Hulu CEO Jason Kilar shares story with business students before public lecture

Chapel Hill, N.C. — What is Hulu and is it really an evil plot to destroy the world?

These and other questions were answered Oct. 14 when UNC-Chapel Hill alumnus Jason Kilar, CEO of online video company Hulu, shared details of the company's rapid rise and stunning success with more than 100 undergraduate entrepreneurship students.

"Our rallying cry is to deliver services that users, advertisers and content owners unabashedly love," Kilar said. "Everything we do must be stunning."

Kilar, a 1993 graduate of UNC's School of Journalism and Mass Communications, visited UNC to deliver the school's Roy H. Park Distinguished Lecture. He spoke first to students in the Global Ventures and Introduction to Entrepreneurship classes at the invitation of professor Ted Zoller, executive director of the Center for Entrepreneurial Studies.

Ahead of the big wave

Hulu was founded in 2007 as a joint venture of News Corp, NBS Universal, the Walt Disney Co. and Providence Equity Partners to deliver video content online. In less than two years, the company grew from zero to 140 million users, two to 100 partners, 12 to 200 advertisers and zero to 143 employees.

Kilar showed students the 60-second television ad featuring Alec Baldwin and "the evil plot to destroy the world" tagline that aired twice during the 2009 Super Bowl. Each ad cost $2.5 million, Kilar said, but Hulu's business rose 60 percent as a result of that premium exposure.

Hulu was founded to get ahead of "the big wave" of video on the Internet to take advantage of its momentum. In September alone, 21.4 billion video streams occurred on the Internet, making online video a top growth sector.

"Media is an impulse business," said Kilar. "Powerful things happen when you make it easier to consume."

So, the company's mission is: "Helping people find and enjoy the world's premium video content when, where and however they want," he said.

Company culture of obsessing, innovating is key

Hulu was named the No. 1 product of 2008 by PCWorld and one of the top five inventions of 2008 by TIME Magazine. While such accolades are exciting, Kilar said, he measures the company's success by the fact that its content partners are seeing a dramatic lift in business, advertising demand has exceeded all expectations and the site now has 38 million users per month.

Kilar believes world-class companies have one common factor — an extremely strong company culture. He attributes that belief to his short but powerful experience at Disney.

"Disneyworld was different than any other amusement park because Disney was obsessed with quality, design and spotlessness," said Kilar. "Even the street sweepers at Disney were considered critical to the company's success." Walt Disney himself stood for this high level of quality in every detail and every aspect of the park, Kilar said.

Using Disney as his model, Kilar set to work establishing a strong identifiable company culture for Hulu that he describes as one of obsessing over details and relentless innovation based on listening to customers and taking quick action.

While Hula's online users are the company's most obvious customer, Kilar said, the company must also serve content owners and advertisers, which can be tricky. "We can't focus on just one customer base. The needs of all three must be considered in everything we do.

Brainspray of awesome quality

The results of Hulu's obsessive culture are visible on its Web site, which offers a number of innovative options for users. Hulu users can choose what type of advertising they see, which Kilar says pleases both users and advertisers. Thumbnail photos on the site change according to each user's search criteria.

"Users love it because they control the experience," Kilar said. "Advertisers love it because the ad targets the right customer and also causes that customer to engage with the ad."

Such attention to detail prompted one early Hulu user to e-mail with positive feedback, describing the site as "a brainspray of awesome quality." The company quickly adopted the term as a motivational theme for employees.