Background Image

How to run a successful creative business

Tips for sustainability from award winning business Carbon Media…

Carbon Media has made quantum leaps in the past eighteen months and we’re delighted the Qld Telstra Small Business Award recognises this. In a highly competed industry in a tough market, it says we’re doing something right, we’re the real deal. And of course we’re chuffed!

Needless to say it didn’t happen overnight – the award or the journey. In reality, it’s been many years of hard work and sometimes two steps forward and one back. The challenge is always how to make the business sustainable and demonstrate its worth to the outside world who understandably want proof before they invest in or partner with you. This has required some out-of-the-box thinking to establish a business model that perpetuates a solid revenue stream enabling Carbon Media to pursue its own creative endeavours.

 

Photo of two peopleCommitment to change

Carbon Media started in 2006 out of frustration about how Indigenous people are often negatively portrayed in the media.  We wanted to change that by sharing inspirational stories and promoting positive Indigenous role models so as to shift negative and outdated stereotypes.  We’ve achieved this through the content we created in children’s television game shows like Go Lingo and Letterbox, the first of their kind to feature Indigenous kids, aired on national broadcasters ABC and NITV (SBS).  And more recently, with Handball Heroes, a children’s live action interstitial series, aired on ABC3, championing an authentic reconciliation message with the next generation of Indigenous and non-Indigenous kids alike, united in their love of handball.

 

Reputation building

Over time we’ve built a good reputation for our creative agency work and as a result Carbon Media’s been fortuitous enough to work with some great clients who feel as passionately about social change as we do. These days it means we work predominantly on social marketing projects that align with the business core values, which is immensely gratifying. Clearly delineating and positioning the business from the outset has been key to Carbon Media being able to do this.

 

New corporate structure

To remain commercially viable we’ve had to be strategic in the way we manage human resources.  In the past twelve months we established a new corporate structure that involved recruiting and retaining only high-level creative staff that are passionate, committed and willing to bend as business requires. This reduction in staff means we operate as a small, yet highly effective team, who work across multiple projects and are flexible in our work practices and disciplines.  We work really hard and every now and then play hard – for effort needs reward!

We also maintain a strong network of highly skilled and experienced freelancers (often the best in the industry) so we can tailor and match their talent and expertise to projects as needed. The result is a win-win for the client, for industry who need regular employment and for Carbon Media who can achieve excellent results without having to carry full-time resources.

 

Opportunity leverages opportunity

A definitive turning point for Carbon Media was the success of 5 Kangaroos, a mixed media clip produced for Sesame Street’s iconic Letters and Numbers segment starring musical talent Jessica Mauboy, the first in the show’s 44 year history to feature Australian Indigenous content. This was an entrepreneurial move by Carbon Media, whose alignment with the television industry giant, Sesame Street, has been able to leverage the opportunity to open doors to broadcasters and distributors, domestically and internationally, which were otherwise shut or at the very least hard to reach.

 

Keep working at it

There are no guarantees in business, perhaps even less so in creative industries. With an extraordinary creative team, a great client base, our own exciting projects and the support of industry partners and Government, Carbon Media’s on a positive trajectory. These days it’s less fragile but nonetheless cannot be taken for granted. There’s much to do.

Wayne DenningsWayne Denning is the Managing Director and Executive Producer of Carbon Media, based in Brisbane.  Wayne established Carbon Media in 2006 and has overseen the production, as executive producer, of many television programs and series. Wayne’s recent productions include 5 Kangaroos for Sesame Workshop, Handball Heroes for ABC3, children’s game shows Go Lingo! and Letterbox for NITV and ABC3, documentaries Intune, Blacktracks, From the Ashes and ProppaNOW. The multiplatform of ground breaking documentary series First Footprints for the ABC. Wayne currently sits on the National Film and Sound Archive of Australia Board, the Brisbane Writers Festival Board and is the Chair of the Brisbane Festivals Indigenous Advisory Group. 
 

 

 

Image credits: Carbon Media