Our Product is Explanation
All posts for “business”
I've been really excited to see the feedback about the new Web License. Asking people to pay to embed a video has raised questions and responding to them has been an interesting experience. If nothing else, it's eye-opening to see what people are assuming about our business.
For example, Mike Masnick at Techdirt wrote an article called "Viral Video Producers Want To Charge You to Embed Their Videos." Then, Steven Hodson at Inquisitor follow up the Techdirt article with "Common Craft... Continue Reading
Amit Agarwal at Digital Inspiration has been a fan of Common Craft for a while and we've always enjoyed his thoughful analysis of our videos and business. The news yesterday about our Web License prompted him to write about it - and question the business case for paying to embed videos. We welcome this kind of analysis.
He writes:
The good old YouTube days are over as Common Craft has created a new “web license” for their videos that would require bloggers and websites to pay a monthly... Continue Reading
For a while now, we've heard a common request from potential customers. They want an easy way to license and share Common Craft videos on their website. Today we're announcing a new partnership with video sharing company Wistia that will help us serve this need with our new "Web License."
A Little Background...
We license our videos to individuals and organizations. Two of our most popular licenses (Individual and Site) are for offline use. Customers download video files for use on intranets/... Continue Reading
Erring on the Side of Happiness
Posted by: leelefever on February 15, 2010- 4:00pm
Categories: beingsmall, business, couplecompany, strategy
Not everyone knows, but Common Craft is a two-person, home-based business. We're 100% independent, with zero employees or investors. While we work with specialists by contract, everything that Common Craft does comes from us and impacts only us. This has been our goal since 2006 when Sachi and I started working together and today, we're starting to really understand what it means to be a two person "couple company."
It's not all unicorns and rainbows. Along with our important video-making... Continue Reading
Sachi and sometimes say that we love making videos and plan to make a lot more, but what really geeks us out is business models. We love experimenting with the many ways a business can be run. I was recently interviewed by Andrew Warner at Mixergy.com and it was one of the first interviews I've done that focused purely on our business - how we market our videos, how we sell content that's available for free, how we scale the business, etc. I came out of the interview feeling energized and... Continue Reading
Daniel Sevitt of EyeView wrote a great article on ReelSEO.com called "The Three Types of Online Video for Business." The article deserves a full read, but I was struck by this simple diagram that illustrates the types of videos and their expected outcomes.
Image courtesy of EyeView
Almost anyone can make a video and put it online, but there are relatively few good models for earning a living from online videos. We've been experimenting over a couple of years and believe more than ever that video licensing is a model that has huge potential.
The Current Options
Of course there's the advertising model. A video is made, it attracts eyeballs, eyeballs are distracted by ads. A tiny percentage of people click the ads and the video host and video owner make a bit of money. It... Continue Reading
Through going to conferences and talking with people about Common Craft, it's apparent that people have no idea how Common Craft could be a successful business. From their perspective, they can watch the videos for free, so how does it work?
I want to answer this question because I think it's important context for understanding why we make the decisions we do.
In business terms, we are a "B2B" company, which means business-to-business. We make videos that are focused on helping businesses,... Continue Reading