed an act. Let's just say for the sake of discussion, their talent lies more in the music than the charisma and personality identity. Obviously, whatever is there is good enough for you because you made the deal. But you're a ground zero. How do you get the music heard?

Well, first you gotta make the music genre.

Yeah, we're working now, that's a different f.

Yeah, we're working shoegaze right now. Shoegaze is gonna is gonna come back to the big, big numbers. So from there we have to start off with the right mix for the new shoegaze sound that's being created a lot more muneier. So you get that mix right, you get the storytelling right, then you're like, okay, cool, what then you start doing market research? What does a shoegaze fan look like in twenty twenty three.

Right, because they they are calling it shoegaze, but the music that they are portraying a shoegaze now is not necessarily shoegaze. So see, that's where you get into the old head vitality where it's like, oh, this isn't a real shoot, you know what I mean? Right right, right, like, but Raf is like, dude, I don't care if it's not real shoegaze. Just fucking teach these kids chord progressions and then we'll make it work, you know. So that's so Jella who's filming actually right now. He's a really

So once that record is done, then we're like, we identify the market and then we don't just put the music off saying this is a good shoegaze record that you should listen to. Let's say that same fan is also a fan of this streetwear brand. Then we start attacking it through the fashion.

So the slower Slowerka, you've created the track, Now you're talking about the fan. How do you decide how to reach out?

And well, how we talked about the genre and then the fan, right so yes.

So then I I'm a consumer. I look up shoegaze, I look up similar artists. I look at people making videos to shoegaze songs. So I'm like, if you're doing this and you're not getting paid, that means you're a fan. I look at their fashion, I look at their age. Then I look at what they're also following on social media. So I'm like, if these twenty people are following this same fashion trend, I'm gonna hit it through the fashion lens.

Okay, slower, you have these people who are making these videos. You have the song. Hey, the point of connection, you say, hey, I love what you're doing. I got a new artist.

No, I don't say that. I don't do that. No, I look at that person make I look at that person making those videos. I look at their interest. And then let's say they're into this T shirt brand, right, I go to that T shirt brand and say, here's the song for free, put it behind your T shirt ad. And then that fan that's been making videos is just scrolling and just sees the things that he's interested in. That song keeps popping up.

Okay, I get it, like just a little bit slower.

You remember Bad Religion, right of course? All right, so I never told I gotta now after this podcast, I'm gonna text him and give him as flowers. But like, uh,

Okay, but my only But even though Bad Religion was the punk era, di I y, there's much much more product today.

Oh yeah, So you're saying you can always go back to the isdlead No, yeah, but you.

Can always go find someone you say, I'm gonna give it for free and they're gonna say yes, as supposed someone say hey we got twenty people are gonna give it to us for free.

Oh all right, yeah you can.

Okay. So there's always someone who's gonna use your music always, okay. Yeah.

And the reason I brought that up is because you know, that is a subgenre, right, and this will always always be alive for subgenres because your subgenre is a smaller community. And if it's a smaller community, you can target. It's a smaller target and.

At the end of the day, it has to be good. That's why the miss.

Okay, you're there, have you picked out a specific element of the song? When you're making the deal with the T shirt company? What are you actually sending them? What do you want them to use?

Well, they're not even a company most of the time. It's just a kid that's posting his big his most favorite outfits. And that's just one example of I'm not exaggerating hundreds and I mean hundreds of algorithms that that we wait.

Wait, wait, wait, wait wait wait once again, we have to slow down. You do this every day. My audience is doing this area.

Okay, So I thought, wait wait, I thought, I so we'll go to the T shirt. No.

Now, I understand everything you're saying, but I just want to make sure I have it stripped. You find someone who's a fan, you see what they're interested, their algorithm, the T shirt and whatever. Blah blah blah. I thought you said you contact the T shirt company.

Correct, So there's he's looking at it a different way. I'm looking at it right, But yeah, you contact a T shirt company. There's two ways. So I run a campaign where I fully control how, what part of a song they're going to use, how they're going to put it in the cat. That's one part of the campaign. The other campaign, I let the T shirt company or another company similar to it, do their own thing. So

Okay, you've done all that. You guys have a lot of expertise in algorithms. You're just not sitting at home waiting to see what happens. No, how do you make it happen?

