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How Wistia Took the Ultimate Risk on Creativity
Chris Savage, Co-Founder and CEO of Wistia, joins the Content Experience Show to discuss Wistia’s “1, 10, 100” project and how they’ve embraced risk.
In This Episode:
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Full Episode Details
Risk Brings Reward
No matter what stage your business is in, there are always decisions to make. Every move is a choice between playing it safe and taking a risk. No one would advocate taking blind risks at every turn, but many times, the greatest reward comes after a great risk.
Chris Savage and the team at Wistia are intimately familiar with taking big risks and coming out with a win. Some of their risks have included buying back shares from their early investors, choosing to continue through hard times rather than selling, and their recent “1, 10, 100” project.
What Wistia has shown is that if you know your business, you know your customers, and you stay true to yourself, you can be confident in risk. Creating something genuine rather than sticking to the popular method is the way to a fulfilling and lasting success!
In This Episode
- How Wistia approached the “1, 10, 100” project.
- Tips for evaluating when to sell a business.
- How Wistia chose to buy out angel investors.
Quotes From This Episode
“Some of our most successful content has been around DIY video.” — @csavage
If we’re really thoughtful, we can probably talk about our own failings, and that will be interesting. Click To Tweet“We believed that the focus and constraint of profitability would force us to be more creative. Fortunately, so far that’s worked.” — @csavage
Resources
Content Experience Lightning Round
What is your favorite disaster movie?
Chris’ favorite is San Andreas, a more recent movie featuring Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson. He’s also a big fan of 2012 and The Day After Tomorrow!
See you next week!
Episode Transcript
Anna Hrach: Hey everybody, welcome to the Content Experience Show Podcast. I am here with the always amazing Randy Frisch from Uberflip, and I am Anna Hrach from Convince & Convert.
Now, today we have a very special guest on the show. We have Chris Savage, who is the CEO and co-founder of Wistia, and we spent a lot of time today talking about their most recent campaign that they did, which you'll hear all about, it's the one, 10, and 100 campaign. But I think a really great theme around today's show was actually risk. Now, Randy, I know Uberflip, you guys take risks all the time, and it pays off.
Randy Frisch: Absolutely. You know, I've known Chris, who you'll hear from in a couple moments here, I've probably known him five or six years, and I remember going to their office at Wistia, you know, they were much smaller. I think they were something like 30 people on their team at the time, and there was a lot of different video solutions out in the market, probably more than we have today because there's been some consolidation.
And I just got the vibe that these guys are doing it different, right? Like, you know, it was everything in terms of their approach to fundraising to the way they had been executing on a product perspective, but even just the type of content that they were creating. And this campaign is one that got my team talking. Like, I can't tell you how long we spent going back and forth both admiring and debating which of the videos were our favorites.
Anna Hrach: Yeah, it is really cool. So basically, again, you're going to hear all about this, but Chris and his team tasked another agency with creating a video, actually three separate videos, one for $1,000, one for $10,000, and then the third for $100,000. And then what they're doing is they've released those videos, so you can see the difference for yourself now, but they're also packaging it up and putting it into this massive documentary about behind the scenes.
It's just so crazy because this was a huge risk. This was a huge budget, this was something that, you know, they wanted to do, it was very creatively driven, and, you know, there was a huge chance that this might now have generated anything at all.
Randy Frisch: Yeah, and what I think I admire about the campaign, the approach, I think a lot of us as marketers, we're often sitting there and debating, you know, what are we going to do? Are we going to take a big risk and go outside of our comfort zone? But too often, when we do, our definition of taking a risk is just spending more money, or doing what the guys who are bigger than us do, whereas what Chris' team did here with this execution was they went to that far extreme, but they contrasted it to not taking a risk, to going ... you know, going the more normal approach.
And I think that's what makes these videos so intriguing is that you're comparing them to, well, what if we just tried to do it in the average way versus what if we went all out on our budget? And I think that's where we're ... where everyone who watches these videos, as he hits on, ends up watching just as much of one versus the other, because you've got to know.
Anna Hrach: Yeah, the results were really fascinating. Before we spoil it anymore for everybody, Randy, what do you say we go ahead and let Chris talk about it himself? And I think you actually brought him in this time.
