The last “real job” I had before starting The Dad was Product Manager for Customer-Driven Supply Chain, analytics, and data science at 84.51, a tech subsidiary of Kroger.
I was working on defining the overall product strategy and framework, how all the tech offerings worked together and fit into a roadmap.
I had a specific vision in mind. My boss was on board and we collaborated closely. But then… he got a new role, and I got a new boss, and she… did not agree with my vision. I asked her who I needed to convince that it was the right direction. She said, “Me.” I asked her if I could have a few months, a couple of developers, and a conference room to prototype it out and prove it would work.
She counter proposed that I should think about what other roles I might like in the company instead. Ouch.
I was in talks with Some Spider about starting a dad brand. So I asked her if I could have two weeks to get back with her. I thought it was possible I’d have an offer for my DREAM JOB by then.
And I got it.
When I gave my notice to 84.51, most people thought I was going back to GE. When I told them I was leading up a social media brand for dads they looked at me with a combination of shock and concern.
“OH. How will you make money with that? 😬” they’d ask.
How “meme brands” make money
The digital media revenue model has a few levers: programmatic ads, affiliate, commerce, and branded content.
Programmatic ads = on site advertisements.
Ads that appear on your website. They are bid out at certain rates depending on how much traffic you get and how much advertisers are willing to spend. To get good programmatic ad revenue, you need a lot of site traffic and good “comscores.”
Programmatic is great because they’re reliable and ideally more evergreen than social. If you’re getting good traffic, usually through SEO, then you’re getting fairly consistent revenue. Programmatic ads also have less overhead than other revenue levers. The client is providing the ad creative, you are providing the audience (traffic).
The downside is that they are not high $ amounts. It takes a lot of traffic to make it work. And while it may not be as reliant on social algorithms, it is extremely reliant on SEO algorithms and strategies, which also change.
The Dad had a website: thedad dot com. Yes…. HAD. Still does technically, but head to thedad.com right now, the last post was an essay I wrote early last year. It is not updated anymore. :(
The Dad programmatic ad revenue was never a priority for our company leadership, and thus, site traffic to thedad.com was also not a priority. Our editorial team cared a lot about it though, because we felt our goal of elevating modern involved fatherhood would be better achieved if we also created richer, longer form content. More on that later…
Programmatic ad revenue was not how The Dad would make money.
(Scary Mommy, on the other hand, was amazing at this. Consistently driving site traffic via social, SEO, and elsewhere.)
Other
There are lots of other ways to make money. One time we noticed the White New Balance dad shoes were on sale on Amazon, so we created an “affiliate” link to them and posted about it. We got a cut of each purchase. Did people actually buy them from this post?
Yes, they did. I was one of them. Haha.
Laura: you’re gonna wear something nice on tv right? Me: yeah
Also, just because we loved doing it and wanted to, and also because Ally Probst an d Morgan Music are amazing at these things, we also wrote books, calendars, and more. We had a solid ecommerce gifting business going for The Dad. (Yes, HAD. shop.thedad.com is no longer with us.)
If you have The Dad Book, the Dadisms day calendar, D is for Dad, The Dad Law, or The Dad Instruction Manual, hold onto em! They are no longer available for purchase. They are officially collectors items.
That leaves us with branded content
This is where The Dad shined.
If you’re a brand with an ad budget and you want to reach the dad demographic, you could try to pick a TV show that tends to reach that demographic. Then you could work with an expensive ad agency to create content. Then purchase the ad space and run your commercial! Yikes.
ORRRRR… work with The Dad, who has that demographic LOCKED DOWN, and knows how to speak to them directly. We’d work with brands to create co-branded content that our audience loves that would also get across their brand message in an organic way. So we’d do the creative, but also…. with our huge audience, we also had the distro. No TV channel, network, or show necessary. Distro and ad agency all in one. With likes, comments, and engagement! And viral potential!
That is the main value prop of a digital media brand. That is the main way we’d make money.
In February of 2018, just 4 months after quitting 84.51, I had attended a branded sales pitch in Kroger headquarters.
But why does Kroger HQ look like a nextgen gaming console?
As we were getting on the elevator to head up to some big board room for the pitch, I ran into the CEO and CTO of 84.51. They did a double take like “Wait, aren’t you the guy who just quit to start some dad meme thing???? WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?”
I felt like an imposter fish out of water in digital media but an 8am meeting in Kroger corporate HQ? Felt like home to me. Nick, Ben, and sales leadership was all there. Even the person who doesn’t think people in Cincinnati wear high heels was there, in high heels.
"I just worked at 84.51. It’s perfect because 84.51 is all about data and personalization. That’s exactly what The Dad is all about too. Every day we entertain millions of dads personally, and we have the data to prove we’re doing it. We can personalize content just for that demographic and optimize it. It seems like a big change from 84.51, but at its core it’s very similar.” I told the room enthusiastically.
Oh yeah. In my element now.
We did really great stuff with Kroger. Almost all of it was high quality video, created by the incredible The Dad studio team led by Nick and Ben.
Including some really cool partnership vids with MLB star Clayton Kershaw:
https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2761351417424436
I also got to drive a lawnmower up to cook a steak on a fireplace poker over a campfire in my backyard.
This was cut to very short IG stories, so it wasn’t actually this painfully awkward. But my kids love this video. They crack up every time, which is all that matters.
There you have it. Programmatic ads, affiliate, commerce, and branded content. The money makers of digital media.
Just goes to show, even when you’re doing fun stuff like making memes, you can never get away from boring, relentlessly soul crushing BUSINESS.
One time the Disney Corporation (allegedly) asked me to delete a meme from my PERSONAL Instagram! I’ll show it to you next week.