Ray Smith - Founder of BeApp

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What is going on, everyone? Casey Adams here. Welcome back to the Rise of the Young podcast. On today's episode, I sit down with Ray Smith, the co founder of B App. Ray and his team are delivering artist access through a virtual portal on your phone. On the BE app, a user is able to virtually attend concerts with mainstream artists such as Katy Perry, Miguel Cascade, DJ Khaled, Steve Aoki and many more, as well as local artists performing new music every day. And these concerts aren't your typical grainy zoom call. The app supports an extremely high quality audio and video experience that lets fans engage directly with the artist and jump to the virtual front row for everyone to see. So if you don't already have BE app, make sure you check it out. And before we get into today's episode, please share this episode with a friend. All you have to do is click share and share, send it to a friend that may enjoy it. And last but not least, with that being said, please enjoy today's podcast with Ray Smith. All right, what is going on everyone? Casey Adams here. Welcome back to the Rise of the Young podcast. On today's episode, we have Ray Smith here with us, the founder of the B app. Thanks so much for coming on, Ray.

Casey. Thank you for having me.

So first off, man, I'm super not only intrigued with the product that you've created, but I'm excited to dive in to just hear more about how it began. And I know with BE app, you guys have been in the headlines recently. You have some amazing artists on the platform, but for those that may not know what BeApp is, I'd love you to give us just a brief overview of what the product is that you have created.

Sure. It's quite interesting that the word live streaming feels a little bit like A buzzword. Nowadays it feels like everybody and their grandmother or every artist is trying to do a live stream. I think like my local gas station, there was some DJ trying to do a set from there the other day. But just because everybody's doing live streaming doesn't mean that all live streams are created equal. I've been in the live stream game for almost 14, 15 years now and one of the things that we've seen is just the experiences is faltering a bit. I think at the beginning of COVID everybody was doing live streams and looking for video content as a way to connect with artists. Way to have social experiences in a time where you can't really socialize. But I think a lot of the platforms that were serving these live streams were really missing a social component. A lot of it was much more of a lean back experience where you're, you're watching a live stream or you're watching an artist and not necessarily experiencing the artist. And it's really just a one way communication between the artist and the fan as opposed to the fan being able to talk to the artist and talk to each other. So B app was really born out of a lack of social live streaming experiences and social live streaming platforms that were in the market. Having done this for some time when Covid first came, I was really trying to figure out how we can really break down the barriers and create these kind of virtualized living room experiences for everybody to tap into these concerts and festivals and music experiences that no longer exist. So we put together a rock star team of some of the best people that have been in the live streaming space for a very long time and built and launched the BE app, which is essentially a live streaming platform that democratizes access to your favorite artists, but really gamifies that experience. Trying to create a new kind of interactive live streaming experience.

I love that, man. And the way you described that, that is quite the product, man. So you guys launched this year, is that correct?

Yeah, we launched on May 14.

Wow.

Peak Covid time.

Yes. Very cool, man. And I found it so fascinating because you hit it right on the nail when it comes to the lack of social gatherings and everything that has happened this year. It fills such a void when it comes to entertainment and a sense of gathering. And I guess I want to ask you, how did this idea not only come about, but with your experience in the live streaming space, how did you build it so quickly and what was the go to market strategy when you were launching?

Oh, three big different questions.

I've been.

