Adam Torres and Stephan Morris discuss FII PRIORITY.
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Show Notes:
Listen to FII PRIORITY coverage. In this episode, Adam Torres and Stephan Morris, Founder & CEO at Digital Star Network, explore media and FII PRIORITY.
About Digital Star Network
DIGITAL STAR NETWORK (DSN) is an influencer-driven consulting and media studio company that creates strategic cross-channel initiatives to harness the decades of marketing and revenue growth experience launching iconic brand campaigns.
DSN STUDIOS provides businesses with Social and Web3 Media sales strategy, Tokenization, Streaming, Live, Mobile, Experiential, Audio, and Traditional broadcast television productions. Silicon Society, a division of DSN distinctive campaigns maximizes audience reach, and new customer acquisition, and taps undiscovered revenue growth opportunities.
S0C1ETY.PICTURES by DSN leads the industry by ushering in cutting-edge production distribution, data analytics, and branded entertainment techniques that syndicate them across major FAST, OTT, AVOD and SVOD services
Hey, I’d like to welcome you to another episode of Mission Matters. My name is Adam Torres, and if you’d like to apply to be a guest in the show, to set on over to my Instagram, ask Adam Torres, shoot me a message and let me know why you’d be a great guest. Again, ask Adam Torres. Today my guest is Stephan Morris.
He’s founder and CEO over at Digital Star Network, and I’m happy to say that this is a part of our FII Priority Summit. Series that we’ve put together based on a recent trip that I went to FII priority over in Miami. And Stephan, first off, welcome to the show. And I understand you were also at the summit, is that right?
Yes, yes. Thank you Adam for having me. it’s a pleasure to be here and yeah, no, I’ve been attending FII summits now for I guess this is our fifth cycle. ’cause I went to one in New York and the this is, and the ones here in Miami ever since. what brings you coming back? what has you come back?
a lot of different ways you can spend your time. A lot of different conferences, some like what makes this so special for you? I. Quite the think tank and, their mission of connecting like-minded individuals cross sector with the purpose of, well, investing with purpose really kind of opens your eyes a little bit about not only not just what everyone’s doing from a professional level, but also areas that we can improve and help humanity.
So for me, that’s been really interesting about the whole overall experience and the differentiator with the other conferences that I do attend. Yeah, I’ll tell you, I was super impressed. I’ve only been to the one in Miami. I know. I’m gonna be going to more just based off of based off of the, interviews and just the conversation I’ve been having.
it was really interesting. and something else that I found pretty unique is that there were a lot of people there that were the decision makers, CEOs of companies like ahead. C-suite, like we’re in the room. And I was a little surprised by that.
’cause sometimes you go to somebody, you’re like, okay, I thought it was gonna be good, but I’d expect it to be that. Right. Same, same, same. And you know, it was an honor. Last year they also invited me to speak on a closed session panel with Oh, wow. Some of these, like, leaders, like you’re mentioning, and it’s just mind blowing.
Just the, level of professionals in the rooms, you know? Mm-hmm. I wanna get into what you’re, working on right now. So maybe tell us a little bit more about Digital Star Network. Yeah, happy to. So Digital Star Network is a media entertainment company that I created. Essentially it’s the evolution of my 20 years of working and building a company in marketing and advertising.
We’ve essentially now since Covid kind of like pivoted and shifted our strategy of for a global mission and due to our network I founded with his Excellency Barron, Alex Stern, the founder of Contact. And we brought along as well, Larry Namor, the founder of e Entertainment Television. And what we’re essentially doing is creating a new vertical of immersive entertainment that allows us to leverage technology to enhance audience engagement and audience participation.
And we’re producing our first flagship series in the coming year. Wow, that, super in. Like, tell me a little bit more about the concept. When you say immersive, like go, go a little bit deeper into that concept and what that looks like. Absolutely. When you look at traditional media, whether it’s on your traditional television broadcasters like your Fox A, B, C, or NBC it’s usually a one-way tunnel, right?
And you’re looking into the, box and not really participating in what we wanted to do. And essentially, since we’re creating a competition program that allows us to really kind of like get feedback and audience participation globally, we’re building a blockchain system that allows for the audience to participate, vote collect.
And win and earn opportunities throughout the program. But not only from a traditional kind of like voting mechanism. We really wanted to build a community ecosystem that allowed the audience to connect with like-minded individuals. So we’re, pushing the boundaries and adding, you know I was saying before, blockchain technology components and allowing for, you know, the audience to participate in, a unique way and, and also in experiential way.
So it’s not just the the experiences on screen, but we’re gonna be doing a lot off screen. And you mentioned the first series that you’re producing, , what can you tell me about it right now? I’ll, I could share, I can share some, no, you can’t share too, too much, but like , what can you, that’s why I positioned it that way.
I’m not trying to, you know, I’ll, oh, I’ll give you a little bit on the journey how I got here, right? Yeah. So in Miami, I’ve been in Miami for about 23 years. Throughout that time I was an influencer on, MySpace and kind of like some of the early social media platforms. I leveraged that experience to develop my agency where I had 160 micro influencers work with me on a team, and we generated, you know, upwards of $60 million in revenue working with amazing brand partners and multinational brands.
And through that experience, you know, we also, you. Created activations with the brands to really bring people to touch, feel, and experience products. And we, essentially wanted to amplify what I’ve done in the past and create an ecosystem that bridges the world. And so that’s a little bit of a, a little background on on what, why, and, how.
