From email blasts to beggy tweets stating ‘One day I’m going to interview @jamaledwards #SelfBelief ‘ – it’s FINALLY here, LEGIT and OFFISH. Everyone I give you…An interview with THE Jamal Edwards.

After being given a basic video camera as a Christmas present at aged 15, with no formal training Jamal started filming friends rapping and singing and uploading the video’s to his YouTube channel – SmokeyBarz. With much persistence, word spread like wild fire gaining the channel hundreds and thousands of hits and now…

At 24, Jamal is a self-made multimillionaire and owner of SBTV, a broadcasting company also renowned as the UK’s leading online youth broadcaster. With millions of hits and features from the biggest names in entertainment and various other industries’ (Will Smith, Kendrick Lamar, Usain Bolt, Ed Sheeran, Kelly Rowland – you name it!); SBTV has led Edwards from a West London council estate and retail job in Topman to the front row of London Fashion Week and now he’s even designing a hat range for Topman!

A friend of Richard Branson, Edwards certainly knows how to graft; from YouTube partnership rejection to standing outside events for hours on end hoping to interview celebrities, he has turned a hundred pound hobby into ‘The Teen Dream’.

Jamal now stands as an ambassador for The Princes Trust, and when he’s not helping others or taking fans to parties, he has a spare 5 minutes after his stage appearance at the MADE Entrepreneur Festival 2014 to sit down and have a talk with me! 

 

Your now 24 with a multimillionaire business underneath your belt. How has the road to success elevated you as a person?
The road to success has it’s highs and lows, there are times when you think ‘let’s be honest I can’t be assed to do this anymore, it’s long’and there are times when it’s amazing. For example, a low might be I want to video someone but they are taking forever to get back to me and a high may be that SB.TV has hit 250 million views on YouTube. The road to success for me has been quite a contrast.

You talk a lot about self-belief being an important part of the entrepreneurial journey. What does this statement mean to you?
Self-belief is about not giving up and believing in yourself enough to do something and change whatever scenario you want. It’s quite random that it’s ‘SB’ TV, it was originally ‘Smokey Barz TV’,but yeah it’s a massive thing and I’m even going to get a tattoo.

Previously you have spoken about being inspired by the work rate of your Mom (Brenda Edwards) and step-father. How important do you feel it is for parents to encourage their children?
I think it all starts with encouraging children. I went on BBC 5 Live this morning and they were talking about the role of teachers, students and head teachers – I believe that it doesn’t start at school, it starts at home so we shouldn’t be blaming teachers. It’s up to parents to empower their kids and make sure they have the right frame of mind when they are going into school.

Speaking of encouragement, last year you published a self-help e-book (Self Belief The Vision). What is the concept behind it?
Self-Belief The Vision is an acronym for SB.TV and I wanted to put stories in there of the up’s and down times and give people realness and try and help them to realise their dreams. I still get tweets today with people saying ‘I love your book, it’s helped me out so much.’ Or ‘You’ve changed my life.’ For me, this is overwhelming and surpasses anything. I just wanted to give something back.

“I still get tweets today with people saying ‘I love your book, it’s helped me out so much.’ Or ‘You’ve changed my life.’ For me, this is overwhelming and surpasses anything.”

You seem to be a guy who is always keen to help, especially your fans -  *cough *cough ‘The Mobo Awards Nomination Party.’ I remember you once talked about “re-writing the rules”. Can you elaborate on this?
Oh sh*t you’ve done your research! I just like to give back, I’ve been blessed to be in the situation I’m in, so if I can give my supporters a taste of what my life’s like I’ll do it, so I just tweeted ‘Who wants to come Mobo nominations with me tonight?’So I took them there and they got pictures with people like Fazer, Dappy, Jourdan Dunn was there, everyone was there. I just thought it was good, and they were like ‘Woah, this is the best night of my life.’ I’m just random like that, I’m a people’s person.

What have been the highlights of hitting the stage as a keynote speaker at the MADE Festival 2014?
It’s been good to share my story with people that may not have heard of me and people that have heard of me; and I’m in Sheffield as well, I’ve never been to Sheffield before, I like to spread out all over the UK, it’s good to do stuff out of London. Everyone focuses on London but there are other parts – Birmingham, Manchester, York, Leeds, Nottingham, Glasgow, Luton, Redding, Norwich, and Norfolk – there are lots of places doing their thing as well.

What advice can you give to aspiring video producers?
Don’t be afraid of whatever equipment you have. YouTube is open to all types of video’s, a lot of video producers are afraid that they don’t have the best equipment, but whatever you have whether its your phone or flip camera just do your thing and try your best.

What advice can you give to a Skool Girl?
Believe in yourself and don’t let anyone else tell you anything different. Don’t let anyone else put you down, there’s going to be a lot of talk in the playground with people saying ‘you can’t do this, you can’t do that’, but forget that.

(Cover & feature image via: tumblr)