Thinking about how you can take a person that's in a remote part of the world and connect them with someone else that's in another remote part of the world. And I think that's kind of the foundation of what the Internet is built for. It's how you can connect to disparate pieces of information, whether it's connecting a person with every song that's ever been created through platforms like a Spotify, or connecting a person with every movie that's ever been created through platforms like a Netflix or Amazon Prime. But there really is no experience platform out there connecting people with experiences that exist all over the world. And with COVID there are some platforms that are kind of filling the void. YouTube kind of does it. Instagram kind of does it. Twitch kind of does it. But they're all doing it in their own different way. And I think from a live streaming perspective, a lot of the major five have been a little bit more reactionary in creating products that connect you with experiences, mainly just because there was no way to connect experiences. And so how we have gone about doing that is really just a labor of love. Since I started my career, I've always wanted to go to music events. I've always loved concerts, I've always loved festivals. But unfortunately, you can't be everywhere at once. And there's so many different barriers that prohibit you from going to a music event or a concert, Whether it's geographical or financial, or for someone like you, Casey, who's a little bit underage in a lot of markets, whether it's age prohibitive, there has always seemed like the power of the web can connect you with all these other amazing things, whether it be movies, books, films. There's never been a platform that really collectivized experiences. And so I started a company called BTV 15 years ago, which really set out to democratize accidents to every kind of music festival, concert and event. And unfortunately, with COVID coming up and really shutting down the live entertainment space, and there are no festivals, concerts and events, trying to figure out how I could take that experience and really apply it to social experiences and how you can use the power of the web to connect people and connect the power of music.

Absolutely. And I saw on the Rolling Stone article that came out with you guys, it says, Katy Perry, DJ Khaled to headline new livestream app. How are you able to get some of these big A list celebrities on board? Because I know the the level of not only star power, but what I've seen as an outsider prior to having this conversation with you. You guys are everywhere. You have the biggest names. You guys have such a great marketing presence. But how did that come about? And why DJ Khaled and someone like Katy Perry to begin with?

That's very kind. Again, there's a lot of people streaming and there are a lot of platforms offering this service, but I think the tools that are available on VIP are slightly different for our customers. And when I say customer, I don't necessarily just mean the fans that are watching at home. I kind of view the artists that work with us as our customers, the brands that sponsor our events as customers. And so trying to create a different value proposition that makes sense for the fan that's sitting at home, as well as the artists as well as the brands that are sponsoring our events and treating those as three distinct entities, but really creating value for each of them is, I think, part of the reason why artists work with us, brands work with us, and fans continue to watch our content. As far as how we get people like Katy Perry, we've streamed a little over 450 artists, big artists, since we first launched back in May. People like Katy Perry and DJ Khaled, just in the electronic music space, people like Diplo and Steve Aoki, and in the urban space, people like Robin Thicke or. Or Benny the Butcher or Miguel. And really trying to create a platform where it's no matter what kind of music you're into, we really have live performances from each of those people. With someone like Katy Perry, one of the things that we did was very interesting is she had her album, which came out in the middle of COVID Now, typically with an artist and they're releasing an album, they'll tour, they'll go and do a stadium show. Someone like Katy Perry, and they'll use that as a promotional vehicle to sell their album. But with touring decimated and no ability to do concerts, we kind of took an old terrestrial model and applied it to the live streaming space, where during Katie's live stream on B app, we sold her album through presale. So aggregating hundreds of thousands of Katy Perry's fans to a centralized location and then being able to use that live stream as a marketing event for her to be able to promote her album is kind of a new way for artists to connect with fans, but also monetize themselves in ways that no longer exist in the physical world.

Absolutely. And I love that. And that's very well said. I did want to bring up the partnership with Coca Cola. I know that you guys partnered with them and I believe raised over, what was it, $20 million for the National Red Cross Foundation.

Yeah. So, you know, Coke is. I can't say enough good things about them as a partner. I think what Coke stands for of uplifting, aspirational, joyful moments was kind of what we were trying to do. Covid has made the world a very anxious place. Not just with COVID but with a very divisive election, which happened here in the US with blm. That's kind of been polarizing a number of different communities in different ways, trying to figure out what common themes that unite all of us in music and experiences are one of those things that regardless of where you sit in the political spectrum, no matter where you sit on Covid or mask wearing, we all kind of can enjoy music together. And Coke really represented that as a brand. So they were not only from an identity standpoint, the brand ethos was right in line with what we were trying to do. They're also Coca Cola, and they have deep pockets and deep resources. So not only we raised a little over US$20 million for Covid relief through the Red Cross, but we were able to put these experiences into 60 different markets around the world. The power of Coca Cola muscle. I mean, just from a marketing perspective, they sell a lot of soda, but they also help us make sure that our content reaches a lot of people.

