Oulo.com, a digital platform that connects celebrities with fans, aims to raise $1 million to fuel its expansion in South Asia and Africa, after registering massive growth in the Middle East.
Founded by former Lebanese investment banker Kamal Nazha, the platform features 200 celebrities including comedians, athletes, theatre personalities, television presenters and social media influencers, who record short video messages at the request of users.
The messages could be a birthday wish or for a graduation ceremony or marriage anniversary. Hundreds of customers have bought videos on the website since its launch last year.
“We are growing 40 to 50 per cent (in revenue) every month," Mr Nazha says. "We now have 200 celebrities with us doing quite a lot of videos. Some celebrities are doing about 15 videos per month.”
Oulo.com is currently active in Jordan, Lebanon and GCC countries. It has a dedicated web page for each of these markets, but Mr Nazha wants to tap into more markets.
“We want to expand and add a country page,” he says. “We are looking at 10 emerging market countries where you have a huge population, like India and Nigeria with a single set of celebrities. Our technology is ready to be in 20 different countries at the same time.”
Oulo.com was first launched in Beirut last year and it relocated to Dubai following a massive port explosion in the Lebanese capital in August.
“We operated for two and half months and then the Beirut explosion came and completely destroyed our office and injured one of our team members. The whole team was in complete shock. We relocated to Dubai and did our second launch in October. And from there we are growing very well.”
Oulo.com features popular celebrities such as Indian comedian Just Sul, Syrian actor Bassel Khaiat, Kuwaiti comedian Tariq Al Ali and Bader Saleh from Saudi Arabia. It also has video messages from the cast of the popular sitcom Friends.
The majority of the requests that Oulo.com receives are for gifts, he says. “For the people, we care about, we are always looking to present them a special gift, not just perfume or another usual gift. Imagine how they would react when their favourite celebrity suddenly shows up telling their name and wishing them on their birthday or on some special occasion.”
Aside from that, the company also receives get well soon requests for Covid-19 patients as well as apology requests. A husband requested a video for his wife on the first day of her chemotherapy from her favourite comedian, he says.
“We have a lot of celebrities, their character is so motivational…so positive, whether from the media or big actors. They (users) ask please motivate this guy, everything would be all right or they would do better in their life etc ... these messages cheer up people and make them happy.”
The video messages, however, are not free. Celebrities charge their own fee, which ranges from $35 to $200 per message, while the company takes 25 per cent of the fee, the rest goes to the celebrity.
The entire process is done through the website, including the recording of the message.
“There is a lot of potential (for growth). These personnel videos are just a start,” he says. “There is so much that can be done by having this ecosystem, by being connected with celebrities, by having an app in celebrities phone you can add so many things to it.”
Oulo.com is also planning to launch business shoutouts, a digital platform for small and medium enterprises.
“We see many requests coming in from small and medium businesses asking us to mention their restaurant or a T-shirt company name in the video. They cannot afford to put an advertisement on the social media pages of celebrities because this is very expensive and sometimes it is not relevant.”
There is, however, competition in the market “but we have differentiated ourselves from everyone else with our localisation feature. So in the countries where we operate, this localisation feature has proven very successful and is a competitive advantage for us”.
A former Deutsche Bank executive, Mr Nazha was working as a chief financial officer for a real estate company in Greece before he started out on his own with Oulo.com.
"I’ve done banking and finance for so many years. I wanted to do something challenging and more exciting, something involving people,” he says.
For Oulo.com, he draws inspiration from similar businesses like Cameo that offers personalised videos of celebrities.
“We looked at Cameo, the successful company in the US. We looked at some others and we are trying to do it here. We build our technology on the basis of location and in each country we can give a localisation experience.”
The company initially raised $450,000 from angel investors and is about to start a seed round, which will be “north of one million dollars to help us expand our operations and go further”, he says.
Forbes billionaires, senior media executives and big tech employees invested in the company during the initial phase of investment.
“Our ambition is to go globally not only be in the Middle East,” he says. “Even in the Middle East, we have three different sites, one for Lebanon, one for Jordan and one for the GCC region. In each one, you will only see people who are famous among this crowd. This will allow us to expand and cater to a specific market.”
Q&A with Kamal Nazha, founder and chief executive of Oulo.com
What is your vision for the company?
We aim to be the go-to technology company for celebrities to unlock new and untapped digital monetisation opportunities while creating special and engaging experiences for their fans.
What is your mantra for success?
The age-old recipe of continuous learning and hard work never fails.
Where do you see yourself and the company in five years?
The goal is to grow Oulo to cover as many markets as possible, and with a great selection of products that link celebrities with their fans. The exciting thing about Oulo, other than the fact that the problem we're solving exists in every single country around the world, is that in this social media age, there has never been as many celebrities as there are today, and it has never been easier to attain celebrity status. So our addressable market is perpetually growing, a characteristic you don't find in many industries.
How do you envision a post-Covid world?
I think that life after Covid will look a lot different from life pre-Covid, with the most dramatic changes being in day-to-day work life. Remote working, virtual meetings, no physical offices are here to stay. This is positive for Oulo as the more people and businesses rely on technology, the more opportunities will arise. For example, imagine having a celebrity making an appearance in your next virtual team meeting or running a virtual celebrity meet and greet for your VIP clients. These are all emerging trends that Oulo will be perfectly positioned for.
What new skills have you learnt in the process of starting the company?
Starting a company has definitely been the hardest thing I've ever done. I think the most important skill I have developed is "serious multi-tasking". One minute you are having a very technical conversation with engineers building your product, the next you are having the most untechnical conversation pitching to a celebrity, then you're with your creative colleagues rearranging milli-second frames for the next ... and in between you are with lawyers and venture capitalists negotiating legal terms.
