How Dude Perfect created a content driven brand?
This week I am curious about how Dude Perfect created a content driven brand? Dude Perfect is a YouTube channel with 60M subscribers and 1.5 billion views. They also have their own Mobile App where users can watch videos, play games and purchase merchandise. They have written a book, have invested in a Pickle ball team, a Premier League team and are currently building their $100M theme park in San Antonio, Texas.
So how did a YouTube channel started by five college roommates build an empire?
The Founders and the Origins
Dude Perfect was started by five Texas A&M roommates - Tyler Toney, Twins - Coby and Cory Cotton, Cody Jones and Garret Hilbert. The dudes had Christian upbringing, played sports growing up, were looking for like minded individuals to hangout with and they hence decided to live together.1
They were quite competitive and would play crazy games after classes. One afternoon, the roommates decided to bet each other sandwiches on whether they can make impossible shots and decided to film these trick shots. They uploaded the video on YouTube, sent it to their friends and families and the video went viral. They became an overnight sensation and were even invited to Good Morning America.
They started shooting even crazier trick shot videos and hence the brand Dude Perfect (DP) was born.
Quitting jobs and going full-time
During the initial days, the dudes brought complimentary skills to the table. Tyler Toney was the group’s de-facto leader and was seen in most videos. Coby and Cory were the marketing geniuses who edited videos and also created their first video game. Cory also wrote a book called Go Big, where he shared the DP story and their business strategy.2
The dudes were living in different cities, had full-time jobs and some of them had even gotten married. Coby and Cory were running DP full-time and would travel four hours to Dallas to meet other guys and shoot videos every other Monday. The DP Youtube channel at that time had 1M subscribers and was doing fairly well with branded deals and celebrity videos.
This part-time content creation was getting stressful to manage and at a point the dudes decided to quit their jobs and focus solely on creating content. Things just skyrocketed henceforth.
Diversifying content beyond Trick Shots
The dudes then started partnering with more brands and celebrities alike. It was just a flywheel where they were creating crazier videos, more people were watching their videos, they were getting more attention, more people were getting associated with them and they were creating crazier videos.
DP started diversifying from trick shots and created different types of contents such a stereotype series to act out common day occurrences, an overtime segment with different fun challenges and an absurd recurd segment where the dudes try to break random Guiness world records.
Since Christian values were at the very essence of Dude Perfect, they made a conscious decision to make family friendly content and also to stay away from alcohol partnerships. On the contrary, they do have content with different types of guns and have hunting videos as well.
Owning the platform
As their brand recognition grew, the dudes made a decision to create their own Mobile App. Their members can watch videos on the App along with YouTube and other platforms. The App also allows DP to personalize content, own the advertising funnel and also allows them to make money off subscription fees. Moreover, users can play games and engage more interactively with the brand.
Merging the online world with the offline world
The dudes had their content game going strong and it was also time to conquer the offline world. It started with the Pound It Noggin Tour, where they did a live entertainment tour by touring 20 cities. This was followed by the dudes traveling around the world shooting bucket list videos.
They then announced a $100M theme park HQ in partnership with San Antonio based Architecture firm, Overland Partners. Visitors can try their own trick shots and create their own content alongwith other DP specific experiences.
The dudes also invested in a Pickle Ball team and a Premier league team, which not only creates more content creation opportunities for DP, but also brings American audiences to Premier League.
What could be next for Dude Perfect?
The dudes already have a loyal audience, consuming whatever DP releases and they are just going to bank on that by doing more partnerships and releasing even crazier videos. They are probably going to double down on gaming and launch new games on their Mobile App or on VR platforms.
The number of eye balls in US are limited and the viewership can reach a plateau. I wouldn’t be surprised if Dude Perfect starts collaborating with Indian stars or content creators to start attracting the 1.4 billion Indian eyeballs. As Major League cricket is picking up in the US, I can foresee a cricket trick shot video series with something like a Texas Super Kings. Just imagine what a video collaboration with MS Dhoni could do?
If I have to put it in simple words, Dude Perfect is just a group of friends with similar values having fun. Perhaps, its a classical example of - If you keep on doing what you like doing long enough, success will follow?
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So this week, I was curious about How Dude Perfect created a content driven brand? Do subscribe to my blog to read about different things I am curious about every week. My name is Kushal and I currently work as a Senior Product Manager at SoFi. I also do writing, quizzing, podcasting and standup comedy for fun.