So well? What he just said is actually very key the don't play God method. In traditional marketing, this is called a B testing, which is, you know, raps don't play God method, and there's a reason he calls it. Then I'll get there. You're going to make the best description, The simpler the better, because the simpler means that more people are willing to do it, And you're going to pick a part of the song that you think makes the most sense for them to post in an easy,

And that's what we learn when you're asking them about our business. Earlier, when we were three years doing campaigns for other labels, we learned a bunch of patterns of communities that are hyper consumers. But we also learned that every time the label would tell us they have to deliver the message like this, it would never work.

It would never work.

So we were like, oh, this is awesome.

We we'll just let the creative, which is why we chuckled when you said, like, okay, so you go when you said, uh, okay, so you say I have a new artist. Now you never say that, like you know, uh some but but you'd be surprised how many you know labels would tell us okay, so you're gonna have the fan say hey, guys, I just listened to you. Da da da da da da, and make sure you do the trend just like me. That's never gonna happen.

Gonna pick up right. Okay, but let's say you do this. I'm not gonna work every time.

That's the beauty of it.

As the beauty of it.

Okay, let's say it didn't work.

Then are you gonna do Then the song's not it, the products is not you start.

You're gonna start the same process all over again.

And we have to and we and and sometimes what's happened. I'll give them the example. We spent thirty thousand dollars on an artist one of his first campaigns. He's trap metal, that's the genre. It's like metal but like kind of hip hop. And we poured it all in on some anime edits and for whatever, which is usually the genre that works really well for this type of music. For

Okay, you use the magic word algorithm to what degree? Let's stay with TikTok because that's run by an algorithm that no one seems to be able to one hundred percent nail. To what degree do you study the algorithm, try to figure it out, and then try to game the system.

It's not about gaining the system. It's just about identifying communities. That's all it is. Like to bring it back. The purpose of at least the mission statement of Facebook is to create technology that brings us all closer together. And so what that means is that you know, you're not gonna actually bring the whole world together, but if you can identify enough communities, you can bring those communities together.

Okay, you say it changes, they say in three months, one and a half months would be more like it. What literally changes? What do you observe? What changed in the algorithm? Talk about the past.

Let's talk about the past. Sure, So, I mean everybody knows the famous ad apocalypse, right, Okay, So if you are, you know, a prankster and that's your bread and butter, and you have a Lamborghini and you bought a house huge mortgage, you know a lot of people who gave it back because pranks are no longer suitable for monetization to the level that they were on YouTube guidelines because of like you know, the harassments reports and all that stuff that was going on in the streets, and so yes,

Well something that's I mean, I don't know how when you get this podcast out, But the reality is if someone wants to go viral right now, the videos that are going viral right now in this current algorithm is videos that are within a loop. So with at the end, it finishes the sentences the way you start the video correct, and as long as it's in a loop, it goes viral and ig and TikTok as of right now, what is it November thirtieth, twenty twenty three.

And the reason for the loop is because the platforms realize that they get more watch time instead of see so some platform in the beginning with beta testing and see that's so it's like no one actually knows how to gain the algorithm. No one dominates the algorithm. It's just who's paying attention and who's paying attention to human behavior. If you paid attention. You remember this and you're like a nerd like us. Do you remember when TikTok would swipe up on its own after you watch the video?

Okay, so to what degree do you leverage certain signed acts to gain traction for other side acts.

We have an example. We signed obviously Loomy Athena in December January, and then we found that he had a friend that made music. I have two hundred and seventeen listeners that act now became the feature on a bunch of other songs that loom he has, and he was able to get his own platform and now he's a top forty electronic Dance Artist of the Year and he has close to five million monther listeners. But he has to be good.

I understand.

Yeah, his voice is incredible, and also yeah, so's I want to make sure people know that we've done it for other people and it hasn't got the same success level. You still have to be good. You can only get someone else's algorithm, but if you're not good, it will wash away.

Yeah, exactly. And also I do want to say one thing, so when we interviewed kid, when we interviewed him to see if we would sign him, out of all the years that we've been doing, this is the first kid that's ever told me, yeah, Prince is my favorite artist.

Okay, what I assume I sign with you is leveraging me with other talent you have signed dere girl. Can I expect you're gonna do that like a feature on a rap song in the old days? Or are you basically saying, well, you got to hit a certain amount of status. It's got to work for you.