I love that. I want to take a step back. Where did your journey begin in the live streaming space? And how did you even start this entrepreneurial journey when you were younger?

Just being kind of completely delusional. You know, I think back to when I was your age. What an idiot I was. Honestly, if I could talk to my younger self, I would say, I have no idea where you're getting the confidence to do something like this, but don't. I really didn't know what I was doing. I honestly thought that anything was possible. And creating a business that connected experiences was the only thing that I could really do. But back then, you know, I started my first company back in 2000, end of 2006, beginning of 2007, streaming live video from concerts and festivals in the middle of fields. I don't know how aware you are of the interconnectivity and upload speeds and all the things that required to do a live technical stream back in 2007. But you have to think this is. YouTube was just getting started. Facebook was just getting started. So there wasn't. The pervasiveness of the web wasn't everywhere. And we were trying to get live Video feeds out of fields in the middle of the uk. Oh my gosh. There's no cell phone service and we're trying to Internet connectivity. I remember one of the first festivals we ever streamed, we were calling it a live stream. I don't think I've ever said this out loud, but I'll tell you, Casey, and anyone else who's listening for sure, we were streaming this festival called Gatecrasher in the middle of nowhere and there was no Internet. So it was so parochial that we would film content, we would put it on hard drives, and then I would have guys in my office standing outside the festival grounds. I would take the video footage, I would run it to them, and they would go to an Internet cafe and upload it. No way. See you live. Yeah, there was like a three hour delay on it, but that was as close to live streaming you could get back 3,007 days.

Put it on a hard drive.

Put it on a hard drive and run it to an Internet cafe, like, because there was. It just the infrastructure didn't exist. And to see now how far technology has advanced over the past 13, 14 years. Where within B app now, we're giving the same tools that once required me to run to the outside of a festival ground Internet cafe password, we're giving those same tools to anybody. So within B app now, you can turn on your mobile phone, you can press go live and you, Casey, can go live and stream whatever you like to fans around the world. And really trying to take the same kind of social experiences, the same kind of monetization tools that we've given to Katy Perry, but provide to you. So for example, if you wanted to do a live stream or even host your podcast through B app, we could not only give you the tools to stream to whoever you want in real time, we could also allow you to monetize that. So you could sell the T shirt that you're wearing or that very cool, that very cool chair that you're sitting in. I mean, we're trying to take the aspirational content and marrying it with commerce to create new types of revenue streams for the creator who's doing these things.

I love that. What are you most excited about for the future of be app? And just what excites you prior to this year, when live streaming is always going to be there and concerts are going to come back, but there's something about watching something online and being there in the digital world that is just different. You can't duplicate it. So what are you most excited about?

Moving forward, I think in a lot of ways, live streaming offers you an enhanced experience to the real world experience. The reality is, if you go to a music festival like a Coachella or a Govball or a Lollapalooza, not everyone can be backstage. Not everyone can have a direct fan experience and talk to the artist. And the thing about live streaming is, not only can we take an event that was once only capable of being viewed by the 75,000 or 100,000 people that are in the physical space, there's only so many people you can fit on the festival grounds. But now, through the power of the web, we've almost torn down those festival walls, and that same experience can be viewed by hundreds of millions of people. But again, that's been happening for some time now. But being able to give fans a different kind of perspective and a different kind of interaction with the artists as well as each other is where we're really starting to press the boundaries of. So just before COVID one of the festivals that we stream is called Rolling Loud. Big Hip Hop. Yep.

I know Rolling Loud.

So we were experimenting with some cool tech. Like we were streaming the Wu Tang Clan, and we put these little lipstick cameras on each of them. We had the Wu Tang Cam. So you could actually get each, like the Ghostface Killer's perspective from the stage and actually get a differentiated point of view of a music experience. Where you're used to seeing it from the festival grounds or from the dance floor, but now seeing the artist perspective, that is very cool. What's happening moving forward is really trying to take the live streaming experience and making it much more social. So using the event or the artist as a hook to get people in, but then using that hook or that call to action to get people to socialize, it's kind of the same reason why people go to a concert or a festival. You go for the artist, but you go for a number of other reasons. You go because you want to hang out with your friends, or you meet a significant other, or you want to forget your problems and using that as a sense of escapism. So one of the things we're doing now is really trying to make live events, live concert, festival, music, viewing social. And we're doing that through a number of different products, which we're getting ready to launch in the next two weeks. So I don't know when this is going to air, but if it's going to air after December 15, I can tell you about it.

