How Beem is building a thriving community of web3 creators with $BEEM
Mihai Crasneanu has been through the traditional fundraising roadshow before. In fact, he estimates that in his previous companies, he spent up to 70% of his time on fundraising.
“It used to be that I’d have to say to my colleagues, ‘Hey folks, I’m here but I’m not really here; forget about me helping on product or feedback or marketing for the next few months.’ With rolling fundraising, I get all that time back.”
By reclaiming a huge chunk of his time as a founder, Mihai can concentrate on what really matters: growing Beem into a thriving, inclusive web3 video platform that puts creators in the driver’s seat when it comes to owning their audience, their data, and their revenue stream.
The ability to let all stakeholders participate in the platform they’re contributing to building — and leaving behind the web2 world of giant platforms & social networks where all of the value added by creators is only enjoyed by a small group of lucky shareholders — immediately spoke to Mihai.
“When Thibauld published the white paper on continuous organizations in 2018, I read it and immediately reached out. I was already in,” Mihai recalls. “The awesome thing is that he and Joris took that vision and built Fairmint. Having the team deliver a SaaS that just works, letting me easily implement it all in my business, is incredibly valuable.”
Like many startups today, Beem is being built with an engaged community that brings value to the growing company in many different ways. A creator doesn’t just make some content, post it and move on; instead, they’re promoting their content across all of their social media accounts.
All that activity means they’re effectively advertising Beem day in, day out.
“A creator knows they’ll make some money on a platform. But they also know that they’re creating lots of upside for the platform itself, especially if they are influential: they bring their audience, they talk to other creators who will ask them about the platform…”
That added value fits perfectly with Fairmint’s Compensation mechanism, which gives founders the ability to easily reward any and all service providers with equity in the company. A founder launching a Rolling SAFE knows they’re going to get the most out of their equity, letting them focus on the services coming from community members.
With a Rolling SAFE, the amount of equity available to all stakeholders, whether through capital invested or services provided, is visible to all parties.
For Beem, that level of transparency matches the transparency they want to have with their community of content creators. With everyone able to see the state of the Rolling SAFE at any time, including price and valuation, there’s no complicated math or estimates that need to be made.
“I find it extremely fair. You can be a big whale, a small fish, it doesn’t matter — you’ve got the same opportunity to own a piece of the company. The small fish can even get a big reward if they get in before the whales arrive.”
Beem’s mission highlights the meaning behind the term community capital. They’re tapping into the value being supplied by all those stakeholders interested in the organization’s continued growth. And so they see it as normal that all of those stakeholders should financially benefit from the company’s long-term success.
Opening to all the opportunity to invest truly changes the investment process, for both professional investors like VCs & business angels and individuals making their first startup investment.
The straightforward Rolling SAFE contract gives the comfort of knowing that you’re investing in something very real: a security representing real equity in the company, not a valueless token. It’s evident, with or without an investor ever talking to the founder.
“People do reach out, we might have a Zoom, 10 minutes later the investment is done. Done! It happened to me just last month — we’re talking, they say they want to invest, I see the money coming to us live as a Slack notification. And it’s like, ‘Welcome onboard, you’re an investor!’ It absolutely happens.”
That simplicity means that every meeting that Beem’s team has, whether with users, business partners, or investors, essentially turns into a sales meeting.
“It’s like our equity has almost become part of our product,” laughs Mihai. With both the equity and the product available for purchase, when someone loves one, it’s very likely that they’ll also be interested in the other.
The parallel relationship between product and equity means that delivering on the product has a direct impact on fundraising results.
And Beem’s case shows how consistently delivering isn’t just about getting new investors. The company has had a number of individuals decide to re-invest as the company progresses. Mihai sees it all happening in the stakeholder dashboard.
“Some people started by putting in a bit of money 6 months ago, then they added more 3 months ago when we shared some good news, then they add a bit more now. Things are moving forward, they see it, and say, ‘I’ve got some cash to invest, let’s do it.’”
The bottom line for Mihai’s experience with raising community capital for Beem using a Rolling SAFE?
“Building and delivering brings investors, the money comes as we move forward. We can concentrate on increasing our business momentum. I absolutely prefer it to the old way of doing things.”
