Stareable, which bills itself as the "largest community of web series creators," will be hosting the inaugural Stareable ...
Problem
Building an audience has never been harder
Video creation has exploded online but building an audience has never been harder. Platform algorithms make discovery unpredictable and marketing channels are expensive, distributed, and difficult to centrally manage. None of this helps original creators meet fan demand for authentic, personalized engagement. 50M digital video creators are desperately trying to sustainably create.
Solution
We help creators build, engage, and monetize their audiences
Stareable makes it easy for creators to attract audiences and grow their reach all on one free platform. We help creators offer freemium experiences to their audiences, letting them pair their free-to-view shows with premium options in one easy-to-manage destination. We also provide a growing user community forum for creators to share ideas, get advice, and connect virtually.
Product
One platform for creators and fans
Our primary product is an audience-building platform, making it easy for creators to share their series, reach new audiences, and monetize their projects.
Creators use Stareable to distribute their shows:
Grow their following:
Leveraging our social media dashboard to manage and amplify marketing on Twitter, Facebook, and Stareable.
And monetize their content:
Building freemium experiences for their most-engaged fans by putting premium content behind paid monthly subscriptions.
Stareable Fest:
We run one of the top indie TV festivals in the country, Stareable Fest. Our festival is on its way to becoming the Sundance of TV, with top tier logos like Adobe, Dropbox, Kickstarter, Shutterstock, and Brooklyn Brewery as 2019 sponsors, and an industry marketplace that has featured senior executives from HBO, Comedy Central, Vice, Warner Bros, PBS and more. This past year, two of our award winners were acquired by major Hollywood organizations and we are on our way to establishing revenue-generating partnerships with major networks and studios in 2020.
Traction
6,000 creative contributors
Stareable is now the largest platform dedicated to web series content. We have 6,000 creators on the site and have driven $120K in revenue through our industry-leading festival. Not only that, we’ve entered into partnerships with some of the biggest names in media, like HBO, Comedy Central, NBC, Bustle, Vice, and PBS.
Customers
Home for content creators
Our primary users are web series creators found on YouTube, Vimeo, or other major hosting platforms but we also increasingly work with the biggest organizations in Hollywood to help them source innovative new talent. Broad City, High Maintenance, Girls, and Insecure all started out as web series and are now thriving at premier networks like HBO and Comedy Central. We are actively elevating the next generation of creators to help them connect with both their online fans and potential acquirers of their content.
Business model
A freemium-based marketplace
We give creators access to our platform for free, making money from a variety of fan-driven engagements, such as merchandise, live event ticketing and subscriptions for premium content. We take a percentage of all fan purchases and work closely with our creators to ensure they are monetizing the right opportunities to earn through our platform.
Market
50M creators worldwide
It’s no secret that some of the most effective creative channels on YouTube make a lot of money. According to YouTube, there are over 50M creators worldwide reaching a potential $12.5B addressable market.
Competition
Outpacing the competition
Stareable is the only platform of its kind that helps monetize web series projects while also providing audience management tools for creators. This means we are engaging audiences and filmmakers across channels and marketplaces.
Vision and strategy
The future of web entertainment
The future of content creation and consumption are online and Stareable's platform and festival are benefitting from these accelerating trends. We are raising $1M in funding to build on our lead within the web series space, adding developers and a new marketing lead to drive faster growth. This raise will allow us to hit break-even profitability within the next 18 months.
Funding
Existing investors include:
- Michael Y. Chow, a serial entrepreneur and VC in media and tech. Michael has been an executive producer for award-winning films like Sorry to Bother You and Fruitvale Station.
- 3x Emmy winning web series creator Bernie Su. Bernie won his latest Emmy for Twitch's first-ever scripted show, Artificial Next.
New investors in this round:
- $250,000 from Jim Leitner, the legendary macro hedge fund investor
- Ariel Lebowits, co-founder and Head of M&A for OLX
We already have 50% of our round closed and/or committed.