Yeah, we definitely. We can make that happen. Let's do it.

Well, one of the things that we're doing and we're launching on December 15th is we are having, I guess the only way to really put it is Zoom or FaceTime video chat functionality embedded within the live stream. So not only can you watch your favorite artist, but you can actually interact with 16 of your friends through FaceTime style video chat in a mobile experience.

Wow.

Now it's happening on web, but it's not. This is going to be a true tech first where being able to have 16 of your friends in your own private video chat room, but using the artist as an anchor. On December 17th, we're going to launch this with Bruno Mars.

Wow. Congratulations, man.

Well, hopefully this airs after November 30, because the tickets haven't gone on sale yet.

Totally. Absolutely. And people listening to this, it will be that time now. It will be out.

So on December 17th, we're going to do a live stream with Bruno Mars, but really layering in all these different ways to socialize with your friends, but using Bruno as a backdrop. Hopefully people tune in to watch Bruno, but they'll stay to be able to communicate with their friends and with their family, especially during these kind of really weird increased lockdown Covid states that are coming coming up. It's hopefully giving people a chance to connect in a time where we can't really connect because of the virus that's surging.

Totally. And I want to ask you, how long have you been involved in the music festival scene? Because it sounds like you have such a background and situational awareness of going there and feeling what it means to go to a festival and what people want out of it that set you up to make a great product, like, be appreciated. But yeah. How far does your history in the festival world go back and when was the first festival you went to?

Case you make me sound old. You sound super old. I've always been a fan. I've always been a super, super fan of concerts and festivals. When I was 21, I went to Europe for the first time and I got to see some of these really big European festivals which didn't really exist in America. Not in the same way. And part of why I started the company is because a lot of the experiences that I saw in Europe, I was just desperate to show my friends back home. I remember calling my friends like, oh, my God, I went to this festival last week. You don't understand. And they just didn't care. And it was very difficult for me to articulate how amazing this experience was to my Friends who were back in California. And so I figured the easiest way to really give them an understanding of how great this music world was and the new friends that you make and almost the music and just the feel good vibe that you had. The easiest way to do that is by amplifying it through live video streaming. I think in a lot of ways, my love for going to these events kind of gave me foundational understanding. But it's funny, as you get older, I don't really go out ever. I have a different appreciation because I have been in that world for a very long time. But because I'm a social hermit, I experience music events like our customers do. And I think I look and approach it like, okay, I remember what it was like somehow conning my way backstage. How can I give that same tool to a fan that's maybe in a remote location in a remote part of the world, but give them that same kind of feeling that, oh, my God, I got backstage and I got a chance to talk to Travis Scott.

Yeah, absolutely. And speaking of that backstage interaction and feeling, something that I know makes you guys different is when it comes to these live streams with these celebrities and artists, like, this is you guys going there and actually doing a production. It's not a. You know, it's not just something where someone pops up and does their thing. Like you guys have a production there, and it's something that looks and feels as if you're at a real concert. Is that correct?

Yeah. I mean, we have so many different ways of how we capture events. Our production team is some of the best in the business. Like, you know, the guys who head up our production, there's not an artist that they haven't streamed. They've done everything from Coachella to Lollapalooza to Justin Bieber to Beyonce to Rihanna to Jay Z. So, you know, we have experience live streaming, you know, the biggest festivals and the biggest artists in the world, but in a lot of ways, live streaming an artist from home, or live streaming an artist in a socially distant environment, it's so much more difficult to make compelling and exciting than a festival. Festivals are easy. We have smoke cannons, we have sirens. There's a lot of things you can point your cameras at. But where we're streaming something like an artist, we have to become very creative with how we can make that interesting. On stream, we streamed a DJ named Cascade. Yep. Live from. From the Grand Canyon.

