How to Use Do It With Others Approach to Build Strong Teams - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 6 of 16 in his 2010 Capture Your Flag interview, IndieGoGo co-founder Slava Rubin answers "How Has Indiegogo's Mantra, Do-It-With-Others, Affected Your Pursuits Outside of Work?" Rubin shares how he applies a "Do-It-With-Others" or DIWO approach to projects and ambitions inside and outside work.  Rubin, along with co-founders Danae Ringelmann and Eric Schell, developed the DIWO approach to build a platform to provide filmmakers and mediamakers tools for fundraising, promotion, and discovery.  Rubin shares that through college and early career, his tendency was more Do-It-Yourself (DIY) but over time he opened to finding complementary skills to build stronger teams.

Slava Rubin is CEO and co-founder of Indiegogo, the world's largest crowdfunding platform. Indiegogo empowers anyone, anywhere, anytime to raise funds for any idea—creative, cause-related or entrepreneurial. Prior to Indiegogo, Rubin worked as a management consultant. He earned his BSE degree from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen:  How has Indiegogo’` mantra, Do It With Others, affected your pursuits outside of work?

Slava Rubin:  Yeah, I think that part of my inspiration involved with Indiegogo is the idea that there are all these tools out there and all these people, while they feel like islands, they really shouldn'gt.  There is a lot of, now, ability to do it with others, whether it`s through influences like bloggers, partnerships with different companies, it always use to be that if you couldn't succeed by yourself, you were done.  There was this whole wave of DIY, do it yourself, which really goes back, I guess to the rock band era, maybe 20 years ago.  Now, it's really about leveraging all the things around you, the people, the tools, the information.

Erik Michielsen: As you're looking at what you`re learning in the work environment to facilitate stronger filmmaker success, what are you taking away from those lessons learned and applying them to your own life?

Slava Rubin:  Yeah, really I've always been pretty competitive in wanting to do things I could succeed myself, but the older I get, the more mature I get, the more I know it's about finding the right people to work with, knowing what you don't know, trying to get the right teammates and trying to lead all together. Which is all about  ``doing it with others``, I mean the leadership at Indiegogo is three people it`s Eric Schell, Danae Ringelmann and myself, and there is no question that we do it with others.

What Matters Most When Pitching a Movie, Charity or Venture - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 4 of 16 in his 2010 Capture Your Flag interview, Slava Rubin answers "Based on Your Experiences as an Entrepreneur, as Someone Involved in Film and Someone Involved in Philanthropy, What are the Most Important Elements When Making a Good Pitch for Financing?" Rubin shares fundraising pitch lessons learned from his work financing films, starting a charitable foundation, and securing startup investors.  Rubin's recipe begins by being honest and passionate and continues with being clear and concise, taking no more than 3-5 minutes to communicate the idea.  Regardless of whether it is a movie, a business venture, or a philanthropy, Rubin advises need to present a team with an ability to execute and plan to apply financing to specific milestones and accomplishments.

Slava Rubin is CEO and co-founder of Indiegogo, the world's largest crowdfunding platform. Indiegogo empowers anyone, anywhere, anytime to raise funds for any idea—creative, cause-related or entrepreneurial. Prior to Indiegogo, Rubin worked as a management consultant. He earned his BSE degree from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

Transcription:

Erik Michielsen:  So based on your experience in the film world, the entrepreneurial field, and the philanthropic world, raising money, what is your advice to others on the most important elements to include when making a pitch?

Slava Rubin:  I think the most important thing is to really be honest about what your pitch is and you can`t really fake a good pitch.  You have to be passionate about what you`re trying to offer and you have to also make it real.  Just because you can say real quickly three sentences doesn't make it a good pitch. The idea has to be clear and you have to be able to say it within five minutes, hopefully within three minutes, but definitely within five.  As soon as you start stumbling explaining away what your idea is, it`s because you don`t understand the idea yourself.  So it`s really important to make the idea feel real, be passionate about the idea, because someone who wants to invest in an idea, whether it`s philanthropy, a movie or a venture, they`re investing for the long term.  You can`t fake passion, you can fake a pitch, but people can read through people faking passion, so you have to be realistic.  Plus, the ability to execute has to be there, on your team, in your partners, in your [pause] whoever it is you`re lining up with, it has to be known that the money will go toward accomplishing something as opposed to pie in the sky visions.

How Media Future Rests on Direct to Consumer Distribution - Slava Rubin

In Chapter 3 of 16 in his 2010 Capture Your Flag interview, media platform IndieGoGo co-founder Slava Rubin answers "How Are Film Distribution Changes, Including Internet Streaming, Impacting What Defines Profitability in Filmmaking?" Rubin shares how film distribution model innovations, including online streaming, are building more direct audience connections and finding economic efficiency cutting out middlemen. Rubin references this relevance across iTunes, Hulu, Netflix and the assorted models from free, pay-per-view, video-on-demand, and subscription connecting content to audience.