No, it has to be. It has to be the community in the genre, especially with these gen z. Are they're brutal man? Like I know, I keep saying like I'm so afraid of them that I am, Like, they're brutal, dude, Like if you tried to introduce like a kid that's just not in the community, like that kid would get slaughtered and cooked.

So what we do to facilitate We facilitate it, but we don't execute it. So the way we do it is we plan recording trips for artists are on the same hime. So a we just had a meal together. Oh, you guys like each other, play video game together? Oh, randomly a song. Now you guys are making together. Ah, let's get you back in the studio together and then finish it up.

Okay, let's pull back the lens halfway. People who are not of your vintage, they will say, oh, the TikTok kits, it's just a fragment of a song. There's no real artists there.

They're right, They're right, They're right. I mean, it's it's only been three years and they haven't proven themselves. Remember Vine Vine, who came out of Vine Lou Combs. Is that a fragment of an artist? I don't think so. Shawn Mendes, is he a fragment of an artist? I don't think so. All those Bieber doing covers wait wait.

Wait wait wait wait, that's that's the upside there's always going to be some talented people playing. Let me let me pull it back a little bit. The record companies, the major labels, you still published players. The old tricks don't work. As you say, as soon as someone hits thirty five thousand streams, they're in. But you can have thirty five thousand streams and you have traffic, but there's

Well, like Graf said, I mean, we're not saying, you know, we're not saying that kid didn't have a future, but you know, kid didn't have the platform, but we believed in his voice and we also saw that he was daring enough to sing on a genre that had no singers.

Okay, wait wait wait wait wait wait, Raf, go for it.

Well, Bob is saying to that, are label signing stuff because it's just making money?

Yes, But the question is if there's something that's trafficked and you can get more traffic, maybe you can even cross over to Spotify, but there might end up being only one song.

That's fine because the deal sizes are so small nowadays, and they're already proven. See, there's being music right now. It's the best time to be in music. A lot of people are complaining about the payoffs from platforms and all that this is the best time to be in music.

Why and they're not interested in doing that correct.

And not just at the major level, at the independent level too. There's people signing artists and they're not finding that why.

But is your experience you're in the trenches every day. Are they doing the math correct and saying one hit sixteen months blah, blah blah, or are they truly believing, Hey, this guy's got this, I'm gonna blow it up.

Something that it would be silly to say you're not doing the math when there's so much data.

Yeah, there's so much data.

A different point.

No, I okay, I understand your point correctly. My answer is me and I hope they're developing people.

Yeah, okay, let's go all the way back to the beginning. So we're we have the old school players, pre internet players, pre social media players. What have we established? You said, despite all the new players, YouTube is still the most powerful platform. You talked about legacy media. You say, well, you want to cross over. It gives you attention and it pays dividends. We talked about traditional networks whatever, they got a lot of power. They just have to go

Well, it's been happening in Latin music for the last fifteen years.

Give me more.

So in Latin music, there's obviously everybody's familiar with Bad Bunny. The Bad Bunny deal only happened two or three years ago. That was a project that has been developing for about seven eight years. It's happening in traditional Mexican music. Those artists now are getting acquired by the major labels, but they're already doing eighty billion streams before the major label comes in comes in. So Latin music has been happening. It's been happening in a lot of other genres outside of the US.

Now I'm asking the first question, Yeah, you've established something. The traditional player comes in, I'm gonna lay a lot of cash and power. I say, yes. Are there people who are saying the traditional outlets are clueless. I'm building it myself and my goal is not to sell out or to make a deal with the traditional players.

There's companies like ours that exist, and there's other companies that are constantly being created. Funding is a big issue, yeah, and so they are now third party people. Do you do you want to take money from a music company or do you want to take money from a venture capitalist. That's that's the conversation that's being had right now.

Okay, just to be clear, because exhibition is free, these sites are all free. Why do you need so much money?

So you catch her record on TikTok. Let's go back to the basics, right, you catch her record on TikTok, that streaming check, you're not seeing it for four months right on the master recording on the publishing right even long. So how are you operate? So you're at you're an artist. That's a million, two million, three million month of listeners that you're constantly supposed to be feeding your business. But there's no you have no money.

Okay, But my question becomes everything is so diy. Everybody's got a laptop, we're shooting video. Where is the requirement for any significant money, especially because no one gives you money for free. If they're giving you the money, they want something in return.

