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Below is our recent interview with Kristopher Jones, Founder and Co-CEO at Special Guest:
Q: Could you provide our readers with a brief introduction to Special Guest?
A: Special Guest is a talent booking management platform. Special Guest makes it easy for talent (i.e. musicians, magicians, dancers, photographers, clowns, impersonators, etc) to get discovered and booked by traditional venues (i.e. restaurants, bars, clubs) and others (i.e. Mom and Dad looking to hire a Spider Man impersonator, a bride booking entertainment for her wedding, a business CEO hiring a band for a Friday happy hour at the office, etc). People can learn more on website or by downloading our app on Apple products.
Q: What makes your app a good choice for traditional venues like bars and restaurants? What are the benefits?
A: Special Guest is an end to end solution for discovering and booking LIVE entertainers. The app is free to use. Users can find talent across 16 different categories (i.e. musicians, impersonators, dancers, etc), review talent profiles within the app (i.e watch videos, read bio’s, see pictures, pricing), communicate with talent in-app, establishing a legal agreement, reading talent ratings and reviews, and making payment to talent). Booking talent outside of Special Guest is a very laborious process – Special Guest streamlines that process saving the person looking to hire talent time and money. In addition, Special Guest is a marketplace (think of it as the eBay for booking LIVE entertainers). Being a marketplace allows those looking for talent the ability to see lots and lots of options ranging from $50 all the way up to $10,000+.
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Q: How did you come up to the idea for Special Guest?
A: I’ve been an entrepreneur for over 20 years and I’ve had considerable successes, including selling my first company Pepperjam to eBay (NASDAQ – EBAY) in 2009. I’ve gone on to found and / or invest in a bunch of successful technology businesses, including ReferLocal, APPEK Mobile Apps, French Girls App, and LSEO.com. In 2016 I was approached by actor / comedian Damon Wayans, Jr. (New Girl, Happy Endings, Big Hero 6) about his vision for building a technology platform to make it easier for non-managed talent. Damon and I hit it off and we decided to co-found the app together and also serve as Co-CEO’s. We are about two years in and we are helping thousands of talented people get paid to do what they love to do.
Q: Why is it important not to fall in love with your ideas?
A: Great question! One of the reasons I’ve had so much business success is that I’ve studied (and continue to study) why certain entrepreneurs succeed while others fail. Turns out about 85% of entrepreneurs fail within the first 5 years or so of pursuing an idea. At the same time 15% or so of entrepreneurs that survive often pivot (change their idea) until they are successful. In this way ideas are not as important as execution of a business idea. That’s why I say it’s important not to fall in love with your idea. Note that I’m a very passionate person and if you met me you’d think I’m completely in love w/ the businesses I pursue. However, in truth I’m most passionate about success and in order to be successful I must be willing to modify my original idea many times in order to fund customers that fall in love with what I’m trying to build or serve for them.
Q: Kris, what advice do you have for early entrepreneurs who hope to scale up as quickly and successfully as you have?
A: Two things. First, study personal development. Make a commitment to improve yourself day in and day out. For me the biggest influence on my personal development has been Tony Robbins. Tony offers books, study materials, and conferences to help people like me and you identify areas of our live we can improve over time. This “personal development” can really help separate one entrepreneur from another. Committing to constant and never ending personal development can be a game changer and can drastically improve ones ability to be successful. Second, commit to developing fundamental business skills, such as financial analysis, sales, marketing, and performance management. Last year I did a series of 100 videos I called “Ask Me Anything” that goes into much more detail about the idea of leveraging skill development to crush it in life and business. Check those videos out here.
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Q: What are your plans for the future?
A: My core belief is that everyday is a baseline. For me that means that I take things one day at a time and focus on delivering the best version of myself possible to everything I work on (both personally and professionally). I recently won an entrepreneur of the year award, which is great, but to be honest I need to balance my business success with that of my relationship with my beautiful wife Robyn and our three kiddos. In this way I feel like I’m only getting started in terms of my commitment to personal and professional development.
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