Randy Frisch: Hey Chris, thanks so much for stopping in and chatting with Anna and I. We are really excited for this episode, and as I said to you at the beginning, like, I love always chatting with you, catching up, hearing about the world of video, but you guys have really done something fun that we can talk about with this, you know, 100, 10, one campaign. Hopefully I'm talking about it properly, but we'll get into that a bit.
For everyone listening, though, maybe you can just set up your role at Wistia, and maybe the ... just quickly, the Wistia story?
Chris Savage: Yeah, sure. Absolutely, and thanks for having me. And, you know Randy, I always love chatting with you.
So, I'm the co-founder and CEO of Wistia, we help companies use video better. We've been around for 12 years, so we're not your average technology company. Based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, we have about 90 people on the team, never raised venture funding, and actually, late last year, we did raise angel funding, and late last year we bought ... we raised some debt to buy out our angel investors and recommitted to running the business for the long term. So, definitely different and excited about that.
And we have a couple products. The main product helps you manage videos on your site, understand how they're performing, integrates them to all your other marketing tools, all that jazz.
And we launched Soapbox, which helps you create videos, last year. That's a Chrome extension that records your webcam and your screen simultaneously, and lets you add transitions between them so you can really quickly make a video that looks really professional. So, if it takes you two minutes to record, it's going to take you 30 seconds to edit, and that's been super fun as well, so check that out.
And the campaign you're talking about is one, 10, 100, that's how I call it, start with the one.
Randy Frisch: You go the other way.
Chris Savage: But basically we worked with Sandwich Video, who are some of the premier video production ... I would say one of the premier video production companies that does product launch videos specifically. They did the product launch videos for Slash, for Square, for Warby Parker, and they just are incredibly funny, incredibly high production, really on point.
We went to them, and worked with them, and gave them a budget of $111,000, and asked them to make us ads at three different price points. What would it look like if the budget was $1,000? What would it look like if a budget was 10,000? And what would it look like if a budget was 100,000? And we wanted them to make an ad for Soapbox with all those different budgets.
So they did that. We just released the-
Randy Frisch: All right, so let's pause there, because there's so much we can unpack with this theme and how it came to be. But before we go there, I mean, the way you teed up your intro was perfect as well, because dropping 100,000, let alone $111,000 on a video series, or a single campaign, if you will, when you are a more or less bootstrapped company that's, you know, kicking ass as you guys have, I mean, we love using Wistia here at Uberflip.
But you've done so in a lean way, and I think that's always admirable, and I think that's the interesting part of this whole campaign. It's a debate, right? Like, how much money do we have to spend on that video? And we go through this all the time here at Uberflip. Any time we're going to do ... whether it's a video, or an ebook, or whatnot, it's how much production value needs to go into any asset that we do?
And I think there's a lot of different beliefs out there, and I think ... You know, Anna, you probably see this a lot when you're talking to some of the clients at Convince & Convert in that there's almost these different expectations these days with user generated content that's pushing us a little down market.
Chris Savage: Yeah. No, I mean, it's a constant debate, right? And especially as you get into higher budgets, the questions of, like, how do you know if you're getting a return become very ... they become the predominant questions, right? So it's something that comes up a lot. It's something that is really hard to pin down, and that's actually why ... That's why we wanted to do the project, because we thought, you know, these guys are the best in the business. We're going to see what the best looks like.
They were excited about the challenge, actually, because their budgets are usually even bigger than $100,000 these days. They were excited about the challenge of, like, how ... what would it be like for them to do these ads at lower budgets? Like, what would they have to sacrifice, and how would it ... would it actually make them more engaging in some cases?
And it's been super interesting to see just the response to the ads themselves so far, because I'm constantly hearing from people who are saying, like, this is an amazing project, the $1,000 ad is by far my favorite, like, that's the most authentic. And then I talk to people, like, well, the $10,000 is the funnest, like, that one's so interesting, and the brand feel you get, the 100 is completely different, too.
Randy Frisch: Well, I'll tell you that ... I'll tell you, on our marketing team we use Slack, which, ironically, I've always loved Sandwich Video since I saw the Slack video that they did. But more so specific to Slack, after the campaign was sent out to our team and then shared around by those who weren't on the mailing list, I guess, a vote was put onto the channel to see, of the 20 marketers, which version did they like the best? And the 100,000 got the least votes. I mean, it was like, you know, people talked about how polished it was, but the ones that ... it was kind of an even downs between the one and the 10.
Chris Savage: Yeah, it's kind of wild, and it ... You know, when you look at the $100,000 one, they're kind of creating a hyper reality, you know? Like, the people, the office, the posters, everything is perfectly done, which is how most television ads are.
And so it's interesting because, like, you can watch ... Almost, I think, it can change the way you think about other ads you see on TV, or on streaming, obviously, where it's like, wow, that looks like this company must be doing great, that's a really polished thing, they must ... It's like a brand elevation thing, which is good for some people and not for others, actually. Sometimes there's a bigger opportunity other places, so that is interesting that no one chose that as the favorite.
Anna Hrach: Yeah. I'm, personally, excited for this campaign for a number of reasons. One, I think it's really cool. It's just super creative. It's a fun different way to look at video.
And then two, also, Randy, going back to what you said earlier, and Chris, I'm sure you guys encounter this all the time, too, but it can be really hard to get people to invest in video and give up some of that cash flow. And I'm not sure what it is exactly, you know, whether it's the perception of having so much money go one place versus what they could be spending it on another, but it's so exciting to finally see some of these things put to the test, and actually show people that you don't have to have $100,000 to create the best video possible. That's not what this is about. It's not always about money.
And I think this is a ... You know, even just aside from being an incredibly creative campaign, it's a really powerful testimonial to just video in general.
Chris Savage: Yeah, I agree with you completely, and, you know, for us at Wistia, so much of our own content that we've made, and has been the most successful, has been around DIY video. How do you light something properly? What's a setup you can get for less than $1,000 that's going to help you make something that looks really good?
And part of the thing that we were interested to see was, like, people ... Just, it's so hard to evaluate when this stuff is worth it. What would it be like for us to see a product of our own that was done at that really high budget?
Like, I was ... When I saw the $100,000 thing, I was, like, blown away in a way ... just by the ... kind of, like, the elevation of the brand. But that piece, how you measure that, is so impossibly hard, right? Like, how do you know that you are elevating a brand or not? Like, where does that show up in your data? It's a really hard thing to wrap your mind around.
And I'm sure there's a ton of people who spend way too much money on content like that, and sometimes people who don't ... they don't actually realize that that's what they need is to elevate themselves, and so they don't spend the money on the bigger production stuff.
Randy Frisch: Yeah, I think this part's debatable, though, at the same time, and not ... I agree with everything that you just said, but ... and not to take anything away from this campaign, but part of me started to overanalyze it, which I'm sure a lot of people are doing, especially internally.
And what I started to go with was, did I appreciate the extra level of polish because I watched the $1,000 video first? Or would I have normally watched that and just taken for granted all of that ... that degree of polish that's in there? So the question to your point is, is it needed, or is it not?
And, you know, we've done some amazing projects on our team. I wouldn't say that we often get away at $1,000, but in that $10,000 range, sometimes five to seven we can pull something off, you know, still bringing in some external help, but not ... but still relying on our own team, where we end up just so happy with it, and getting some of the best feedback.
Chris Savage: I think ... Yeah, I mean, your point is on the money, I think. When you ... You can see the difference in the $100,000 video because you see the 1,000, and I think actually, most of the time, we don't see the difference. You're not thinking this ad is high production quality. Normally we think, like, this ad made me laugh, or this ad is boring, or, like, I have a problem that this solves. But so often it's ... like, the high production quality is just assumed.
So I do think it emphasizes that, and I ... but I actually don't know myself, like, does that make that more effective, or does it make it less effective because you're aware of it? It's a great debate.
Randy Frisch: It's like trying on the $3,000 suit versus the $500 suit.
Chris Savage: Yeah.
Randy Frisch: You know? Like, you know the $3,000 suit is better because you just tried on the $500 suit, but, you know, to the plain eye, $500 suit ain't bad.
Chris Savage: Totally, which, I think, puts it within reach of many more people, right? Like, which is exciting.
