Hey folks, today I’m happy to announce a new feature here on VCN; The Poptent Report. The monthly report is being sponsored by our pals at Poptent.net and I’ll be using it to cover, what else, Poptent-related news!
And for the inaugural report I’ve got some legitimately astounding news to share. On December 20th, Poptent announced that it had officially paid out more than ONE MILLION DOLLARS in cash to filmmakers. That blew my mind when I heard that. I knew Poptent was really growing fast but I didn’t realize just how serious things had gotten. I became a Poptent member in the summer of 2009 and it seemed like most assignments paid out $3,500 to $5,000 each. I’ve watched those figures creep up all year and $7,500 to $10,000 price tags are starting to become the norm. Right now I’m working on a video for Poptent’s current Sprite assignment and in that one, Sprite is going to be buying FIVE submissions for $5,000 each. Those are some really, really nice odds.
But the great thing about “winning” a Poptent assignment is that you don’t actually win at all…because Poptent isn’t a “video contest site.” It’s more of a spec-video-crowdsourcing-social network type thing. If you’re a filmmaker you accept an assignment, follow the sponsor’s creative brief, shoot an ad and then if the brand likes it, they literally BUY it from you.
What does that mean? It means that aside from a big bag of cash you also wind up with something you can’t put a price tag on. It means that technically the huge, well-known company that bought your work is now a CLIENT of yours. Thanks to Poptent I’ve sold videos to Harley Davidson, Coors Light and Monograms Travel and so on my production company’s website I’m able to say “past clients include Harley Davidson, Coors Light and Monograms Travel.” That’s hella impressive! There are a few other contest-hosting sites on the web that are sort of similar to Poptent but the fact you can actually SELL work to big companies through Poptent is what really sets it apart from its competitors.
The other thing that sets Poptent apart is that they don’t screw around when it comes to paying their filmmakers. Poptent doesn’t offer trips or laptops or giftcards or other prizes. That million dollars they paid out was in cold, hard cash. If you see other sites saying that they’ve given out X amount of dollars in prizes you should take that figure with a grain of salt. The “Actual Retail Value” (AKA the amount you’re going to be paying taxes on) is a lot higher than what the sponsor actually had to spend. For example, if an airline sponsors a contest and gives away a free plane ticket that ticket doesn’t actually cost them anything.
So anyways, congrats to Poptent on a really significant accomplishment. Their success has apparently caught the attention of financial big wigs who have recently made multi-million dollar investments in the company. (I’ll assume they saw some of my videos and realized what amazing geniuses poptent creators are.) So it sounds like the company is poised to really make an impact on the advertising world (and hopefully my checking account) in the coming years.
If you’re interested in more details about Poptent’s Million Dollar Milestone check out this article from Online Media Daily:
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=141618&nid=121909
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I feel mixed emotions about you accepting the concept of sponsored posts.
While I think Poptent is an excellent site, and I always point people who are interested in the video contest world to see it and see how well things can be run, you started your site as a place where you would speak truthfully about the decisions made by judges, reexamine finished contests, etc. If you are being paid by poptent, you can no longer be trusted to write those posts.
Either this came about because you are totally broke and desperate for money, in which case I totally understand it. Or it came because you got excited about the possibility of “monetizing” this blog, in which case, number me among the extremely disappointed readers of this site.
Joel,
I can understand what you’re saying. But to be totally blunt about it, I’ve always been biased towards poptent. It’s just now readers will actually be aware of the bias. That site and the people who run it have been very good to me and VCN. I’ve been an active member of poptent for about a year and a half, I’ve submitted to lots of their assignments and I’ve made lots of money thanks to poptent. So I am a big, big poptent fan and I’ve even kind of gotten to know the people who run it. So long before I agreed to do the featured post thing I would have been hesitant to say anything negative about the site.
However…I’ve been covering Poptent news since I started VCN and in all that time I’ve never HAD to be critical of how Poptent operates. And that’s one reason I was cool with doing the featured posts. I knew I’d probably never feel the need to censor criticisms about poptent because I’ve never really had any criticisms of poptent.
So like I’ve said, I’ve been covering Poptent news for a long time now. The sponsored post idea came about because poptent liked the posts I did about them and they wanted to put their official stamp on them. The posts will all be written by me and I get to decide what news gets put in or left out. Plus poptent doesn’t have any influence what I say in my other posts. So this really isn’t going to effect the honesty of the site in any way.
And also yes, I am super broke right now.
Fair enough.
I think poptent sucks. I spent A LOT of time preparing some storyboards and presentations for a SNICKERS contest. They said the winners would be revealed at ______ date. They weren’t.
In fact, I never heard or found out about ANYONE who won the contest, received the 10 or 15 grand prize, and actually made their spot (as stipulated by the contest). The site is garbage man. The only players in the video contest genre are frito lay (pepsi + doritos) and godaddy. The rest are hacks.
WHOA, BH! THAT WAS NOT A POPTENT CONTEST! I know exactly what you’re talking about though.
Last fall, Snickers DID run an assignment on poptent but it was for actual commercials. I remember because I wrote a script but never got to shoot it. Snickers bought 4 Poptent-made ads for 5,000 each. Here the are:
http://www.poptent.net/assignment/112#tab=results
At the same time as the poptent assignment was running, a DIFFERENT video contest site ran the Snicker’s storyboard contest. I think it was a site called Filmaka or Eykea. I remember that the contest was open to people from every country in the world. If it was Filmaka.com, I’ve gotten complaints about them not paying winners. I’m going to check into the storyboard contest and I’ll post what I find in another comment.
You know what, you’re right. It was filmaka. My bad! Sorry poptent. I was so f’in pissed about that contest. Filmaka sucks!
@BH – we remember that. We’re sorry you had a bad experience with Filmaka. We hate seeing anyone being treated unfairly. We work really hard to make sure everyone at Poptent gets recognized for their efforts and that we run fair assignments each and every time. Sure, we have our bumps and bruises like anyone, but we always make right. That’s our promise.
@Joel, @Beardy,
For the record, we don’t want Beardy to feel that he can’t say negative things about us. In fact we specifically stated that we encourage any and all criticism. We only ask that everyone be professional (or at least good spirited)
If we run a terrible assignment – tell us.
If the payouts aren’t good enough, let us know.
If client purchase decisions aren’t made in good time (which is a problem right now) let us know.
etc. etc. etc.
All of this feedback gives us more fuel for the fire. It will help us position ourselves for the future. We need this type of feedback.
Good for you Beardy, the fact that Poptent wants to sponsor you is a good thing, it means your blog is getting a lot of hits and its the inevitable next step. In the hippy dippy world, some may call you a “sell-out” or whatever, that is ridiculous, I say keep doing what your doing and Poptent is great, and there is nothing bad to be said about them anyway! You can speak truthfully and make a little cash.