Slava Rubin is CEO and co-founder of Indiegogo, the world's largest crowdfunding platform. Indiegogo empowers anyone, anywhere, anytime to raise funds for any idea—creative, cause-related or entrepreneurial. Prior to Indiegogo, Rubin worked as a management consultant. He earned his BSE degree from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen:  How are film distribution changes, including internet streaming, impacting what defines profitability in filmmaking?

Slava Rubin:  I think the way the film, video, TV, media world on the internet would evolve is still yet to be known.  I think that Netflix is doing some amazing things, iTunes is doing some amazing things, Hulu, we`re getting TV everywhere. But I think it’` going to expand and evolve similarly to the way TV today is, there are different flavors.  There is free TV, there’s commercial TV, there’s PPV TV, there are pay channels.  I think all of those opportunities will find themselves also on the internet.  When the internet and TV converge that will happen more and more, but I think profitability is tricky.  I think one of the key factors [pause] that slowly all those middle men are getting torn away. 

So, it`s all able creating your own brand, creating your own following and perpetuating by profiting as much as possible by not giving away all your margin to all those middle men and all those aggregators. You asked me specifically about streaming but I think this can be true for any of the various forms of distribution, where really it`s evolving and it`s more of a direct connection with your audience.

Slava Rubin on How Indiegogo Helps Finance and Promote Sundance Films

In Chapter 2 of 16 in his 2010 Capture Your Flag interview, IndieGoGo co-founder Slava Rubin answers "How is Your Company Indiegogo Helping Filmmakers Complete Film Festival Caliber Projects, such as the Sundance Grand Jury Prize Documentary Feature "We Live in Public", Presented in 2009"? Rubin shares how Sundance award-winning films "Dig!" and "We Live in Public" are two of many efforts utilizing IndieGoGo to connect content to audience.  Rubin shares the democratic vision behind building the fundraising and promotion tools for media makers to complete projects and why Robert Redford showed up to speak at the company's one-year anniversary celebration at Sundance 2009.

Slava Rubin is CEO and co-founder of Indiegogo, the world's largest crowdfunding platform. Indiegogo empowers anyone, anywhere, anytime to raise funds for any idea—creative, cause-related or entrepreneurial. Prior to Indiegogo, Rubin worked as a management consultant. He earned his BSE degree from The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.

Transcript:

Erik Michielsen:  How has your company, Indiegogo, helping filmmakers complete film festival caliber projects, such as the Sundance Grand Jury Prize documentary feature ``We Live in Public``, presented in 2009?

Slava Rubin:  We were pretty excited to have ``We Live in Public`` we also had ``Dig`` in 2009 we also had other award winners at SXSW the previous year as well.  They won the awards after they were associated with Indiegogo.  Some of them use it for raising money, some of them have been using for just promotion.  It`s greats to have these blue chip projects associated with Indiegogo, but really it`s about having anybody using Indiegogo, whether you’re a Hollywood studio or whether you`re one of the top independent producers, like we have some of them here in New York, or whether you`re a high school trying to make your first film.  It`s a democratic process and it should be because if you can cultivate your audience, you deserve to get it made. The idea is that never before in life have you been able to be so connected to your audience.  It use to be that there were all these middle men, and the middle men really they took away part of the profit, but they also took away control and they also separated you from your audience, and at the end of the day the most powerful thing is content connecting with audience.  On indiegogo, that`s exactly what you can do and you can mobilize that fan base, that audience, that collective for different action.  That action could be to do something, to demand something or to contribute money and Indiegogo allows you to do any of those things.

Erik Michielsen:  So, last year at the Sundance Film Festival, Robert Redford can to one of your events and spoke specifically about on what you were doing.   What have your learned from that experience and how has that propelled your vision?

Slava Rubin:  Well, it was definitely a big surprise, I can`t say it was all planned to have the founder of Sundance, Robert Redford, to show up, but you know we just started Indiegogo actually just less than two years ago and on our one year anniversary he was able to come by.  I think it was just a testament to us having good projects associated with our party, us having a pretty innovative spirit, and trying to advance the film and media community forward using some digital tools.

How to Join the Healthy and Sustainable Food Movement - Cathy Erway

In Chapter 12 of 15, "The Art of Eating In" author and "Hungry Filmmakers" film festival organizer Cathy Erway learns to integrate sustainable food into everything she does around food. On one hand, she takes a direct approach around writing blog posts and hosting events around sustainable food. Alternatively, Erway also leads by example using sustainable food in everything she does, from home cooking and shopping to food events and cookoffs. Erway shares how her "Hungry Filmmakers" event series offers filmmakers platform to share views on food and farm issues. To join the healthy, sustainable food movement, Erway recommends sharing time, energy or financing, as these collectively help make a difference creating healthier communities and individuals.

How Social Media Impacts Sports Marketing - Mike Germano

In Chapter 12 of 13, social media expert Mike Germano discusses how social media is enhancing the sports entertainment experience by building a stronger connection between fans and their favorite players, teams, and leagues. Social media highlights the approachability of athletes. Social media also provides players opportunity to break the news, eliminating media and reporting middlemen and going directly to fans. Finally, social media participation offers younger, lesser known players opportunities to build popularity and support through fan connections.