Randy Frisch: Cool. So, there's a lot more we can unpack from this, and we're going to. We're to first take a quick break and hear from the sponsors here on the Conex Podcast, and then we'll be right back with Chris.
Jay Baer: Hi Friends, this is Jay Baer from Convince & Convert, reminding you that this show, the Conex Show Podcast, is brought to you by Uberflip, the number one content experience platform.
Do you ever wonder how content experience affects your marketing results? Well, you can find out in the first ever content experience report, where Uberflip uncovers eight data science backed insights to boost your content engagement and your conversions. It's a killer report, and you do not want to miss it. Get your free copy right now at Uberflip.com/ConexShowReport. That's Uberflip.com/ConexShowReport.
And the show is also brought to you by our team at Convince & Convert consulting. If you've got a terrific content marketing program, but you want to take it to the very next level, we can help. Convince & Convert works with the world's most iconic brands to increase the effectiveness of their content marketing, social media marketing, digital marketing, and word of mouth marketing. Find us at ConvinceAndConvert.com.
Randy Frisch: Today's podcast is brought to you by CoSchedule. I am a big fan of the team over at CoSchedule, because they are making it possible for us, as marketers, to live with an all in one marketing calendar, combines project management, email marketing, social promotion, all in one place, which we know is so tricky when our team is not aligned. So, to get complete visibility over your entire marketing schedule, keep your sanity, and get more done, check out CoSchedule.
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Anna Hrach: Hey everybody, welcome back. We are here with Chris Savage from Wistia. Now Chris, before the break we were talking a lot about the individual videos that you and your team made for the one, 10 and 100 campaign, but you actually have huge plans to turn all of this, basically the entire process of doing this campaign, concepting it, shooting it, into a massive sort of four part, 100 minute documentary, which I think is fascinating. I think it's amazing, too, that you're able to take this entire process and then document it, because it is just so fascinating.
Chris Savage: Yeah, we're really excited about it, and what we wanted to do was, when we had the opportunity to work with Sandwich, they got excited about this project, we thought to ourselves, you know, this is a big project, and we're going to spend $100,000 on one of these ads, like, how do we learn from this, and how do we document it?
And so we sent our team out to document ... We documented all the meetings that we had with them, and we documented their first couple shoots, and the team came back and were like, okay, we might have thought this was going to be a couple videos in our learning center, or a couple blog posts. Like, there's a lot more here. There's a lot to learn, there's a lot of trade offs, it's actually ... there's a bigger story.
And so we basically kept documenting the process, and have put together this four part original series that's going to come out later this month, which is really about exploring the connecting between money and creativity, so a lot of the stuff we've been talking about.
And it kind of mirrors the ad, so you can see the Sandwich creative process, how they went about creating each ad, and then we went and kind of broke that down so you can see, like, for the $1,000 video, how do you make a video like that? Like, what does that take? How should you be thinking about the lighting, and shooting and editing.
And it pieces together, so you can kind of really ... it's the same format, so you can highlight the difference between each video, and hopefully, if you watch the series, you're way more informed about those types of decisions that one would make. You kind of have a view into how Sandwich works, which is very, very cool, and we learned a lot. And we thought it would be just, like ... It's a different thing, it's a bigger thing, it's a scarier thing, it's a more creative risk, and that got us excited, as a company, to take it on as a challenge.
Anna Hrach: Was it just crazy to be on the other side of the camera, and actually being, you know, so involved in, you know, being actually onscreen and helping to plan all this? Obviously, you know, you do video things pretty regularly, but how was it actually being sort of on the other side?
Chris Savage: I mean, it's very different, because we come up with an idea and then usually, once we have a concept and a script locked internally we move really fast, and in this case there was, like, many revisions to scripts, the shooting took a lot longer. I mean, the 100k shoot, I think there was, like, 30 people on set the day that it was shot. There's many more moving pieces, totally different equipment and stuff. And even on the post side, once it was completed, the number of revisions that they made was mind boggling, and the number of small changes to the $100,000 video was quite ... It was just ... just totally different level of production.
So it was super interesting. We learned a ton from it, and I hope people can get a view into that and kind of appreciate why you would do these ... you know, think about video at these different budgets, and also from a creative standpoint, so differently.