Well, that's why we sell the artists, and that's why we partner up with them in the business because.

The reality is once you catch that one record pop, you're supposed to have a music video done, right, let's say the music video is even a thousand dollars, you shoot that music video. Let's say the moment you start getting streaming, a lot of artists are not clearing their records, right, the elephant in the room, right, they're they're dropping all these records. And then the producer comes back, it's five thousand dollars. So you have to go back.

You have the millions right now. Now your first check is not going to be five that'sn't right.

So Cade went from two hundred and seventeen listeners to five million now. But when he was a two million monthly listeners, one of ANRS came back to us and said, hey, this bees ten thousand dollars. We hadn't seen a check because he just went viral. And then we went back to him and said, can we go back to like a reasonable number because he just went viral. There's really no money here. Yeah, he said, he has two million monthly listeners.

Okay, but I.

Go back to my point, So why do we need the money? It's because, like we here signed the artist. So if we signed the artist, that means that we have to invest in the brand, and we have to invest in their career, and that costs money. At the end of the day, you can't you can't escape that.

But I'm looking at it from just I'm just an artist that went viral. Yeah, and then you also need a follow up record. That's what's happening too. No one's in investing, okay, but let's say all in, I'm in ten k.

Okay, if I take the ten k from somebody, they're gonna want a lot more than ten k back.

That's why distribution companies on their eyes. That's why a lot of the stigma used to be that not stigma. I mean, the reality is artists didn't get fair deals. Right now, artists are getting extremely fair deals to the point where the other side does not care enough and they don't do anything. They don't do anything. Hence why there's no superstars. Because your partner is used to eating at a certain rate, they're not eating at that level anymore. They're not that invested in you as an artist.

Okay. But okay, your company twenty five to seven Media, is it self funded or are you taking money from somewhere else?

We're self funded right now.

Okay, So if you're self funded and you sign talent, are they going to third parties for money.

They're not. No, but it gets uh, they're not going to third parties, but there's always a major Daniel.

Okay, but hold that for a second. So in this particular example, you're considering yourselves to be the.

Money or the label.

Okay, but it's certainly not a traditional situation with the three majors in their tentacles. Let's stop there. And you said in the Wired article that you contemplated doing a deal with Mike Kieren, I have certainly known for decades, has a long history in the music business, but ultimately you did not. Why did you not make a deal with Mike Kieren in the.

End, Well, Mike, Mike is a tight end in music. Let's just let's just start there. And Uh, when we met with him, I was super impressed how he knew so much about a and just the future of music in general. I'm like, at this level and at what you've accomplished like that, it shouldn't be that in tune he was really so the reason why we didn't do a deal with Mike and a bunch of other people is you've ever been in those email chains and there's like thirty people in the email chain and you don't

On top of that, we're doing the marketing for these majors.

So we noticed the bigger the email chain, the slower the process was. So we're like, we're on the rise right now, and we like Mike, but I'm like, we're not working with Mike every day. We're working with everybody else in that building. We're not working with Todd at Alama every day. We're working with everybody else in that building. And you know, it's kind of hard to recreate those type of guys. So we were like, while we're on the upward trajectory, we want to do it on our own.

And another honest answer that we that we gave people was just the truth. I mean, like, you know, sometime at the time, music was really only one third of our revenue and we have so many other aspects of

Okay, but this has been going on since Napster. People have said there's going to be disruption. Professor at Harvard who wrote a whole long article the New Yorker magazine saying, ultimately there isn't disruption. What strikes me here is for all of this new technology, new platforms, you're always coming back to the traditional players. But hang in there for a second. Is your goal to sell at a certain number or is your goal to never sell?

We talk about that.

Every day when I'm when I'm done having fun with my two best friends.

That's a different issue.

No, no, no, that's the biggest. But that's the real, that's the real. I mean, with the numbers that we've got offered for our company, overall.

Not just the music.

So we we we would have been fine even before music, even before I genuinely enjoy working with my two best friends.

This is you know, you're not at that point. Okay. Usually when people sell out, either they're done or the money is just everything's for sale. If I come in here say I'm gonna sell you. Yeah here, let me open my wall. Twenty bucks for your company, No twenty thousand, no twenty million. Well, all of a sudden you saying, well, let me let me think two hundred million. We're in and sold. Everything's got a price. But there are companies.

