Poptent is our new community site where brands and independent video creators connect.
The Chaos Scenario is renown AdAge and NPR ad critic Bob Garfield’s new book about the changing nature of the media and advertising business. He features us extensively in Chapter 9, so turn there first! But do read the whole thing, Mr. Garfield has many astute observations on the state of the industry. We’re glad he’s on to our pulse.
Here’s the trailer for the book:
Pick up a copy today!
We had the whole team in the office today and went out to lunch. I snapped this photo while we were happily chatting and since we all look so handsome in it, I thought it’d be fun to go ahead and post it to the blog. 
From left to right around the table that’s Jason, Drew, Neil, Ryan, Megan, Tony, Liza, Chris and Tim. Me, I took the photo, but you’ve seen my face all over the site already…
Back in 2007 we did an assignment for Zorbeez, the super absorbant cloth. Their pitchman, Billy Mays, was one of the most famous infomercial talent in the business and we enjoyed seeing all the great videos our community produced, using Billy’s style as expert inspiration.
We’re sad to see his tragic passing and wish his family and friends well.
XLNTads was featured this month in the Association of National Advertisers’ The Advertiser Magazine. Here’s a short excerpt:
There’s an untapped space between ads produced by agencies with
high-end production houses and those created in someone’s basement. It’s
this gap that a startup company called XLNTads hopes to fill by connecting
independent or semiprofessional filmmakers with advertisers looking for
low-cost quality video content.The company was launched in February 2007, initially to create a platform
for consumer-generated advertising. “We thought by reaching out to consumers,
we could supply brand marketers with quality video along with the extra insight
of passionate consumers,” says Tony Romeo, XLNTads’ senior vice president.
“But the realization, as we got to know the videographer community better, was
that there are a lot of independents out there who have a significant degree of
filmmaking talent.”The XLNTads model has evolved accordingly. The company launched a
community site, called Poptent (www.poptent.net), where content creators can
showcase their wares, collaborate on projects, and connect with brands. The
company claims to have signed up more than 7,500 community members.
Companies, such as Anheuser-Busch and Nestlé, have used Poptent to post
campaign assignments for which Poptent members can submit creative. The
brands pay only for the spots they choose to use in a campaign.
Download the piece as a PDF here.
A couple of things have come up that I’ve been meaning to share with you. First, Neil has an article in MediaPost called “Marketing Differently in a Recessionary Economy“. Here’s an excerpt:
…what’s a marketer to do in this recessionary economy? Go gently into that good night? Of course not! Now is the time for growth and gaining competitive advantage; now is the time to do something different.
First, you better start getting creative, in particular, as it pertains to your creative. Here’s something different — crowdsourcing. Coined by Jeff Howe in a 2006 article in Wired magazine, and blown out in his book of that name, crowdsourcing is the act of taking a task traditionally performed by an employee or contractor, and outsourcing it to an undefined, generally large group of people, in the form of an open call. It is a method of generating ideas and materials from a broad spectrum of interested bystanders, and using their input to meet business needs.
Crowdsourcing can be used to develop creative to supplement your marketing plan’s needs. There are hundreds of thousands of talented creators online who are young, independent, energetic and excited about your brand. Let them take a stab at filling in the gaps created by budget cutbacks. [read more]
Next, I had the opportunity to be interviewed on the brand new Philadelphia Startup Blog. I believe we are the first company to be featured, so that’s pretty cool, eh?
We feel like we’ve given birth in 2008! And what a giant baby it is!
As we rolled into the New Year last year, we had around 1,600 creators in our fledgling XLNTads family. Today, we have 7,700+ in the extended XLNTads / Poptent family.
Our first major campaign for a national brand closed out 2007. It was the Nestle’s 100 Grand Bar campaign. 2008 had us doing assignments on Slim*Fast, Bud Light, Net 10 (a Tracfone product), New Line Cinema for Harold & Kumar, ProQuo, three campaigns for Brand Affinity Technologies; Natural Light and two Designated Driver campaigns for Anheuser-Busch. Whew!
In addition to client assignments, XLNTads and four talented creators developed webisodes for our Searching for Love series and our Road Trip series. These five part programs are currently being shopped around to leading advertising agencies and brands in the XLNTads network.
To accommodate our growing internal family, we moved into our Global World Headquarters outside of Philadelphia in April, and have been loving our private building, just steps away from the trains to downtown.
Along the way we recognized a need to bring more creative tools and opportunities to our ever growing family of videographers, so we created Poptent. We launched this all new creator site in October, and have been basking in the accolades ever since.
2008 also marked the point where we have exceeded $200,000 in payments to our creators for their work on assignments for our clients. Two of our best creators have already exceeded $10,000 in total payments for their work on XLNTads assignments.
So what’s in-store for 2009? More of the same. Much more, in fact.
On the client front, we will soon launch an assignment for Callaway Golf, and Universal Theme Parks is scheduled for January as well. Our friends at Annheuser-Busch have two more programs they’d like us to tackle, and Nestle is ready to roll with at least one, if not more in the first half of the year. Currently, we are looking for commercials to promote Poptent itself.
Our successes have been reported in TechCrunch, Mashable and MediaPost, as well as ongoing coverage in Advertising Age and numerous other trade publications.
And finally, in January of 2009, we plan on launching XLNTads Direct, a “do-it-yourself” version of XLNTAds which will allow small to mid-size brands the opportunity to launch and manage assignments all by themselves at a very attractive price.
It’s been one heckuva year, and 2009 is looking like it could be even better, despite the economic troubles we’ve all been feeling. One thing remains certain, brands and advertisers are going to need creative to deliver their messages, and we can do it better, with a real, authentic feel, moreso than any other solution for the money.
So thanks to all you videographers, part of our growing Poptent family, for all your contributions. Keep the great work coming in; tell all your colleagues and friends about us; use the great tools our tech team has developed to help you collaborate. We promise to keep working to provide you with the best opportunities to build your craft and give your work the commercial exposure it deserves.
Here’s to a great 2009 for our whole community!
Thanks for reading,
Neil Perry
We’re very, very excited to announce the public beta launch of our new community site, Poptent!
We’ve all worked incredibly hard on this project and we couldn’t be happier to have this baby out in the open for eveyone to check out. Please feel free to poke around and give us feedback.
We built Poptent based on the lessons we’ve learned over the past year from XLNTads, and feedback from creators like you. Stellar new features, full networking capabilities and a beautiful new HD-capable video player will provide all the tools you need to manage projects, build your portfolio and get your work seen.
Be sure to check out all our New Assignments!