We got here now With the added benefit of bringing in, you know Larry NMR and what he’s done with Ian television and essentially, you know, creating platforms that essentially accelerated the, like professional careers of like the Kardashians. We’re looking at how do we create the next generation of influence and how can we create more impact and solutions for the world simultaneously.
And so what’s the purpose behind doing that? Like what do you feel is the value add? Well as right now in America alone, mm-hmm. And this is a sample size of the rest of the world. 90% of audiences and young adults between 13 and 38 want to become more influencers, right? They want to become more influential no matter what vertical and and profession they want to do.
They know that’s social media is very relevant, important to them. I see now is there’s a lot of, and, and I’m not discrediting any, you know, platforms, but you know, where, whereas a lot of those individuals that wanna become influential, only 3% of the Americans actually consider themselves influential.
And off that maybe 1% is making over $50,000 a year and creating a sustainable income. Through this experience. So through this experience we really wanted to build a model that allows us to educate, empower, and nurture the next generation. Mm-hmm. And and then aligning that strategy like I did in the past to create real world value.
And, as far as like how they monetize these experiences in these platforms and how can we create sustainable impact by supporting local charities as well. Hmm. That’s amazing. That’s amazing. And how do people get involved? Like what are you looking for?
Are you looking for investors, talent, all the above infrastructure? where’s the project at? What are you looking for? And what kind of conversations are you having? I. Absolutely. I’m speaking of very high level conversations now and you know, whereas, whereas I’ve built kind of like a 20 year prototype in Miami, we’re now essentially bridging a global a global demographic to essentially create teams in multiple cities and have those teams compete in this national, global competition.
And with that, I’m talking to a lot of investors because like your NBA or your FIFA organizations, it allows us to really have regional partners. in cities or across the world to build teams and, build influence in those regions and to have that cultural and economic impact. Right. And so we’re talking to investors.
We’re talking to economic development agencies. We’re talking to corporate partners cross, cross industry, cross sectors and, and really building our infrastructure around the world now. So investments, we’re looking at brand partnerships. As our first two kind of tiers of, conversations now.
And then once we kind of like, ’cause the program is built around these companies and brands and the creative process of becoming an influencer. Then, we go into the audition process and really kind of like ramp up into our program. Hmm. What kind of brand partnerships are you looking at?
Like in general? I. So it’s, industry agnostic, but you know, we call it lifestyle, brands, right? So you know, from fashion to beauty to hospitality, you know, there’s a lot of fitting opportunities and, and even there’s opportunities for us to partner with governmental agencies, like for tourism and hospitality boards.
So, ’cause we’re, we’re creating. Impact in these cities, and we’re showcasing local landmarks. We’re showcasing local entrepreneurs, we’re showcasing local land infrastructure. So, that’s kind of like the areas that we’re currently focused on. But it, it’s, automobiles. But, you know, and we’re also standardizing the tools and we’re really creating a new game show that kind of feels, I’d say it’s a game show.
It’s not, it’s a competition. Yeah. Not like a tournament style, but we’re giving them all the same tools. So even the phones, the products they use, we wanna make sure that in this contest, it’s really an educational platform. Mm-hmm. So they’re, we’re standardizing the tools that they’re using. So it’s a lot of technology focused, technology evolved and the platforms evolved, the tools they use are evolving. So we’re, streamlining, so that everybody’s is, working from the same toolbox, if you will. Hmm, that makes a lot of sense. And a lot of entrepreneurs watch this show.
So when I say this , what’s the, let’s say, vision over the next five years. let’s dream for a moment. Like gimme, gimme some of the vision. Well, the vision for us is to essentially have this global organization that mm-hmm. Connects local individuals in our network of teams supporting local brands throughout that process, and of course, having our multinational partners.
so the vision is really to, hyperscale and reaching, you 40 to 50 to a hundred markets in over the next, few cycles. Amazing. Stephan, if somebody’s listening or watching this and they want to learn more, they want to connect, they wanna follow you, they wanna follow the project.
How do they do that? Oh, I’m easy to get ahold of. my connection point now , of choice probably is LinkedIn. So you can just find my name, Stephan Morris there founder, CEO of Digital Star Network. Also my first and last name on Instagram. So you can shoot me a note and then we’ll connect according to what the area of interest might be.
Fantastic. And for everybody listening, just so you know, we’ll definitely put the information in the show notes and so you can just easily connect with Stephan and Stephan. Really, it has been a pleasure having you on the show today and learning more about what you’re doing over at, digital Star Network.
And I will say that I’m happy to bring this story to my, audience, and I can’t wait to look back at this. Like, I remember you came on the show and he was talking about that. Now look at it. We’re watching his show right now. Like, I, can’t wait, man. , I’m definitely pulling for you and your whole team of, experts that you have working on this.
And to the audience, if you haven’t done this yet definitely make sure you hit that subscribe or follow button. This is a daily show. Each and every day we’re bringing you new ideas, new content and new stories to hopefully inspire you along the way on your journey as well. So hit that subscribe or follow button, and Stephan look forward to seeing you at the next FII priority event.
And thanks again for coming on Indeed. Thank you. So grateful to be on the show and I really appreciate it. Adam. Thank you so much and looking forward to building a long lasting friendship.
Let’s chat.