Vitalii Romanchenko, the CEO and Co-Founder of Elai.io, is a seasoned professional with more than 10 years of experience in Product and Project Management. In his career, he has gained vast experience building teams, helping companies reach millions in revenue, working with different products, and launching new features. After working for world-famous brands and companies, he has decided to build his own start-up, using all of his knowledge and learning more along the way.
Please tell us a little bit about your business – what is Elai.io all about?
Elai.io is an online text-to-video solution that allows you to create tailored AI videos with a presenter just from text. In this powerful SaaS solution for video creation, there are 65+ languages accessible for translation and over 20 digital avatars to pick from. Using the Elai builder, you can create video slides with text, audio, media, animations, and other elements that are fully customizable to fit your needs. What is more, there is an opportunity to request your own digital avatar or the cartoon avatar of the company’s mascot.
With Elai, you can convert any text into a video in a short amount of time. Using this leading platform for generating AI-generated video content, companies are now able to personalize their video content quickly and overall get a more impressive result. Elai has the potential to fundamentally alter the video production industry by fusing an effective production pipeline with engaging content.
Elai’s solution is advantageous for any business that uses video materials. These include but are not limited to explainer videos, employee onboarding, e-learning, e-commerce, corporate communications, product presentation, chatbots and more.
Elai platform fully solves the problem of the expensive, time consuming and inflexible process of video production. Now, everyone has the opportunity to create professional videos with AI-powered digital humans and voiceover in minutes, no special skills required.
Tell us a little bit about your background and how you started your company.
I have more than 10 years of experience in Product and Project Management, leading software product development for well-known companies and brands. During my career, I have managed to work with numerous products, make millions in revenue for the companies, launch new features and build top-performing teams. After building a successful career, I have decided to focus on my own startup, which helped me to bring my skills and experience to a whole new level.
I knew that I wanted to build a product that is fresh and impressive. However, before Elai.io came around, I created several products that did not last. It taught me more than anything ever could. I have gained new priceless experiences and felt hopeful.
The idea came up quite spontaneously. I was talking to Alex, my Co-Founder, who was fond of playing around with different Machine Learning solutions at the time. There it was: my desire to build a product that pushes the limits of modern technology met his passion for everything innovative.
The video creation process, but futuristic. Why not bring the future into today, we thought? No more cameras, long shooting hours, post-production.
The idea captured us both completely. We did our research and started right away.
What would you say are the top 3 skills needed to be a successful entrepreneur, and why?
- Creativity. To be successful you have to be able to think out of the box; a lot of times you have to be able to come up with creative solutions in order to overcome challenges and fix non-standard issues.
- Communication. It is an important skill in every aspect: from being an inspiring leader to networking, to negotiations, to raising investments, and more.
- Resilience. This skill needed to be able to transform failure into success. Put it this way: it helps form the understanding that certain issues and problems are unavoidable, but they should not take control and move you into a negative mode. Resilience allows you to be in control of any situation and treat challenges as opportunities.
What are your plans for the future, and how do you plan to grow this company?
We are currently known as a service for creating videos with AI avatars. To use Elai, our users only need a simple video script, and the platform provides the rest. We are also planning to be a number one company in the text-to-video segment. For instance, generating a video from a blog post link or from a link to a product on an e-commerce site. This way, users will only have to paste a link — everything else will be handled by Elai.io. We are the pioneers of this kind of solution.
We are also developing in the cartoon avatars niche and constantly improving existing functionality.
How do you separate yourself from your competitors?
- We have a unique feature that allows users to generate a video from just a link to an article.
- We have a narrow focus on locations such as LATAM and Central Europe, but we have clients worldwide.
- We also provide custom cartoon avatars for our users. We only need an image to develop one, and we can even help with the image creation.
- We also have an auto-translation feature, so video can be translated in one click into one of 65 available languages.
What were the top three mistakes you made starting your business, and what did you learn from them?
- Hired the wrong person. It was a huge lesson for me, as in my case this person turned out to be a fraud and I didn’t notice it from the very start, as I tend to trust people. Now, I still believe that it is important to trust your team, but I also look at the results and stay vigilant.
- Not paying enough attention to data. At the very beginning, me and my co-founders were pushed by our gut feeling. Well, in our case it even worked for some time, but it is certainly not the best approach. Data is important. However, be cautious that data is not the only thing to take into account when making decisions.
- Focusing on delivering features versus clients’ feedback. We didn’t gather enough customers’ feedback when we just started and it is something that should be done as it might lead to great insights.
Tell us a little bit about your marketing process, what has been the most successful form of marketing for you?
Nothing special actually. Just common things like the word of mouth, SEO, and personalized outreach.
8. What have been your biggest challenges and how did you overcome them?
Finding team members; keeping focus with an overwhelming amount of tasks.
What was your first business idea and what did you do with it?
It was a custom software development company where we were providing web development services.
If you started your business again, what things would you do differently?
Move fast (even faster) and break things.
What are the top 3 online tools and resources you’re currently using to grow your company?
- I use Google Analytics to analyze the data;
- Trello to keep track of tasks and make sure that we as a team are moving towards our goals and there is a transparency among team members;
- Notion to keep things organized.
What’s a productivity tip you swear by?
Decompose big goals into small achievable tasks for each day and track them on the board.
There are plenty of tools that might be used including Jira, Trello, Asana — even Google Keep can work.
The idea is to plan your activities, have Acceptance Criterias for tasks and closing tasks every day. A really important thing to mention here is that the list of tasks should be manageable. Do not put everything that you have in mind out there, focus on what is important and prioritize accordingly.
What helps you stay driven and motivated to keep going in your business?
Seeing the results or our efforts and celebrating all accomplishments, even small ones, is what helps me and my team to stay motivated and driven.
Also, my family is driving me as I understand that I’m building a better future for them.
What valuable advice would you give new entrepreneurs starting out?
Know your market. You have to do your homework: research the market, do competitors analysis; understand what would be your unique value proposition. You can create a Lean Canvas and a Value Proposition Canvas to get a helicopter view of where you are and what you want to achieve. Try to create a prototype and test whether you’ll be able to get the first customer.
Deliver often — start with an MVP version and improve it incrementally. Introduce new features as soon as they are ready and see how your customers react.
Listen to your customers. Identify your main customers and listen to their feedback. Make sure that it is easy for them to share their thoughts. You might want to do a survey. In this case, a few short surveys is a better option than one long list of questions;
Avoid sunk cost fallacy. If you see that your strategy is not working, do not be afraid to pivot/abandon it. Do not spend even more money and effort on something that has already proved to be the wrong approach/strategy/product only because you have already invested heavily in it. It will only lead to disappointment at the very least.
What is your definition of success?
Freedom to do what you like and not be limited by someone else’s opinions, finances, or anything else.
How can readers get in touch with you?
You can connect with me and my team through the Elai.io website. You are also welcome to follow Elai.io on LinkedIn, and Youtube.
You can reach me personally on LinkedIn or Twitter.
