Nathan interviews Joel Holland, founder of VideoBlocks - a company that distributes over a million clips of royalty-free stock video and audio each month to over 150K customers in the television and video production industry, ranging from professional outlets like NBC to video hobbyists and enthusiasts. They're a 5x INC 500 out of 5000 fastest growing company, and Joel has been named one of the Top 25 under 25 by Business Week, and INC magazine’s prestigious 30 under 30 list.
Famous Five:
Favorite Book? – Influence What CEO do you follow? – Elon Musk Favorite online tool? — Mailchimp Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— “I do now” If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? – “I wish I have lived my college life”
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:50 – Nathan introduces Joel to the show 02:57 – What is VideoBlocks and how does it generate sales 03:00 – Stock media company 03:22 – Elements that creative professionals can incorporate to their projects 03:45 – VideoBlocks was founded 2010 04:00 – Idea of VideoBlocks 04:40 – VideoBlocks’ model 04:50 – Started selling by the collection 05:10 – Launched subscription plan as a test in 2010 05:20 – 150,000 paying members 05:38 – Monthly and annual plan 05:43 – Total revenue in 2015 06:15 – Royalty-free 06:30 – 6,000 videographers now shooting for VideoBlocks 07:10 – RPU 07:37 – Created more premium plans 08:00 – The 80/20 rule 08:30 – How much would a videographer get if National Geographic buys his clip? 08:40 – Standard pricing 08:50 – “If National Geographic bought it for 49 bucks, the videographer will get a check” 09:00 – 2 types of libraries 09:38 – VideoBlocks buy clips to put in the library 10:10 – Customers only need to download 2 clips in a year to avail unlimited clips 11:00 – “We want shooters to make as much money as possible” 11:24 – A few million dollars to acquire creative lights 11:40 – “Content is king” 12:00 – MRR 12:09 – Annual churn 12:16 – Subscription business is like a puzzle 13:05 – Churn on monthly plan 13:26 – Returning cost acquisition 14:10 – Customer insights operation 14:25 – Direct response marketing 14:33 – Million dollars spent monthly 14:40 – Example of direct response marketing 14:58 – Joel has a huge number of list 15:15 – Launching other products 15:42 – Weighted average cap 15:55 – Lifetime value on average 16:16 – Blended channels 17:17 – 80 team members 17:25 – Based in Virginia 17:36 – Funding history: Raised under 20 million to date 18:02 – North Atlantic Ventures 18:11 – SBA gives you leverage 18:40 – Interest rate 19:35 – “Currently, we are not raising nor in any acquisition talks” 20:15 – “Going public is a tough process” 21:07 – Connect with Joel through his LinkedIn and website 22:45 – The Famous Five
3 Key Points:
Work hard but don’t forget to live your life. Give life to your ideas if you want your business to grow. Know your customers and the people who supports your products.
Resources Mentioned:
Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to quality of Toptal developers. Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible. Freshbooks – The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts. Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+ Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books. LinkedIn – Joel’s LinkedIn account VideoBlocks.com – Joel’s business website Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives