[Jim Hohl]

Hi John, Mark, Doyle, and the Creative COW community!

Allow me to introduce myself and address some of your concerns. My name is Jim Hohl, and I am one of the co-founders here at Vidaao.

First of all, it’s cool to see this discussion happening at all. I am glad you found our site and are interested in it.

That being said, you raise some very valid points. We definitely have to do more to enhance the experience for and the information provided to our “creatives”. We are in the process of doing that.

We have some limited FAQs for creatives here: https://www.vidaao.com/faq#creatives and we are adding more.

In the meantime, I will do my best to answer your questions here. Here goes:

Do we get paid in each step of the process (which some of their literature not posted on the site suggests) and which parts of those processes are they?

– You are paid half after you post the final video for client review and the remaining half after the client approves it.

what are the requirements for getting paid?

– Same as with any client. The client has to be happy with the work.

Must we meet all client changes at the quoted amount?

– You must meet all client changes up to the agreed upon proposal. Anything outside of that is negotiated separately with the client and we will collect it for you before the client can proceed to download the final video.

Is it one round of changes, or some other system?

– We suggest two rounds of edits, but that would be something you negotiate with each client.

what’s my protection against laying out these expenses only to have a client refuse the project at the end? Do I get a portion of the escrow anyhow, or not?

– We allow client’s to cancel the project up to the first rough cut. After that they owe in full. Currently, we pay you half after you post the final video for client review and the remaining half after the client approves it. However, our model is shifting to be more flexible and those terms can be negotiated (up to a point) more directly with the client on each project.

I’m also not crazy about the smorgasbord catalog with price tags. The relationship of quality to price I see after skimming thru a few of the samples is, let’s say, uneven.

– Totally agree with you and we just spent the past few weeks making that much more even. A lot of people who were not up to par were removed and we revamped our vetting process to make sure we keep the quality overall much higher (and yet serving a range of price points).

But every job, EVERY job, is a custom job, unique.

– Agree as well. We don’t expect the “pricing” in our system to be anything more than a benchmark. (ie. $5k is totally different from $25k) You will bid each job separately.

While I agree that the sample reels can roughly indicate a “ballpark” level of production, I think the unrealistic expectation it sets up is that two projects in the same “ballpark” are going to be identical in costs within a buck or two. The most likely effect of this used car lot kind of sample page is to increase downward pressure on my rates, which I really need no help with.

– It is not in our interest either, nor in our clients’ interests. We want, and we believe our model encourages, fair pricing for both sides.

is it just a fancy mandy.com?

– Definitely not! We offer much more than a listing. We collect payment, mediate disputes and provide outbound sales support to get you business – and on top of all that, we provide a platform for collaborating with the client, reviewing edits and much more.

Hope this addresses at least some of the concerns here. Feel free to reach out to me with any further questions. My LinkedIn profile is https://www.linkedin.com/in/jameshohl and I accept all inbound emails.

I’d encourage you to check us out and apply to post your profile. There is no cost or obligation.