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North America, Travel Startups

Create Highlight Reels of Your Trip with Potion

Today we introduce to you Shannon Broderick, co-founder of Potion, a video app that helps traveler easily make beautiful video memories of their trips.  

Shannon is a part of our Travel Massive San Francisco chapter and has kindly agreed to answer some of our questions about working as a travel startup in a fast growing industry. Here’s what she had to say:
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Who is your startup for?

Potion is perfect for people who explore life to its fullest, it is for explorers who engage in fun, social experiences and want to give others a glimpse into their lives.

What inspired you to create this startup?

We were inspired to create Potion because we wanted a way to easily capture and share highlight reels of our travels.  Videos montages can immerse you into an experience, but there wasn’t an easy way to create one.  In my own travels, I had to choose between taking a photo or shooting video (which took me out of the moment), and then edit the video in a laborious process to make it watchable. With Potion, I can just take photos and easily create video montages of those memories. We made Potion so travelers can focus on enjoying their experiences while still getting videos that capture their amazing trips.

How did you build your startup?

The two other co-founders and I met while working at a social game startup that was acquired by The Walt Disney Company.  We connected again recently and were inspired by a travel video that I had made on a trip to Vietnam and Hong Kong last year.  We decided to build a tool so anyone could easily create and share beautiful videos of their travels.  

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How is your startup disrupting the travel scene today? 

Potion is different from other video apps because it approaches video through photography, which is a much easier and more familiar behavior.  To use Potion, you take photos in the app and the app automatically records 2 seconds of video before each photo was taken.  You can loop together as many or few of these 2-second video clips as you want and add music to easily create a shareable video montage.

How did you get your startup off the ground and gaining traction?

We are only a few months old and are currently testing Potion with a small group of handpicked people (email us if you’re interested in joining trying the beta). We are focusing on travelers because we see an opportunity to build a community of awesome people exploring the world around them and sharing their experiences through video.

How is your startup changing the future of the industry or helping to make travel better?

Potion helps people capture, share, and memorialize their experiences.  We believe that videos (and specifically video montages) tell a rich, authentic story.  Being able to easily capture and share special moments in video means that people can connect with and inspire others through their experiences.

Do you have any tips for new entrepreneurs who want to create a successful startup?

Choose an area that you are authentically passionate about.  Recruit the smartest and hardest working people you know.  Build less than you think you need to start and focus on getting it into the hands of potential users within weeks.

As a startup, what benefits have you seen from being a part of Travel Massive meet-ups?

I very recently joined Travel Massive and have already been connected to several interesting travelers.  Erika Helstrom, chapter leader of Travel Massive San Francisco, has been incredibly welcoming and helpful, and has helped connect me to interesting people creating communities for travelers and travel professionals.

Here’s a little video using Potion you can check out: 

 


Travel Start-Up is a monthly series that profiles unique online travel start-ups in the Travel Massive community around the world. Connect with Shannon via Travel Massive and Instagram


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