18 Years In, and More Optimistic Than Ever

Magnify Digital turns 18 this month.

Looking back, it hasn’t been a journey so much as a theme park ride.

Exhilarating highs. Gut-dropping lows. A few moments hanging upside down wondering why we got on board in the first place.

Here are a few lessons I’ve learned along the way.

1. Good ideas need the right moment.

People often say success comes down to a great idea or a great team. Both are essential. But timing may matter even more.

In 2012, we introduced ALERT, our framework for building audiences around screen content. People agreed producers needed to think more about marketing and audiences, not just making content. There was curiosity. There was enthusiasm. But very little changed.

In 2018, we began calling for a national audience strategy. In 2020, we brought together more than 60 leaders from across Canada’s screen sector to imagine what it might look like. Again, there was broad agreement. Then the world changed overnight. Other priorities took over.

We’ve learned the hard way that ideas don’t succeed simply because they’re good. They succeed when the conditions are right for them to take hold.

2. Every startup needs champions.

No company succeeds alone.

TELUS Fund believed in us when our ideas were still unproven. They challenged us, tested us, and stayed with us. Bell Fund and Rocket Fund did too.

Champions don’t just invest money. They dare to see around the next corner. They continue to step up when others step back. They understand that meaningful change takes time.

3. Global is the new local.

Most digital businesses no longer have a domestic market and an international market. They simply have a market.

It is not always intuitive for Canadians to think our ideas are worthy of global attention. We must.

We leaned in, and ScreenMiner users now span New Zealand, Europe, the United States, and the United Kingdom.

4. Outcomes matter.

Whether you’re building software, content, or crayons, making something is only half the job.

The other half is making sure it reaches the people it was built for.

This is the insight whose time is long overdue for the screen sector, where we’ve traditionally measured success by what gets made rather than what gets seen.

I remain a passionate supporter of investing taxpayer dollars in great Canadian stories. But we only realize the intent behind that investment when those stories are discovered, watched, and valued by audiences.

So why, eighteen years in, am I so optimistic?

For the first time, it feels like the momentum is coming from every direction, in every market. Creators are showing what an audience-centric approach looks like and how it can drive revenue. Regulators are calling for audience data sharing. Funders are naming audience development and data as key pillars in strategic plans. The idea of a national audience strategy is landing differently. Governments are talking about commercialization, innovation, export, and accountability.

I believe the next chapter will belong to companies that are as good at building audiences as they are at making content.

It will also belong to sectors willing to think differently, collaborate more deeply, and build the infrastructure needed to compete globally.

To every client, collaborator, colleague, mentor, champion, and armchair therapist who has been part of the ride, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Here’s to the next chapter.

-Moyra