The Accidental Social Network
Interview with Josh Simons, CEO of Vampr Inc.
Tell us about your business. What do you do?
Vampr is the largest social-professional network for the music ecosystem, where you can find people to collaborate with, create new music and monetize your work.
What is your startup’s origin story?
Baz Palmer (co-founder) and I are both lifelong musicians who spent many years struggling before making a living from our art. This story is not uncommon. The obstacles aren’t talent or ambition. We simply didn’t know the right people. There had to be a better way. With Vampr we are striving to eradicate this pain point for the next generation of creative souls.
Had you been involved in the industry before this startup? What is your background?
As a songwriter, indie label manager and former artist, I’ve had the pleasure of working with everyone from Travis Scott to Keith Urban, racking up tens of millions of streams along the way. This year I was named in The Music Network’s 30 Under 30 Power List and voted Reader’s Choice. Baz is a Hall of Fame musician. His band Hunters & Collectors reached 12x Platinum sales and toured the world for more than twenty years.
What’s unique about your company? What are the key differentiators between you and other players?
Most of the other players in our space have taken a list based approach to networking and personnel discovery (ie. scrolling, Web 1.0, desktop, etc) which lacks the edge and modern approach we have taken with Vampr — it also lacks any element of fun, whereas Vampr has helped to gamify networking.
Aside from product differentiators, scale is the ultimate defensibility and differentiator in our music social network sector (no one wants to show up at an empty party!) In this respect, we are the market leaders.
Take us through a day in your life. What does the typical day look like?
1am — My day starts by going to bed! As the CEO of the largest social-professional network for creatives with team members all over the world, I’m lucky if I get to bed before 1 am PT. We recently announced a bridging round alongside an equity crowdfunding campaign with the endorsement of Neil Patel’s Angels & Entrepreneurs Network — so needless to say it’s been a busy and exciting time!
9am — Waking up and getting ready for the day. Starts with a 15 minute cuddle with my dog, Bear, a poodle-terrier mix. I gave up coffee in 2017 but I’ll still usually pickup a decaf ice coffee before jumping into my first meetings of the day with our London team to talk marketing and publishing. Since we’ve added Vampr Publishing to our platform, we’ve brought on over 5,200 songs from our users, building a catalogue that we’re pitching for sync placements.
10am — After the first business of the day, I like to take a moment to center myself and refocus. This can mean a long walk or a bath, or sometimes both if I can squeeze it in! No breakfast.
11am — Back to business. This hour is reserved for any East Coast business and calls. This is usually biz dev related: partnerships, co-marketing opportunities, sponsorships, etc.
12pm — 5pm — Much of this time is spent in Zoom meetings with LA. These are also the hours where I actually get things done — updating pitch decks, approving content, updating spreadsheets, etc. I will usually make myself some kind of salad and turkey wrap during these hours.
5pm — This hour is reserved for daily check-ins with my co-founder Baz. Both musicians ourselves, the idea for Vampr came from frustration in music networking overseas. He actually signed me to my first record deal back in the day! This meeting is where most of our strategy decisions are made — everything flows from the decisions we make in this hour.
6pm — Gym time. I find it important to carve out time to focus on mental and physical well being. If I’m not in good shape, my work won’t be in good shape either.
7pm — Dinner with my beautiful wife and dog! Lately, we’ve been really into our crockpot — making brisket, stews, chilli — we just love it. We’ve recently stopped ordering from Uber Eats because I was putting on too much weight!
8pm — The day’s not over yet. After dinner, I have a daily standup with our tech teams in Vietnam and Australia. This is where I get updated on the progress of our tech developments and where we get to feedback information from our marketing and data teams into the product directly. Sometimes this lasts 15 minutes — sometimes it’s 90 minutes. Every day is different.
9pm — 12am — I’m on call for any questions from our teams around the world. Thankfully, most days I get to spend quality time with my wife and dog.
12am — Winding down now. This can take many forms for me — a stiff drink, listening to music, watching TV, reading the news. I’m relaxing before it is time to go to bed and then start all over again!
What has been the most challenging part of growing your company?
Improving product while also spending money on and improving the user acquisition process. It’s a balancing act and incredibly hard to get right. The biggest takeaway is to keep on going, even when you have days or weeks where you’re not hitting the milestones you’d like to be reaching.
What has been your best marketing channel? What are some channels you are looking to explore next?
Paid social has been very good to us. PR is great for social proof. And word of mouth accounts for a healthy percentage of new users. So they all interweave a bit to create a healthy feedback loop.
What apps do you use that you would recommend to others?
Slack, Hootsuite, Adobe Suite, Google Suite — I don’t think I could do my job without any of these!
Do you have a book, podcast, or Youtube channel you would recommend to other Entrepreneurs?
I enjoy reading about mindfulness. Eckhart Tolle is one of my favorites leaders in this space.
If you could go back in time to the day you founded your company, what advice would you give yourself?
Brace yourself! Every time you think “I can’t possibly add any more responsibilities or tasks into the day” you almost will have to and learn to make it work. If that doesn’t sound appealing to aspiring entrepreneurs, perhaps this isn’t the job for you!
What’s something you’ve learned from building your business that someone else can learn from?
Keep showing up and the universe will reward your effort, even if it’s not the reward you initially had in mind.