They're going to win in the end. I mean, look at right, they're going to win in the end.

Where Yeah, because there's also people like us that the moment they even know that they could sell they.

Say, yeah, correct, So that's that's that's the thing, Like there needs to be a unity in the independent space, right But what happens is there the big companies are getting very smart, like in Grooves merging with the Virgin Music, it's still a UMG company. Is that is that considered independent? No, that's the You.

Don't know, but I ask you, as I say, even in the tech space forget music. Yeah, the guys started WhatsApp, the guys started Instagram.

We ultimately got squeezed out.

They took the check and the big guy said, hey, this is where it's going to be. Wasn't that way they were out?

Well, just to give you we've done this is our first year as operating as a label. We've done management and other stuff. We've done a couple of billion streams. Right right now, we're just a little fly in the room. We're the little mosquito. Let me no one cares.

Okay, well, let maybe pull let me pull it differently from my perspective. Hey, we're in an era where streaming television is the most vital art form to make. That kind of streaming television is expensive. You can shoot on your iPhone, but really you can't compete on The other extreme is music. You and me. We can cut a record right now and have it up on Spotify almost instantly. It doesn't mean anybody will listen, but the barrier to

That was Latin music. Yeah, and they're all telling okay, yeah, no, it's Latin music.

Okay, but it is very disheartening to hear from people like you that are on the cutting edge of this that ultimate because let's say, I am talent, okay, it bothers me that the talent sells out for two reasons, you know, Okay, I hear every day from people who say, you know, streaming payouts are bad. Let's forget the people who are just delusional, who are never listening to But there are people who make deals with major labels, talking to the experts. Maybe at a blue moon you can

Okay, So we're we're on your team. Yeah yeah, right right now. Well we're championing. Even the land companies were like, you shouldn't do that. We're we're trying to partner up with other entrepreneurs similar to us, and we're like, let me help you catch a second third record with your artists. We're on your team on that end of it. However, there's not a lot of people fighting that fight. Yeah, so it does get lonely the other a lot of people are going for that check.

Yeah. Another like, like I said, I'll return to look, there are going to be more twenty five seven medias and there probably are, and there were, But what I smelled is that the moment they could they even know

Just we're fans of like that gritty story.

However we want to build a story.

There's there's other people that are not like that are our peers. I'm constantly talking to my peers in these big buildings. I'm like, you found the artist. The deal was twenty thousand dollars, thirty thousand dollars in pocket because they're signing. Our majors are signing artists very very early now because they know there's other companies similar to us willing to, you know, develop. So I'm like, you could do that same deal on your own, but no one's actually doing it. Everyone's afraid.

Everyone's afraid of making their own move.

And it's scary because because you want to empower people to, you know, take the next leap in music and just be music entrepreneurs. But then when you see all these big mergers happen with Virgin and INgrooves and all these big distribution companies just buy up everything, You're like, who is the last true distribution partner out there that's not owned by a major label.

Okay, two things. Distribution is king. The talent is not king, because if it can't be bought heard, whatever doesn't matter how good it is. But unlike anytime previous, let's just stay with the music business, distribution has been institutionalized and available to all. Okay, So therefore there is more emphasis on the talent than there has been. Now getting noticed, there's a lot of steps along the way. But you can't say, at the end of the day, well, I

No, No, you can play, make a lot of money and it and it also costs a lot of money, and you can make a big impact. You could do all that, but until we see an artist truly fully do it independently. H Ghazi and Empire are an independent company that you know champion artists, but a lot of artists just haven't taken that h that leap. Everyone just at the end of the day sells off for that check. Everybody thought bad bunny and that company was never going to do a deal with a Sony or UMG. They

And we and we talk about this every single week.

But the reality is when you see other you know, colleagues and counterparts, uh not doing it, it gets a little lonely, okay.

But also historically the traditional purveyors don't want something to If you look at the history of talent entertainment, yeah, to begin with, from beginning to end, it's always the independence that push the envelope.

Correct.

Yeah, but I think that's changing. And so here's here's a take. I mean, you talked about the barrier of entry, right, right, I mean SoundCloud. I mean there's no barrier of entry. You don't even need a distributor for soundcland or for YouTube. You can just upload an asset. Now you know, this is a whole other podcast for another day. But AI is going to change that level of entry as well.

