ABOUT
Most people in this space teach from their own growth. That’s not what happened here.
Fandom Builder exists because 25 years of building systems for other people’s audiences — not my own — turned into a way to diagnose exactly what’s broken in how content connects to a business.
THE BUILDER
Otavio M. Lessa
I started in the entertainment industry in the 1990s, translating and curating films for cable TV and home video. By the 2000s I was producing DVD releases, doing PR for companies like Sony Home Video, and writing for publications like Electronic Gaming Monthly and Nintendo World — years before “content creator” was a job title.
In 2010 I was hired by Blizzard Entertainment and moved to California. I spent nearly a decade there helping build the marketing systems behind World of Warcraft, Overwatch, Diablo, Hearthstone, and Call of Duty. Then I moved to Amazon Game Studios and led the content rebrand of Twitch Prime into Prime Gaming. I’ve applied the same structural thinking across entertainment categories beyond games too, from film and anime to music.
The pattern I kept seeing was the same everywhere, regardless of franchise size or industry: the businesses that built lasting attachment did it structurally, not accidentally. And the ones that didn’t — no matter how much money or talent they had — kept cycling through campaigns that spiked and faded. When I became a professor at Full Sail University, I had to turn that pattern into something teachable. That’s where the diagnostic framework came from. Not from theory. From the need to make 25 years of observation useful for someone who doesn’t have a billion-dollar franchise behind them.
Blizzard Entertainment · Amazon Game Studios · Full Sail University
Plus partnerships and collaborations with:
Blizzard HQ, Irvine · BlizzCon · Call of Duty XP, Los Angeles · WoW pro-wrestling, Mexico City · Warner Bros. Studios
WHAT COLLEAGUES SAY
Recommendations from LinkedIn
“I’ve been privileged to be able to work directly with Otavio over the years to set a standard in social media content both at Blizzard and in the games industry at large. With Otavio’s willingness to test new platforms, and take calculated risks, his ability to understand his team and leverage their strengths is a unique skill I’ve not seen much anywhere else. Otavio is also an amazing storyteller, with the ability to obtain buy-in from all manner of stakeholders. Any company would be lucky to have him at the helm of pitching the next-level content campaign, or World of Warcraft wrestling match (yes, wrestling match).”
Jesse P.
Video Game Publishing and Production
“He is not someone who will apply a cookie cutter framework on those either - he is the person who will find the team and partner you need, and if they don’t exist, will actually work with the options he has available to build you one - Otavio was instrumental in spinning up a number of our external partners, and actively led the creation of the biggest self sufficient content platform for Hearthstone, perhaps worldwide, active today years after inception.”
Antonio H.
Director, Brand Development — Bandai-Namco
“Otavio was always a highly trusted colleague - his ability to turn even the most vaguest of brand marketing’s crazy ideas into functional, real and trackable executions is second to none. He is organized, practical and driven - but add in years of content marketing experience: a massive mental database of pop culture and the entertainment industry; a willingness to push the envelope and a can-do attitude - and you have in Otavio, one of the best resources that a cutting edge marketing team could wish for. He is Scotty to the Enterprise and he ALWAYS has a solution.”
Jon B.
Regional Product Publishing Lead: The Americas — Riot Games
THE METHOD
What the diagnostic actually measures
The framework behind the diagnostic maps five areas that determine whether content drives a business or just creates activity. They work as a system — when one is off, everything downstream stalls, no matter how good the content is.
Each one has a specific function, specific failure modes, and a specific relationship to the others. The diagnostic identifies which one is stuck in your case and why fixing that one first changes the rest.
This isn’t a personality quiz and it doesn’t produce generic advice. It’s a diagnostic read built from the same pattern recognition that drove franchise-level marketing — applied to individual businesses.
Find out what’s actually going on.
In 3 minutes and 15 questions, you’ll get a clear read on the structural gap between the work you’re putting in and the results you’re getting — plus which part of the system to fix first. Enter your email at the end and I’ll send you the full breakdown with practical next steps based on your result.