Yeah.

And so, like, taking a world where we can't put people in crowds, we have to figure out how we can make something that's super interesting, that people are going to want to sit at home on their couch, on their phone and watch without all the pyrotechnics that we would normally have in a music festival.

Absolutely. And I do want to speak about the marketing strategy for B app. I know there's tons of entrepreneurs that they launch apps and, you know, it never gains traction. And you guys have been able to not only gain traction, but to build a real community and a real customer base. Like, what's your advice to founders and entrepreneurs that want to launch an app? And how have you guys been able to build such a brand so quickly in the space?

I think you can have the most amazing tech in the world, but if no one sees it, it doesn't matter. Especially if you're building something that's social. The reason why Instagram works is because everybody's on Instagram and the second you remove all of the people, it's just a dummy app. So while the functionality may be there, I think what makes a social or an entertainment app really compelling is marketing. So it's probably one of the biggest things that people need to think about is how do you scale your user base? How do you go from 0 to 60 and from 60 to 60,000 and 60,000 to 6 million as fast as possible, Especially if consumers are so. Or if the experience is so reliant on customers being there. I think for us, how we've marketed ourselves, I don't know how applicable this is to other businesses, but we work with assets. I say assets, but we work with things and people and artists and assets that have their own inherent following and we build off the back of that. I mean, the artists that we're streaming are already huge. Yeah. I mean, on December 17th, we're streaming Bruno Mars and a Japanese group called Arashi. Now, those two people alone, I don't know how big Arashi is on social, I'd have to check. But I think Arashi, they have two and a half million people in their own fan club that pay $10 a month to be in that fan club. Wow. So that level of engagement is already there. And then leaning into that and letting the artists as well as us co promote the shows make our marketing lift a lot less easier. We're not carrying the burden on ourselves. We're just going to where the communities are. And in a lot of ways we're just. The only thing we have to do is point the cameras and create a sexy platform. A lot of the artists can do the heavy lifting on our behalf because they already have an inherent following that wants to see them. It's about making sure that when you're negotiating with the artists that you can create a value prop that's compelling enough for them to go to their fans. And we're creating such an amazing experience for that artist that they want to shout to their fans and they want to tell them that, oh wow, on this day, check me out.

Absolutely. What's your advice when it comes to building an actual product and getting market feedback? Because like I talked about before we're getting before we started the show is I'm building a product right now when it comes to a SaaS business. And I know you have a lot of experience in this, but what is the some of the things to look out for or to try to avoid when launching a product that requires users and tech and a team that is always on top of.

Depends on your funding strategy. And I think your capital, your human capital and your cash capital is paramount. I think a lot of times in a startup you spend so much time building a product and you wait until it's completely finalized and then you press go. And the problem is you've spent all of your money, you spend all of your time and all of your resources getting a product ready for market and then if something doesn't work, you're kind of married to that product. You almost muscle it in to the market as opposed to letting the market tell you if the products any good. I would say launch your product six months before it's ready because that level of feedback and interaction that you're going to get from real people is going to help tremendously, kind of steer the next steps. If you wait until your product is fully fleshed out, you've waited six months too long. You're never going to be. I think with me, I'm such a perfectionist. I'm never happy with anything. Yeah, I'm always like, this could be tweaked, that could be tweaked. And I think that that's just part of the game. If you're 65% of the way there, 70% there, let it in the market and see what happens. I think depending upon how advanced your rollout strategy is. But there's ways that you can a b test your product in different markets. Like there are testing circles that if you're an American company, you can hire different testers in Canada. So if you look at a company like McDonald's, they rolled out their plant based meat strategy in Canada just to See how a very similar market to the US would adopt eating plant based meat. And that way you haven't necessarily ruined your core market. If the US is your core market. I think the two things one, make sure you keep your financial and human capital fresh enough that once you hit the market that you can iterate and change as quickly as possible based on market dynamics and based on AB testing. And then two, if you don't have the cash resources to go into the market, if you only have one shot and that's all you're really going to get, try to a B test it in places that are secondary with secondary customers that are not going to pollute your main core audience that you're going after. It's amazing what the public will tell you, especially when they don't feel as though they are a data set. If they know that you're looking for information from them, they're going to behave a little bit differently. And that's why AB testing works in some scenarios, not in others. But I think if you just put it in the market and say this is our real product, people are brutal. Whether you want to hear it or not, they're going to tell you how they feel.