Randy Frisch: So I'm just curious, you know, as you hit on that, and this is something we've struggled on in the past when we've gone outside for video help, is giving up control, giving up creative control. You know, when we do the hackey project yourself, you know, all of us are micromanaging, we're coming up with that idea, we know our product inside out. At what stage do you find you have to give up that control when you go to a company like [inaudible 00:19:19]
Chris Savage: Yeah, so we knew we'd be giving up control, and while that was scary, we trusted them. And the weird thing is it felt like a risk to do this project, and it felt like another risk to make the original series, and then it felt like a risk to be transparent about how it's performing. So it seems like a lot of big risks that we kind of layered on top ... we layered each risk on top of the other ones.
And actually, in some weird way, that made it easier to do, because in my mind I was like, well, if these ads are not good, or they don't show up the way they're supposed to, we can probably make content explaining about how that happened, and if we're really thoughtful we can probably do it and, like, talk about our own failings, and that will be interesting. And if we're transparent about how they perform, that will probably also be another angle for us to learn, and share, and talk about. So we almost, like, added all these things together, and that made it easier for each individual part to give up control.
Randy Frisch: That's interesting. And just at a high level, how have you evaluated the success of these so far?
Chris Savage: So, yeah, we set some internal metrics that were about, like, the number of ... For the series, we set some metrics that are about the number of engaged views, so how many people will actually watch this both on our site and other platforms. And obviously the series isn't out yet, so I don't know how we'll do on that.
And then, for the actual ads themselves, we set some metrics around do they perform in getting people to learn about Soapbox? Which is, like, obviously what they're about.
The interesting thing is, we shared this stuff on Twitter, and that was kind of, like ... We did that first to kind of see what would happen, and we didn't really know what kind of response we would get. And to be completely candid, I was really blown away by the response. There was, like, far more interest than I thought there was going to be in just the ads themselves.
In hindsight, makes sense, but ... and that's why we did the project, but it was pretty remarkable. And so we had, I think, over a million impressions of the ads just on Twitter, before we sent an email out, and when that happened I was like, this was probably worth it.
So for me, at least, it frees us up to take some more risks in how we handle everything else. It feels like we've already had more of an impact than we thought we would have.
Randy Frisch: So I want to bridge on this idea of risk, but before I do, there's ... I'll give you a bit of a Wistia plug even though you're not looking for it, because one of the things I bet you can tell, because I know how Wistia works, is how far people are making it into these videos. I'm curious which of the ... before we jump off these videos, of the one, 10, and 100, aside from engagement, which ones have locked people in the longest?
Chris Savage: They're almost exactly the same.
Randy Frisch: Really?
Chris Savage: And actually they're all almost the exact same number of plays.
Randy Frisch: Wow.
Chris Savage: I think people see it as one thing, and so they watch them all. And there are so many different things you can look for in each. Like, you can look at the scripting, you can look at the visual quality, you can look at the audio quality, you can look at the fact that there are actors in some and Sandwich employees in others, and, like ... Yeah, I ... Again, we were quite surprised by that.
I assumed that it would be the most people would watch the 1,000 and then we'd have a drop off of people who weren't actually that compelled by it, and maybe, like ... I don't know. I thought maybe 50 to 60% of people would watch all of them if you watch the first one, but it's more like 95%.
Randy Frisch: Interesting. So I said I wanted to kind of leverage this idea of risk that you talked about with the videos, and there's no question, the approach that you've taken growing Wistia is not conventional for a technology company. The approach that you took, that you wrote about in your blog post earlier this year, that I read, around, you know, raising debt financing to buy out early investors and commit to this business is not traditional. How did you and your team evaluate that as a risk?
Chris Savage: Yeah, so that's a great question. So we were faced with the opportunity to sell the company in 2017, and Brendan and I ... You know, there's been many people who have poked around and tried to buy Wistia over the years, we're very fortunate for that, but in this one moment we actually had three different companies trying to acquire the company. And we're like, huh, maybe that means we should have these conversations.
So we had some conversations, and we were actually also coinciding with a tough time internally. It was one of the hardest times I've had at Wistia, probably the hardest time, of just, like, things were ... there was a lot of confusion, we didn't have great operating systems in place. I won't go too far into depth, but let's just say it was not super fun.
