Last year, together with my team at Brainient, I started working on an open-source video management platform for big video publishers, Veevid. I was sure it’s a pretty cool product, but didn’t really believe it’s the next big thing, so I wanted to get some feedback & thoughts from people smarter than me. So I applied to Mini Seedcamp Paris.

To my utmost enthusiasm, we got shortlisted. And won. I wrote 39 pages of feedback & ideas in my Moleskine. The whole event was actually so good that I decided to apply for Mini Seedcamp London event as well. We got shorlisted again.

Needless to say the London event was even better. I got more feedback & ideas. While looking through those notes together with my fantastic team at Brainient, I realized that we’re focusing on the wrong thing. “They need video monetization, not video management tools”, I remember myself saying under the shower, after that meeting with my team.

So we went back to the drawing board and created LayeredBrain, a tool that would help video publishers make more money with their video content. And the more I thought about it, the more I believed it’s going to be the next big thing. So in September, I applied for Seedcamp Week.

We got shortlisted again, and boy, what an experience. I don’t even have words. Here’s just a quick glimpse of what we’ve gotten out of it:

196  business cards. 6 potential customers. 4 parties. 640 minutes of mentoring with some very smart people. 27 pages of feedback. 19 glasses of wine. 44 powerpoint slides. 76 emails. Over 40 pitches. 6 meetings with clients. 2 potential advisors. 50.000 euros. Credibility. Validation. Focus. Enthuziasm. Vibe. Momentum. And that’s just to name a few.

If I think about the progress we’ve made in just 8 months, I still can’t believe it. We went from a company with one product and no real direction or business model, to a company with two products, a kick-ass business model, a few customers eager to try it out and, if that’s not enough, we now have Seedcamp on board.

To sum up, I strongly encourage every startup out there to apply to Seedcamp. It will really put your business on steroids and take you to a whole new level.