Memo To The Tempest Team
Hey hey to everyone at The Tempest,
Before I get into things, I want to thank you so much for all of your incredible work over the past year. All of our success, growth and broken barriers is because of you. As we jump headfirst into 2017, I’m reminded of just how incredible our work continues to be — a reality that’s evidenced by the fantastic growth curve The Tempest is on.
We’ve reached new milestones and our future looks tremendously bright.
Amidst a world fraught with uncertainty, quickly changing realities and increased disenfranchisement for minorities and women, that’s monumental. So much so, that the following highlights serve more as a signifier of our increased need, than anything else:
The Tempest celebrated record traffic of millions of unique visitors in 2016, all of which was done on a shoestring budget. We are 500% bigger than we were just one year ago, and our incredible editorial team has worked with our global contributor network to create more innovative content this year than any other platform. By this time next year we should be one of the most disruptive platforms online.
This incredible growth can be attributed to the amazing editorial network built by Nadia’s and Saffiyya’s teams, visual brand maturation set forth by Deema’s team, the innovative videos built by Esther’s team, the breakthrough optimization developed by Maryam’s team, and the data science and social content put out in the world by Silla’s team. It hasn’t been easy to build out our diverse impact from scratch since we officially launched at SXSW in March of 2016. Most publishers today integrate diversity as a factor in their growth and development, but our vertically integrated approach to maximizing the impact and influence of diverse millennial women was worth the significant, multi-year investment, and continues to pay off incredibly today.
While there may be amazing tech and media companies today, it is beyond rare for one company to take the multiplicity of the world’s voices as seriously as we do.
In 2017, we’re rapidly expanding to new worlds beyond our website. We are quickly growing out our multimedia presence, building out our original video and mixtape offerings by creating authentic, unique products that have reached millions. This year will mark the expansion of our podcast network, starting with a fresh cast for the ever-surprising, taboo-breaking podcast The Exposé. And our marketing team is hard at work developing a series of innovative events and conferences to reflect our brand to reach and amplify our incredibly diverse, young audience.
With more than 700 diverse female-identifying contributors from more than twenty countries developing and sharing their perspectives on everything from politics to culture, fashion to technology, we have become the leader in content that refuses to adhere to societal norms and guidelines. 2017 ushers in the development of some exciting new verticals, spearheaded by our incredible editorial team.
We also began booking record revenue in 2016. We’ve gone from zero revenue in the beginning of the year to a company creating innovative social content advertising by the end of this past year. Last year, we ran multiple integral programs, and this year we are more than doubling our partnerships.
While both digital and traditional media outlets have continued to struggle with reaching both diverse and female audiences, there remains an insatiable desire from the global diverse millennial audience for incredible content, integral storytelling, and unique multimedia. With the ushering of a new political climate this year, that need has only continued to grow, and user-generated social content isn’t enough to fill the vacuum so many desperately seek from more “conventional” media outlets. Our world needs vibrant, innovative and sustainable media companies staffed by people that look like them: particularly content for diverse millennial women that grew up seeking their own spaces on the web, whose perspectives and voices have been significantly ignored by conventional and digital media.
This is exactly why The Tempest has exploded onto the global space as quickly as we have, and why we are on track to play a significant role in the coming years, producing incredible content and authentic narratives. We have the potential to be the defining company, eschewing traditional roles that tech + media companies have taken in the past to amplify our audience through innovative methods. We are scrappy, growing and refuse to take no for an answer. We’ve proven the skepticism of critics wrong, pioneered new models, and are continuing to succeed because we serve our audience better than what came before.
This is exactly why The Tempest has exploded onto the global space as quickly as we have.
With that in mind, we’re incredibly excited for the year ahead! We are developing the defining media and technology company for diverse millennial women. The road ahead won’t be easy. As a team, we need to be ambitious and consider setbacks as simple steps towards success. We must continue to work hard — but stay smart and have fun doing it. It’s up to us to continue experimenting, embrace uncertainty and risks, and focus on our long-term potential.
It’s natural for us to experience downs — just as we celebrate ups. But there is no reason success is not in our future, since we’re already on our way.
Thank you to each and every one of you for doing such incredible work, and congratulations on an amazing 2016.
Here’s to a record-breaking 2017!
Laila