And we're faced with that decision, should we sell? And you would think, not super fun, running into some problems, like, might be a good time to sell, but I got advice from someone who had sold their company, and he said, “You know, no one tells you this, but if you have problems, and you sell the company, you still are going to have problems, and you're still going to have to solve them, but actually now you're going to be working for somebody else, and so you better believe you're going to solve those problems really fast.”
And he's like, “That happened to me, and I sold my company. I had the problems, I fixed them really fast, we were operating way better.” And he's like, “No one ever tells you not to sell, and I'm not going to tell you not to sell, but it's kind of similar, I think, to, like, if you're marrying the wrong person. People don't tell you that you're marrying the wrong person, either, but later, if things don't work out, they're like yeah, I know, I never really liked them either.”
And I think that there's, like, a funny thing of recognizing what you're giving up when you're selling a company. And so we realized, and got advice, and fortunately, I think, just took some real time with it, that if we sold the company we'd be giving up a platform to try different things. And we built one product, we could build other products. We could build a bigger brand. We've been doing this a long time. We love what we do.
And so we decided we're not going to sell, we're going to recommit to fixing those things. We're going to recommit to building the business our way, and if it doesn't go well, then that's okay, at least we bet on ourselves.
But once we made that decision we were misaligned with our angel investors, who did, probably, want us to sell, because they invested a long time ago in the ... you know, they invested when we were making $1,000 a month in revenue, and I am very thankful to them, but they needed some kind of return. And then, actually, we'd also been giving employees options, stock options, and if we're not going to sell we'd have to do right by the employees too.
So we did a bunch of research, looked at all the different options that were out there. We realized that debt could be a way to fund this, because we'd have ... we'd get the cash today and we could buy back shares from investors, we could let employees sell their options if they wanted to. And then Brendan and I would be taking on the risk that we could keep the company growing, and we could grow a lot more profitable than we had been, and that would allow us to pay off the debt.
And so the risk was, like, do we think we understand the fundamentals of the business, and that we can keep growing? And will the team leave? You know, will they not want to be here without stock options? And if things go sour, then we'll have to do something about that debt. We'll have to sell the company later, or raise money to equity to take out the debt, we'll have to do something like that.
But we believed that we could do it, and so ... And we actually believed that the focus, and the constraint, of profitability would force us to be more creative, and to go faster. Fortunately, so far, that's worked.
Anna Hrach: So you actually wrote an entire article about, sort of, how much you took on. Are you willing to sort of chat-
Chris Savage: Yeah.
Anna Hrach: ... about that piece?
Chris Savage: Yeah, we took $17.3 million in debt.
Anna Hrach: I like how the point three is in there, like, as if ...
Chris Savage: That's important, that's 300,000.
Anna Hrach: Yeah, no, it is. Yeah, I ... No, I would be counting every penny, too. I literally can't even quantify how much that is, like, in my brain. It's like when I think about the universe and my head just explodes.
Chris Savage: It was pretty funny the day it went into our bank account. I was like, look at our bank account, there's $17 million. Then we paid it out, it's like, it's gone.
Anna Hrach: Oh, my God. Seriously, I mean, hats off to you guys, because seriously, you know, like Randy mentioned, you know, taking big risks, and even just starting with that massive risk, you were able to do amazing things like the one, 10, and 100 campaign. And I'm really excited, personally, to see everything else that you all do at Wistia, and especially continuing this path of risk taking and making just really cool stuff.
Just in case ... You know, I know that the documentary isn't out yet, but when it is available, where should people go to actually view it, and see the behind the scenes, and see all these cool risks that you guys are taking? And can they sign up for alerts when it comes out?
Chris Savage: Yep, so if you go to Wistia.com, and you go to the Learn section of the site, you can sign up now. You can watch the trailer, which is, like, two minutes long, gives you a good sense of what you're signing up for. And if you do that we'll drop an email when it all comes out.
We're going to be ... It's going to be coming out later this month in a few different forms. There will be a live broadcast, that you can watch, of all of the stuff at once, you'll obviously [inaudible 00:28:30] watch on demand, and it will be on Wistia and a few other places too, which is exciting. So I would say, if you are interested, go to Wistia.com/Learn and sign up for when it comes out.
