All Eyes on Paul Amorese (Rhythmic Pulse Music)
Written by: Rhythmic Pulse Music
Thank you for sharing your insights about Buddisystems and your journey as an entrepreneur. It’s clear that your passion and drive have played a significant role in shaping the company. I’d like to delve a bit deeper into your experiences and the development of Buddisystems.
You mentioned that your initial inspiration for Buddisystems came from your experiences in commercial film production. Can you share some specific challenges or pain points you encountered during that time that made you realize the need for a solution like Buddisystems? Were there any particularly memorable incidents that drove the point home?
Absolutely. In film production, especially commercial film production, you have only a few weeks to start and complete a project with so many moving parts. Still to this day, producers and production managers are still using spreadsheets, Dropbox folders and paying people via ACH for things. It started to dawn on me back in 2018 that people needed to be paid faster and the process of booking needed to be streamlined. I started conceptualizing a few project management tools and testing them with friends in the space and things gradually turned into what is now Buddisystems.
As a producer and former production manager, one of my least favorite moments in the process was always in booking people. I would need to call someone for their availability and they would sometimes not promptly respond because they were working on other jobs.. It forced me to be attached to my phone waiting for that one person. Once they would respond and tell me they CANNOT do the job, I would need to try my next favorite freelancer for that same job. Again, waiting on them. If they would get back to me and tell me they were on hold for another job, I would have to try yet another person for safety. I always found this process to be wildly wasteful of time and energy and was always something I thought could be done better.
That’s why one of the first features we created on Buddisystems was the booking system where you could choose to create job offers for your top 3 favorite freelancers and the system would do the waiting and reaching out for you based on the responses from the freelancers until the position was booked.
As you transitioned from the idea stage to the actual development of the Buddisystems platform, what were the most significant challenges you faced, and how did you overcome them?
The biggest challenges are always time and money. In software development, it takes a lot of time, energy and willingness to fail before you can see things come to fruition and many times they are not the way you originally imagined. We tried desperately to think of every obstacle before building. No matter if it was us guessing or doing alpha testing with people in film, we would get started building a feature and would almost 100% of the time find a roadblock in development somewhere and have to pivot.
If I could go back, I would have read the books “The Lean Startup” by Eric Ries and “Traction” by Gabriel Weinberg sequentially. Having the knowledge from these books would have made us take a slightly different approach to things when building. I can’t say if it would have brought us anywhere different to where we are today but I can say we may have saved a few bucks in the process.
Overall though, each challenge we have faced has ultimately brought us closer to a product that is stronger yet slightly different to our original idea. Then, once it’s out there, the beauty of testing the product with customer feedback and understanding what people actually want is truly invaluable.
The name “Buddisystems” is quite unique and carries a meaningful definition that resonates with your mission. Can you tell us more about how you settled on this name and what it means to you and your team?
We originally started the company as Benji (short for Benjamin Franklin on the $100 bill). Because we ran into some legal issues from a mishap with trademarking, we were forced to change the name to something else. After weeks of trying out new names, we landed on the name Buddy bit it wasn’t available and felt it needed a little help from another word. We workshopped a bunch of combinations and when looking at the definition for the Buddy System,(a cooperative arrangement whereby individuals are paired or teamed up and assume responsibility for one another’s instruction, productivity, welfare, or safety.) we found it was the perfect mix for our mission of helping companies and freelancers to work together for a common goal.
You mentioned the satisfaction of running your first successful job through the platform. Could you provide more details about that experience and the impact it had on your vision for Buddisystems?
It felt thrilling, scary and vulnerable all at the same time. As soon as we had people signing up and using the wallet, we were stunned at how easy and fast people were able to use it. We had hoped for people to have a smooth experience but I think we surprised ourselves at how fast and easy it actually was. Immediately, we had a shortlist of things we wanted to add or tweak but the core of it was working and that was one of the most momentous occasions in this whole process. I think any founder would tell you, it’s a truly special moment when your idea is happening in real life and people actually LIKE using it!
Moving away from business, it’s interesting to learn about your involvement in music. Can you share a bit about your musical journey and how it may have influenced your entrepreneurial spirit or the development of Buddisystems?
I had a wonderful career in music and learned some of the most essential skills in life that have shaped my life to this day. Everything from learning how to give myself time to learn music to when I needed to promote my own music all the way to realizing that most musicians don’t have much desire to be entrepreneurs.
When I made the move to New York City, I had the opportunity to play as a session musician, a bandleader and hired gun. Through all of my experiences in these cases, I had to go through a crash-course in business for myself. Everything from meeting people, to getting to know who was good for which gigs and recommending people of course.
As I was getting hired and also hiring others, i was finding that I would get paid all different ways. At the time there wasn’t Venmo or Zelle so I would get payments in cash, check or ACH and it was usually a major hassle. I recall getting a check that the bank wouldn’t let me cash because the person paying me didn’t have the correct date. Of course that was the check I was going to use to pay rent so I was late on that payment and it would throw my whole month off. The mishaps would go on and on… cash miscounting and not realizing until I got home; getting my stick bag stolen with my night’s pay in it, giving someone my wrong bank details and delaying the payment process even more.
When Venmo finally did come out, I was doing a lot of bandleader gigs and I would be limited in how much I could pay out to people at one time. I recall telling people “Don’t worry, I’ll pay you right after the gig” and then needing to come back and tell them that Venmo wouldn’t let me send it which sounded like a terrible excuse. “But I have the money I swear!!”.
Your potential autobiography title, “Life without the Degree,” hints at an intriguing story. Could you elaborate on what this title represents and any life lessons you’ve gained from your journey?
Growing up, there was a huge emphasis on college amongst myself and my peers and it was assumed that if you were a college dropout or worse, a college dropout musician, you were most likely going to fail at life unless you had a family business or were already succeeding at a young age. I was neither of those but I had a fire that fueled me to keep going and I just went without a net. For some people, college is essential, for others, going into a trade is the way to be.
To try and say this without being cliche is difficult but for me; I just followed my instincts and went all-in. I didn’t care what people thought and just decided to go into the grind really, really hard. I did whatever it took to get to my next step and some moments in life were really scary while others were unbelievably memorable, positive and life-altering. If I could offer any advice as I reflect on my own personal experiences, I would share that in order to truly get what you want, you need to just do what your gut tells you and actually follow through… even if it’s not your best performance. You learn so much more from failing than you do from not trying, especially if you don’t know where to start. Get out there and find people to ask, talk to as many different professionals as possible and just start anywhere. You will probably fail a lot but you will also win and likely win big! Just don’t stop no matter what. It’s all true.
Lastly, if we were to consider the future, where do you see Buddisystems heading in the next few years?
Are there any exciting developments or projects on the horizon that you can share with us? Buddisystems has a very exciting future and I feel very optimistic on where it’s headed. I wish I could say I could clearly see what is going to happen in the next few years but really, I think it’s going to be better than I could imagine.
Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing more about your entrepreneurial journey and the growth of Buddisystems.
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Buddisystems is here to make your music journey smoother, more efficient, and more rewarding.
