Innovator of the Week
Paul Waksmonski
Founder and CTO of ViewJoin
Please provide your 30-second pitch about your company.
ViewJoin is an end-to-end broadcasting platform in the cloud that empowers anyone to easily create professional live video.
With our intuitive drag-and-drop studio you can produce compelling live content without expensive software, excessive time and technical knowledge.
Design the way your broadcast looks by adding text, graphics, webcams and other elements to multiple scenes or skip the creation process and choose from a variety of premade templates. Go solo or invite participants and guests to join in from their webcam on desktop or mobile. Then, in one click, stream your broadcast to platforms such as Facebook Live, YouTube, Twitter and Twitch where you can reach large audiences who can view, interact and share your live or archived content.
What Wix and Squarespace did to help anyone easily create a stunning website we have done the same but for live video.
Who or what was your best resource for starting your company?
My support network – The people who have been there throughout this journey to help lend a hand and provide the necessary feedback required to become successful. I appreciate the support from my team, friends, family, mentors and the resources I’ve been privileged to be a part of such as the Alpha Loft and Accelerate NH program. It’s also been extremely helpful learning alongside the other companies in the Accelerator who have provided excellent insight based on their own experiences.
The team members who I am grateful to work with are Mark Aquilino (President), Justin Martin (Creative Director) and Alex Deyeso (COO).
What was your biggest obstacle in starting your company and how did you overcome it?
One of the main obstacles was going from an idea to building a product that provides value to users. It’s easy as a content creator myself and a developer to get lost in building an application with flashy features that I want to use. I want to push the limits as it relates to live-streaming and content creation but I had to dial it back in order to meet the demands of this market. I identified the need to focus on core parts of the application and succeeded in doing so. There will be a time when we can expand on other features.
What’s the best advice you have received?
The advice that has resonated with me the most is to not sweat the hard stuff and to be confident I can overcome it. As with most tech startups and companies, in general, it’s often challenging trying to solve certain problems.There have been times when the difficulty can feel defeating and you wonder when or if you’ll see the finish line. Being confident in my ability to research and learn how to solve these problems has been incredibly important.
What about the NH lifestyle appeals to you?
I appreciate being surrounded by the history of New Hampshire. There’s so much to learn about the state and how it came to be. I love seeing the old architecture and being able to travel to small towns that have kept their character. It’s also amazing to see how modernization can take place in Manchester and other areas while keeping their historical value, as with the mill buildings.
The ecosystem to start a business also appeals to me. Programs like the Live Free and Start and various other organizations throughout New Hampshire have provided me countless resources. I’m looking forward to giving back and helping enrich this wonderful state.
What does the future look like for your company?
I’m super excited for the future of ViewJoin. I absolutely love what we’ve built and I can’t wait to finally open it up to the world. We are currently in private beta but expect to be opening it to the public within weeks.
We have so many ideas and enhancements in the pipeline to transform content creation as a whole. We’re looking forward to when we can integrate our platform with partners and other third party services. Doing so will give users unlimited creative potential.
One of our main goals is to create live video content ourselves. I have many ideas for different types of talk shows and live streams that I can’t wait to start. Be looking for these across our social media channels.
Connect with ViewJoin on Facebook and Twitter, connect with Paul on LinkedIn.