How Drawing Passion Informs Commercial Art Career - Jason Anello

In Chapter 2 of 13, designer and Yahoo experimental marketer traces his love of commercial art from childhood to present day India.  As an eight-year old, Anello watches commercials and feels he can do better.  With parental encouragement, Anello's passion for drawing morphs in commercial art, including signs and logos, that remains true today as his travels uncover new commercial art treasures such as Goa, India bus stop advertisements.

How Art and Design Shape Social Behavior - Jason Anello

In Chapter 3 of 13, in his Yahoo experimental marketing director role, Jason Anello fine-tunes details to shape experiences, project by project.  Anello relates detail in art and design to shaping collective anthropological and sociological behavior.

How Yahoo Unites London, Mumbai, and NYC - Jason Anello

In Chapter 5 of 13, Yahoo experimental marketer Jason Anello gets tasked with concepting, designing and building the Yahoo Yodel Studio across New York City, London, and Mumbai.  Through the experience, Anello embraces the unexpected, including Mumbai Domino's pizza, to unify different local interactive experiences across a global theme.

Why Use Urban Planning in Experience Marketing - Jason Anello

In Chapter 6 of 13 of his 2009 Capture Your Flag interview with host Erik Michielsen, experience marketer Jason Anello translates an early interest in how cities are designed  into customer design experience across New York, London, and Mumbai. Fascinated by city planning and resident behavior gets Yahoo Experimental Marketing Director Jason Anello one credit shy of an urbanization minor during his University at Albany undergraduate experience. His work designing Yahoo Yodel studios opens doors for Anello to actualize his concepts across large scale Yahoo events, including Yahoo Yodel Studios.  View more at career learning and development videos at http://www.captureyourflag.com

How to Apply Creative Skills in Direct Mail Marketing - Jason Anello

In Chapter 7 of 13, designer Jason Anello joins a direct mail marketing firm after finding an entry-level advertising agency job creatively too restrictive. At the direct mail firm Anello connects a new found creative freedom with client business results. This then empowers Anello to stretch and experiment creatively within this measurable framework and learn more about how people behave when presented with differing stimuli.

Creative DIY Ways to Feed the Homeless - Jason Anello

In Chapter 10 of 13 of his 2009 Capture Your Flag interview, Jason Anello shares how he developed a cooking based homeless outreach program from his Manhattan apartment. While sharing a pizza with a homeless man in San Francisco, Jason Anello witnesses how so many treat the homeless without dignity or respect. The experience motivates Anello to create "Gotham Soup Kitchen" in New York, a public access television show where he cooks for local homeless individuals in need of a good meal.

How Technology Enhances Sports Fan Experience - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 16 of 18, Major League Soccer legal counsel Jen Duberstein uses her sports industry digital media and legal experience to understand how technology enhances the fan connection.  At a higher level, Duberstein believes the technology helps bring a sense of hope to fans and makes a greater impact in the world.

How to Create Sports League Sponsorships - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 15 of 18, Major League Soccer (MLS) legal counsel provides Jen Duberstein learns to mitigate risk in structuring and negotiating contracts.  Duberstein learns why drafting sponsor fair agreements must lock sponsors into business terms and reduce termination risk.  She finds larger deals, inculding expansion agreements, must include huge non-commitment penalties in protecting league interest and weighing business risk vs. legal risk.

How to Apply Law Degree in Pro Sports Job - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 14 of 18, corporate attorney Jen Duberstein learns why business decisions affect how legal action is taken in her in-house sports league counsel work at Major League Soccer (MLS).  Duberstein's daily responsibilities focus on how contracts affect business - sponsorships, partnerships, intellectual property sharing - and impact individual groups and clients. The in-house position teaches Duberstein motivational tools and business fundamentals necessary to managing a sports business.

How to Excel in Internships and Entry-Level Jobs - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 8 of 18, Major League Soccer (MLS) legal counsel Jen Duberstein highlights the importance of commitment and willingness to work extra when trying to establish a career in sports, media and entertainment. Referencing her present work with interns, Duberstein highlights how interns and entry-level staff working extra to help the team make an impact and get remembered for future opportunities.

How to Apply Law Degree in Sports Career - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 6 of 18, Jen Duberstein learns the importance and relevance of applying a law degree in a sports career.  While working sports public relations and media production at NBA on TNT, Atlanta Thrashers, & Goodwill Games, Duberstein is exposed to several groups and realizes sports industry executives all have law degrees. Duberstein then chooses to attend Northwestern University Law School to learn law and apply to sports legal and business career pursuits that eventually land her a job at Major League Soccer (MLS).

How University of Michigan Sports Inform Career - Jen Duberstein

In Chapter 4 of 18, University of Michigan undergraduate college experiences, including college writing classes, small sport color radio broadcasting, and public relations (PR) interaction, help Jen Duberstein get hired into college sports media & broadcasting internships. Duberstein, now a Major League Soccer attorney, shares the importance of developing craft by covering smaller sports, in preparation for future large sport opportunities.