Okay, let's just go back a little clean up work. You have a musical artist, yep, they have traction, yep. How do you cross it over to a traditional streaming outlet, not YouTube, which is visual, Spotify, Apple, etc. How do you draw consumption there whereas there so much low hanging fruit money elsewhere that you don't care.

Uh, well, you got to start off globally first. For a company like ours. We have to focus globally because US marketing is expensive. The three majors in the subsidiaries are controlling the biggest influencers, so we have to start off globally. So the way we identify a sub niche, we have to also identify subcreators or micro creators to you know, get the ball rolling. If then it starts working internationally, then we bring it to the US.

UH.

And then this way we're able to no, not put, not go all in on just one record. We can do multiple records because the cost is a lot less in the global.

Markets, which is also why it's such a cool and useful tactic to do ab tech.

So let me stop there. The reason why I kind of gave almost a pessimistic outlook on like the machine is was gonna win because what's happening globally now is those companies that were vendors or like third party for everybody, they're getting acquired by the big companies as well, or the small indie label in UH, you know, Sweden, Germany, whatever, they're getting acquired as well. So it's it's UH. And then the even the big majors are focusing more of

Okay, just go back to the very specific question. You have some success, how do you drive play on streaming outlets, not YouTube?

Just an influencer, an influencer push, Yeah, it's a it's an influencer push or also have the creator. Like here's the thing, like, either either you do sweat equity or you pay for it, or if you really care about your music, you do both. We're fortunate that, uh, we work with talent that we're very honest with them and we tell them that they also have to push their own music, and there they lend themselves to being coached

Yeah, because we were driving in We were in the Uber and Ursus points to one of those Hollywood buses and he goes, man, you know what's a funny rap? I was like, what is it that he goes, No one cares about fame anymore because their cousin can get fifteen million views on TikTok. That's why that bus is empty.

Okay, let's just stay on that for a second.

But to finish that, it's it's the truth, man. No like these platforms, you know, the monolith is so beautiful, beautifully designed, and it fits in your hand and it's a habit for you to look down for hours that no one picks up their phone and says, yo, I'm going to find my favorite song today, Like no one has a goal saying like, okay, I'm gonna go on TikTok right now and I'm gonna find my favorite song where I'm gonna go to the show where I'm gonna meet the girl in my life's of my life and

But they are looking to shop. They are looking at video game clips, they are looking at wrestling clips, they are looking at other stuff.

They're looking at interest because it's the feedback, it's the feedback machine. You put out, you put out what you like, the machine gives you back. So music is an accessory. Accessory, accessory, yeah.

To the content correct, and then if your music is good enough, it becomes primary to that person.

Exactly and asked mentioned in the magazine, we're true believers of like the nine touch points, which is like someone needs to see something nine times in order to buy it, and then obviously the ten percent role, which was also covered in the Wired article. So it's just a matter of volume, but it's also a matter of how you can connect. So if you're one of the lucky ones and you're working with an artist that can get coached on how to create content themselves, it's the easiest way

Okay, just to be very simple, you're representing an artist, musical artist, other than streaming revenue on YouTube, Spotify at all, where's the money and how much money is there?

The merch business is business is crazy? Is incredible, It's crazy.

Okay, But just in terms of x number of views deals with the platforms, is that a business or is that very rare? And not much money.

We've only had deal with Yeah, we've had We've had three deals with with Twitch.

Oh you're talking about artists.

Yes, yeah, yeah, there is money with with platform exclusives. But see, sometimes, man, I don't want to misspeak. I mean something right now, doing an exclusive deal with a platform is only for the big dogs in my recommendation, you know, because we've done it where we have a deal with Twitch and they were great and they're awesome partners, but you know, the exclusivity is just something that you know,

Like like Rapp said, I mean, let's let me bring it back to music, because now I understand the question a little bit more. TikTok has its own distribution, That's that's true, and we've been approached a couple of times. Why why would you do TikTok is the hot platform right now, but why would you do a deal with the platform itself? It's like all those people that deals with Apple Music. Okay, well what was the benefit of that?

Okay, Okay, Let's say I send both of you to Tahiti for four months without your phone, no computer, no phone. You come back, how much have you missed and how much of you behind?