Anna Hrach: Fantastic. Chris, thank you so much for talking to us about the professional side of your life. We're going to go ahead and have you stick around for just a few moments to talk about the personal side. So stick with us and we'll be right back.
All right, so Chris, as we mentioned before, we got to know the professional side of you. We got to talk about all these cool campaigns and this amazing risk that you're taking on. Let's talk about some personal questions.
So you have talked to us a little bit about the fact that you love disaster movies, which I think is interesting, because we don't often hear people talk about their love of disaster movies, so ... And not in a negative way, I just think, you know, people ... Like, you know, it's not something ... it's not a genre that gets a ton of love, it seems.
So two question, two part question for you, what is your absolute favorite all time disaster movie? And then what is your favorite, like, best worst disaster movie? You know, like, the movies that are really terrible but you just ... you have to love.
Chris Savage: Great question. So I think my favorite ... It's really hard to pick a favorite disaster movie, but I'm going to go with San Andreas.
Randy Frisch: Really?
Anna Hrach: Okay, that one's pretty recent.
Chris Savage: It's pretty recent.
Anna Hrach: The Rock.
Chris Savage: Yeah, it's definitely worth a watch.
Randy Frisch: I mean, isn't that Dwayne Johnson?
Chris Savage: Oh, yes. Dwayne The Rock Johnson? Yeah. If you have Dwayne The Rock Johnson in a disaster movie you know you're doing well.
Anna Hrach: Feel like he is taking over that genre. Like, he's kind of owning it.
Chris Savage: You got Skyscraper that just came out, not as good, but ... But yeah, I mean, I have always loved disaster movies. I love them because they're so ... I mean, so outrageous you kind of know what you're getting, and because you kind of know what you're getting, they're all trying to push each other to extremes. Like, San Andreas is just absolutely outrageous, everything that happens in it.
And I've ... I mean, I guess it's escapism, but I really enjoy ... I enjoy knowing that I'm going to see a good disaster flick. 2012 is another classic, Day After Tomorrow is another classic.
Randy Frisch: I can't believe you haven't said Armageddon. Armageddon's [inaudible 00:30:43]
Chris Savage: Armageddon is a classic, yes. You know, it kind of, like, defines the genre, and it ... I did like when Armageddon was out, and that was the same time that, if you remember Deep Impact, also came out, and it was, like, the two different asteroid movies. And then there was The Volcano and Dante's Peak that came out within, like, a month of each other, too. Like, there's like a weird thing where some studio gets wind that there's another specific type of disaster movie coming and they're like oh, my God, we better do that too. Got to give people the disaster.
Randy Frisch: It's kind of the same with ... I can't remember which, I'm thinking of Netflix, that felt like Westworld.
Chris Savage: Yes, I know what you're talking about.
Randy Frisch: Like, HBO and Netflix were like, okay, I've got my spin on robots taking over the world.
Chris Savage: It's like what's happening in the culture at the moment, and everyone's trying to figure out what's the next thing that people want for their, like, escapism disaster movie, and it's like, oh, it's asteroids, that's what it is. Or, I mean, you know, there was, like, the ... This is not disaster, but all of the going to space stuff with, like, Interstellar, and Gravity, and all happening at the same time. It's like, it just ... It's funny it happens in waves like that.
Randy Frisch: So the question here really is, who is going to try and take a spin on a one, 10, 100? Like, one of the three different approaches that people are like, the Wistia team nailed it, we need our version, and we'll have to keep an eye out for that. But, you know, until that time, you guys can reign with the box office hit. I think you guys knocked it out of the park. Get your Oscar, Emmy, whatever it is that they're going to get for these.
But congrats, Chris, and kudos to everyone at Wistia. Again, just a, you know, quick call of action for everyone to go to Wistia.com/Learn to find these videos, enjoy them. If you've enjoyed this podcast, you know, continue to subscribe and find other episodes that we've had, you know, together, myself, and Anna, and Joy connecting with you. And appreciate everyone taking time out of their days to listen to these conversations with bright marketers like Chris.
Until next time, this has been the Conex Podcast.
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