Yeah, absolutely. What have you learned from the product side since launching B app in May?

I've learned or. Well, I feel like I'm learning new stuff every day.

Totally.

The thing that's really resonating with me today is for us, we are a global platform. So we're right now, I think we have 16 different language versions of platform, 60 different markets, and not all markets behave the same. We have a huge footprint in South America. We're top 10 in the app Store consistently in Brazil, Argentina, Chile.

Wow.

It's me seeing how people respond to our tools in certain markets but hate in other markets. Like we have this one very cool thing which in America people love. We have bang messages. So you can, while you're watching a live stream, if you spend enough points, you can send a message that every other viewer around the world sees. And I thought that was quite cool. Casey. You could say Casey. Adam. Girls, check me out on IG and points. Everyone can see that. And that level of social capital that gives you Casey Adams. That's pretty powerful.

Totally.

Now you have thousands of people around the world who now know who you are and they'll check you out on ig. South Americans hate it every single time we do it. The Brazilians are like, how do we disable that? Yeah, I guess the biggest learning is trying to create a product that scales, but also understanding that there are cultural nuances depending on the market that you're trying to penetrate. And that can be at a macro level of country by country, but it could be on a micro level, state by state.

Love that. That's. That's very. Not only great information, but things that anyone can take from today's episode and apply when it comes to testing and especially when it comes to different markets in different countries. What would your advice be to your younger self if you were to do it all over again?

Oh, have more fun with it.

Okay.

I think in the early days, I was so caught up trying to get to a destination, which. And I guess that destination is always constantly moving. As I said, I'm really never satisfied. So it's like you always think you're gonna do something and that's gonna get you there. You're gonna do that move, and if that's gonna get you there. I think the one thing that I'm trying to understand, not only talking to my younger self, I'm talking to myself two minutes ago, myself right now, is just every single day. That's the game. It's like if you want to be an entrepreneur, especially in the tech field, the whole journey is part of it. Because I don't know if you ever reach a destination. I guess a lot of people think the destination is either going public or having someone buy your company. But then if you're a true startup tech person, you're just going to start a new company the very next day.

Yep.

So I think it's just kind of just enjoy every. Every part of it. The good, the bad. It's never going to be as bad as you think it is. It's never going to be as good as you think it is. As long as you get comfortable being in that volatile space of some days the whole world's crushing in, and some days you think that you're the smartest person you ever met. If you can enjoy both of those states of mind, it's just a much more interesting ride.

I love that last thing right before we end today's episode, and that is where's the best place for the listeners today to follow Bapp and follow yourself moving forward?

Go to getbapp.com that's going to take you to our mobile platform. Download the app. You will not regret it. If you're an aspiring musician, we have an ongoing competition where we're giving away US$1,000 a day, every single day to any person out there that's talented, all you have to do is go live from your phone and you're in a very good chance to win money. And then also, if you're not an aspiring musician, but you just want to socialize with some friends of your own, invite them in and you can FaceTime within the app and watch some cool music. As far as how you can find us, it's all the social platforms that you can see us on, IG, etc. Or just listen to. Casey Adams podcast hit repeat.

I love that. Well, Ray, thank you so much for coming on the show today, man. I really appreciate it and I learned a lot.

Thank you, Casey. Let's chat soon.

Monarch Legacy of Monsters An Apple Original Series the world is on fire. I decided to do something about it on November 17th. This place, it's not ours. Believe me, the most massive event of the year arrives. If you come with me, you'll know everything.

I promise. Oh, my God. Go, go, go.

Legacy of Monsters streaming November 17th only on Apple TV.