Meaningfully Impacting the Economy in The Philippines: John Jonas, CEO of OnlineJobs.ph (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: Tell me about the timeline. How long did it take you to experiment enough to arrive at this stable conclusion that you could get a virtual assistant?

John Jonas: I don’t know if there was a timeline of when I realized it. The whole thing was just a leap of faith. I didn’t know they were going to help me. I worked with other people. It hadn’t worked out.

Meaningfully Impacting the Economy in The Philippines: John Jonas, CEO of OnlineJobs.ph (Part 2)

John Jonas: I was getting good at SEO. I built this website. A week later, I made $50 in one day. I remember jumping around the house. I had this tiny 2-bedroom house. It was 900 square feet. I was jumping around the house with my wife because we made $50.

I built more of them. I recognized that these weren’t adding value to anybody. These aren’t doing any good. This isn’t going to last forever. I started learning more.

Meaningfully Impacting the Economy in The Philippines: John Jonas, CEO of OnlineJobs.ph (Part 1)

If you haven’t already, please study our Bootstrapping Course and Investor Introductions page. 

John has built an online job portal specifically focused on the Philippines. Very interesting story of how one entrepreneur has held steady his priorities and built a terrific lifestyle business! Kudos!

Sramana Mitra: Let’s start at the very beginning of your journey. Where are you from? Where were you born, raised, and in what kind of background?

Capital Efficient Entrepreneurship: Glamping Hub CEO Ruben Martinez (Part 5)

Sramana Mitra: What about number of travelers? Are we looking mostly at couples traveling or are we looking at group travel?

Ruben Martinez: Our demographic is between the ages of 25 and 42. There really is something for everybody. We do get a lot of families and couples, and ladies weekend and solo trips. Really because of the variety of accommodations, you can find something at your price point within your area.

Capital Efficient Entrepreneurship: Glamping Hub CEO Ruben Martinez (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: What did you see on the horizon that if you could do that, it would move to the next level?

Ruben Martinez: Some of the strategy was built around normalizing the word glamping itself. Anytime somebody says glamping, they’re going to list out their thoughts. Their thoughts are probably different from everybody else’s. This idea of unique outdoor experiences was still new.

Capital Efficient Entrepreneurship: Glamping Hub CEO Ruben Martinez (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: What about financing? Did you bootstrap it? How did you get it off the ground?

Ruben Martinez: At the very beginning, it was bootstrapped. It took about two years, more or less, before we got our first angel round. We had a small round that allowed us to invest in a little bit of technology and hire a few people.

Bootstrapping First from Colorado, Then Scaling with VC Funds: Faction CEO Luke Norris (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: What does this do to your revenue? You’re approaching $20 million in revenue and you’re facing competition. What happens? How does the revenue change?

Luke Norris: At this point, the revenue started to flatten a little. We’re growing but we’re not growing anywhere near what we used to. We’re still finding our way on how to position this complex product.

Capital Efficient Entrepreneurship: Glamping Hub CEO Ruben Martinez (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: What was the spark for the business?

Ruben Martinez: The idea of Glamping Hub came from the simple fact that nobody was representing unique outdoor accommodation online. Everybody has gotten into hotels, apartment rentals, and condo rentals.