Ever made fun of a video online? It very well could have been one from Dhar Mann Studios.
The video entertainment company, which is named after its founder, has been lampooned online for its sometimes cringey, often moralizing videos showing characters in different situations facing life lessons. One 21-minute video from earlier this year, which is tagged as an #inspirational #shortfilm on YouTube, depicts a toxic boyfriend apparently learning how to be okay with his girlfriend dressing how she wants. Cringe aside, the YouTube channel has grown to have just shy of 26 million subscribers.
In the past year, DMS has undergone something of an internal makeover. In September, the company hired Sean Atkins, a Discovery and MTV alum, to serve as CEO; earlier this year, more industry heavyweights came aboard to help run the show, including Toni Gray, a MrBeast and Fremantle vet, who joined as head of production.
The hires are part of a broader move from DMS to scale at a moment where YouTube and creators are aiming to get footholds in high-production entertainment.
“Our goal is to be the No. 1 creator of positive content in the world,” Atkins told Marketing Brew.
More is more
Atkins says that DMS is looking to enter a new chapter, expanding its content from its version of inspirational content into different genres, including horror. It’s also considering new formats, such as vertical videos and podcasts, as well as additional distribution methods: DMS debuted a FAST channel partnership with Samsung TV Plus in May.
“As our audience wants more experiences, wants more content, how do we super-serve that need in what format? What genre might that be?” he said.
While DMS plans to continue emphasizing positivity and universal human themes, Atkins said, there will likely be more experimentation done on DMS’s channels with new types of content throughout the end of the year.
The play is to further personalize content for its audience across platforms; Dhar Mann and DMS have said its audience is roughly 145 million followers. (Across Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok, accounts for Dhar Mann and Dhar Mann Studios have more than 124 million followers.) The studio puts out a breakneck five scripted episodes each week, and it already tailors its content to some degree depending on the platform that content is distributed on. For example, its Facebook content tends to be more “soapy,” which Atkins said is geared toward moms, while its TikTok videos often feature clips geared toward teens.
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The company makes content primarily for YouTube and Facebook, he said, but clips are shared across social platforms to generate audience interest.
“We have two platform-focused studios that make content primarily for that premiere on that platform, and then it gets cross-pollinated across all the other platforms,” Atkins said. “Something that is made for YouTube will ultimately also have a life on Facebook and Snapchat and TikTok and Spotify and all that.”
Beyond pre-roll
Right now, DMS relies on organic advertising to distribute the videos it makes, and Atkins said the company does buy paid ads for “experimentation.” Relying on the company’s large audience can benefit algorithmic distribution on various platforms.
Atkins likened DMS’s approach to those of the cable networks he previously worked at.
“It’s not that MTV or Discovery wouldn’t do paid media, but the majority of the lift was done on on-air promotion to get the audience to view something,” he said. “It’s the same thing for most digital creators.”
As it grows, DMS is exploring branded content, and Atkins said that Dhar Mann himself attended Cannes Lions for the first time this year. As it considers more brand work, Atkins said the aim is to ink select, long-term brand partnerships that make sense for the brand’s audience.
Part of DMS’s planned growth spurt isn’t just hiring execs and branching into branded content. The company is also exploring the possibility to acquire other creator-led businesses, Atkins said. To that end, he told us, it’s working with the talent agency CAA and has plans to work with the company’s merchant bank, CAA Evolution, as a way to potentially facilitate acquisitions.
As it evaluates potential acquisition targets, DMS execs are evaluating creators’ interest in scaling as well as their existing audience overlap with that of DMS. Eventually, Atkins would like DMS’s original and acquired channels to “all speak to a Middle America.”