Who is Michael Ovitz?, Michael Ovitz
- Substrat: CAA, a talent agency, swung power from the studios to the talent
- Strategy: get all the talent & corner the market
- Tactics:
- offer talent a menu of business services
- serve clients as a group
- package a great script with talent & profit predictions and sell it to potential buyers
- avoid press
- talent pitch: 1) better material, information, deals, 2) we'll make your dream project happen
- either: politely criticise choices, tell him he needs better material & access, offer both
- or: tell him he'll make it anyway & you'll help stay on top with better material & access
- act like you're the client's agent already
- full focus on person (welcome concierge, $500 start date gift, return every call eob)
- 4 commandments
- never lie to your clients or colleagues
- return every call by end of day
- follow up and don't leave people guessing
- never bad-mouth the competition
Notizen
- CAA strategy: get all the talent (directors, actors, writers, ...) & corner the market
- agents served clients as a group, several agents were in touch with client
- they created work for clients by packaging their talent, not just field offers
- CAA activities:
- find film buyers for books (the writers' book commissions remained untouched)
- package talent & profit predictions into a movie project & sell it to buyers
- negotiate for the clients (e.g. branding deals or gross revenue participation)
- help executives find new jobs & share information with them (often without immediate payoff, able to sell projects later)
- take care of clients' daily needs (e.g. restaurant reservations)
- create ads & do m&a
- CAA business model: 10% cut of client fees, consulting fees for non-client work
- at peak, ~$350 million a year in commissions from ~1,350 clients;
- siege mentality: unleash hell on anyone who crosses them
- passed down clients to junior people by slow-rolling return calls
- didn't talk to reporters, hired media relations firm to keep them out of the press
- consequences: lots of conflicts of interest ("no conflicts, no interest"), clients could fire CAA ("the children had all the power"), lots of bitter enemies, young turks can walk with clients, mystical brand
- CAA client pitch: "better material, better information, better deals - and we'll make your dream project happen"
- how he signed clients: politely criticise past choices, tell him he needed to see/choose better material & directors, promise him both
- poach by assumption: behave as if you're the client's agent already
- poach clients after someone else had developed them
- inoculated clients by instilling the negative from competitors in advance
- focus on first impressions: parking concierge welcomed guests personally; clients walked through art gallery to the elevator; assistants sat in conference room already when clients arrived; tip lavishly at restaurants to get premier treatment; they had employees only responsible for sending gifts
- "With no papers to renew, our clients had no anniversary to jog them into thinking about leaving us."
- CAA agents handed more contract work to lawyers than other agencies to free up agents' time
- "Look, you're going to make it with or without us. But we can keep you at the top, because we see every project first, we develop for you, we represent every important studio executive (...). Going with us is just like taking out career insurance."
- start-date gift: $500 survival kit in actor's dressing room on the set
- CAA's 4 commandments:
- never lie to your clients or colleagues
- return every call by end of day
- follow up and don't leave people guessing --> COMMUNICATE on every desk
- never bad-mouth the competition
- he had 5 assistants surrounding him (1 trained to become an agent; 2 handled calls; 1 handled schedule; 1 gave gifts), they tracked all the clients' hobbies & charities
- limited income + heavy servicing = bad deal
- Louis Brandeis: "I represent the situation"
- "In any multiplayer contest, you want to be the outlier."
- he looked for respect and validation most of his life
- for years, his business card had just his name, no title.
- he advised a16z how to stand out: offer a full menu of business services to founders
("be the CAA of Silicon Valley")
- team provides in-house experts to assist its start-ups with recruitment, budgeting, operations, sales, publicity, IPO rollouts, ...
- develops ties with the Valley's best software engineers, designers, product managers (often without direct payoff --> aim: long-term relationships)