Phillypreneurs

The concept is so simple it’s almost a no-brainer: Connect the big brand dollars of major companies like Budweiser with the best and brightest of the creative and cost effective independent film/video community. For the web 2.0 savvy, XLNTads is to online video what Threadless is to T-shirts. The quality of the submissions are surprisingly good and have a definite Indy edge to them that typically do really well online. See for yourself: XLNTads Bud Light Submission(be patient, the third party Brightcove player takes a couple seconds to load the first time)

XLNTads in their own words:

XLNTads connects brands with the exciting emerging voices of the video generation. Our platform allows independent creative talent to collaborate with major consumer brands. The result: opportunities for a new generation of videographers and ads for a new generation of consumers - authentic ads capable of breaking through the clutter, contrivance and cynicism that pervades traditional media.

I had the pleasure of chatting with Mark Schoneveld, Community Manager of XLNTads.com, and asked him a couple questions about this young Philadelphia company.

With the proliferation of cheaper video technology, the emergence of more and more independent video talent and the seemingly universal obsession with the elusive ‘Viral Video’, XLNTads has positioned itself into a potentially lucrative niche, and it’s not alone. With Atlanta based Vitrue and the Italian company Zoopa, XLNTads is taking the modern reality of “quantity equals affordable quality” to it’s next logical step; video advertising. Offer up a generous prize and collect large quantities of videos to find that nugget of gold, i.e. that viral video that spreads like wild fire (hopefully) over the endless connection points of the web. The brilliant part for advertisers is that for the price of one prize you get ten to twenty videos, all carrying your brand and message to every nook and cranny of online video sites.

The real challenge for this young company is having to simultaneously attract the creative community that will produce the ads while courting the companies that will foot the prize money, resources and subject matter for the videos. For XLNTads to be a huge success they need to build a solid and devoted community of independent film/video talent and a track record for massive amounts of impressions to attract the big brands.

In the end, if they can keep both of these very different groups happy and coming back for more, there is potential to cause a serious paradigm shift in the way companies approach online video. Here’s to the success of our fellow Phillypreneurs XLNTads!

Dave Speers is an online marketing consultant and start up junky that has worked with a wide variety of Philadelphia Start-Ups . Dave spends most his time annoying really smart people at Indy Hall co-working collaborative.