See, that's the beautiful thing about Like I know the way that when content is consumed, and even the way that the magazine, the underdog story of the magazine, and how was portrayed. Like, no one, I promise you, no one actually knows how to gain the algorithm. No one knows how to manipulate the algorithm. Like, like, what we

And I'll be a lot of that was really good, by the way, But I'll add onto that I used to be a song promoter, like I said earlier, for labels, and everything was SEO based, So I would make the Bob playlist and everybody that would just.

For those who might not be up to speed search engine optimization correct.

So I would put Bob's playlist and every time someone would look it up, I would have put all those songs in there that you would recommend, and then I would sneak in a label song in there as well. When that went away, it was like the worst thing that happened in my life because I was like twenty two and I was like, I have no other hack. This is my only hack. But then I realized, how

So twenty five seven media, what's the annual gross?

Now, well, it's one more role to daddy. I don't want to put that out there, but over eight figures for sure.

Okay, when you zero it out, you have twenty seven employees, and you got to share the money with the creators. Are you in the black or in the red?

We're doing well, Yeah, we're doing well. I'll actually talk about that a little bit. So this is something I just talked to my brother about, my little brother. So, you know, the stereotype of the agency, record label or whatever social media guru person is like here's my Lamborghini and here's like the you know, like, I'm really glad I had these guys and we all check each other, like we don't flex any of that stuff, Like I've never posted my car anywhere.

Well, we're gonna say what kind of CARDI drive?

Not gonna say, but it's awesome. I mean, we'll take you to the to the range and then you'll see. But the thing is, like, I like actually making a difference in someone's life and employing them. I think that's our flex. One thing that we've always flexed since we had one employee to now having twenty seven, is we always say how many employees we have, because I think that's the only thing we flex, and we're really proud

Okay, you mentioned a number of times you're a Mexican, you're an immigrant. Is there something about that you reference this but a little bit longer that makes you successful, has more drive? And how do you feel about the immigration situation in America today? And how would you saw everyone's anger about what's going on?

Oh man, well, well start, okay, let's take it back. So what I'm proud of I'm an immigrant as well. I retired my parents. He retired his.

Parents, And you're an immigrant from.

Born and raised in Greece, but I'm from Albania. So we both retired our parents. When twenty five to seven started doing really well. So that's probably our flex that's our our Leamborghini, right, And that's actually the reason why we're winning because the way we invested in our families, we invest in people that work for us and just our talent. As far as the immigration issue, there's so many different levels of immigration that we need to talk about.

We had, we had a completely different, complete culture shock when we were when we were just beginning, when we met.

And he was talking about immigration like low skilled or low skilled workers. I was like, oh, I see the opposite. Like these kids get educated in America, they get off for this huge compensation, and then they can't work here. I'm like, that's completely different than the experience that you're talking about in California. So I wish I could find a big answer to that. I think it needs to be in phases. I think if people are getting educated here, they need to get addressed if you want them to

Okay, you know the fact that the high tech worker and the factor limits that's just nuts. But you were going to say something urseless.

Yeah. I think when when Rap and I started becoming friends, we had a huge culture shock. I didn't know the East Coast people aren't just open about their immigration status. I think that's a very La Mexican thing, Like we're just we wore our heart on our sleeves and we connect right away when we let people know, like hey man, like I'm you know, like I speak fluently, like let's

What happened with medical school.

Well, he added Sauce on that I was a biotechnology major where with the University of Connecticut with the premise of going to medical school. And that's when I came out to La was doing the song promotion stuff, met him and then didn't think.

That did you finish college? Yeah, okay, I think at this point we're going to close it. I want to thank you guys for being so forthcoming, and there's a lot to chew on here, even for those of us who thought we knew what was going on.

Well, I do want to say thank you to to Brendan from from Wired for first of all for connecting us right and then also obviously we're humbled, you know by his story. I didn't have to go to therapy for a whole year because he just he just interviewed me for like once once a once a week for

But yeah, yeah, I just want to I just want to say thank you to you, Bob for allowing us for your platform to be heard. But I really really want to go back to the the premise that we were talking about earlier, where you were talking about are still independent companies trying We definitely are, and we're looking

And let us know, like literally, let us know right now, Hey, I want to retire my parents. I manage artists. What do I do? I want to start a label? How do I do it?

Like?

Reach out a raph and I because that's that's part of the message and that's why we're.

Doing about a bing Until next time. This is Bob left sets.

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