A Serial Entrepreneur’s Lessons Learned: .CLUB CEO Colin Campbell (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: How much money did it take to get this rolling?

Colin Campbell: We’ve raised $11.6 million to date. Initially, I put some of my own funds into it.

Sramana Mitra: So you did not fund it yourself? You did take financing?

Colin Campbell: I didn’t take any financing. The way it worked is each applicant had to lay down a $185,000 application fee and put their stake into the ground. You had to declare the name. If there were multiple companies applying for that domain extension, then it would go to an auction. There were multiple companies applying for the .club extension including one that had raised over $100 million dollars.

We went into an auction scenario and we were successful at winning that. Prior to winning the auction, I didn’t have enough funding myself to compete in this auction. I needed to raise money. I had to be careful. I didn’t want to let everybody know how much I was raising because I didn’t want to push the auction price much higher. I didn’t want it to get overvalued. >>>

The Story of a $9M Lifestyle Business: Kean Graham, CEO of MonetizeMore (Part 4)

Sramana Mitra: Interesting. The reason why I’m curious about what you’re describing is that I have done quite a lot of travel. I continue to work while I’m traveling. At one time, I was calling my colleague in New Jersey. I said, “Guess where I’m calling you from? I’m calling you from a cave in Turkey.”

Kean Graham: Was that in Cappadocia?

Sramana Mitra: Exactly.

Kean Graham: It’s beautiful there. Did you stay in one of those cave hotels?

Sramana Mitra: Yes. After the Europe trip, you came back to Victoria? >>>

A Serial Entrepreneur’s Lessons Learned: .CLUB CEO Colin Campbell (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: You stayed with the company for three years and that brings us to 2011, yes?

Colin Campbell: Yes. Just an interesting note about the three years is that I was working as a corporate executive in a corporate environment. It was very difficult. There was a lot of politics. I reported directly to the CEO. I had weekly meetings with the CEO. It was a very interesting time because I learned that big corporations are fearful of taking risks and being innovative.

Those who take the risk and innovate seem to get knocked out of the company. I didn’t have anything to lose. I’m an entrepreneur. Even today, Hostopia is one of their crown jewels. It was a very tough environment to be in. The day my three-year term came up, I sent a note to the CEO, “I’ve done >>>

The Story of a $9M Lifestyle Business: Kean Graham, CEO of MonetizeMore (Part 3)

Sramana Mitra: You started doing this in 2008 you said?

Kean Graham: 2010.

Sramana Mitra: In 2010, you basically worked with your prior employer and figured out how to increase their revenue. When did you add team members to this process?

Kean Graham: About the third year. For the first three years, I was outsourcing. I hired my parents part-time to do some of the reporting, but it was pretty small scale.

Sramana Mitra: Did you meet your objective of traveling during those three years and working from wherever you wanted? >>>

A Serial Entrepreneur’s Lessons Learned: .CLUB CEO Colin Campbell (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: That company was also bootstrapped?

Colin Campbell: Yes, bootstrapped. Talking about bootstrapping, I actually used some of my student loans and credit cards to start the first company. There was no funding when I started. In any case, we sold the company. My other company, Internet Direct, went public and we sold that company. It was a $180 million transaction. The partners owned 40% of the company.

It was a dial-up Internet company and we applied to the government in Canada to get a license for wireless Internet across the country. It was actually granted to us for free unlike in the United States where they auction it off. It went to over a billion dollar market cap.

Sramana Mitra: What year are we talking? >>>

The Story of a $9M Lifestyle Business: Kean Graham, CEO of MonetizeMore (Part 2)

Sramana Mitra: When you double-click down on that goal and thought about what kind of a business would fit that model, talk to me about all the different ideas that went through your mind.

Kean Graham: A lot of ideas.

Sramana Mitra: That’s precisely what I want to do. What was the process of figuring out which one of those you wanted to execute on?

Kean Graham: I was looking at the world like an entrepreneur. I was looking for problems around me which are, in turn, opportunities. There are many things offered in South America that are not offered in North America. There’s also a lot of things offered in North America that aren’t being offered in South America. There are a lot of opportunities there. >>>

A Serial Entrepreneur’s Lessons Learned: .CLUB CEO Colin Campbell (Part 1)

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

Colin, in one of his ventures, worked 10 years, and made no money when the company was exited. Subsequently, his perspective has evolved, and in this interview, he offers lessons on what to watch out for.

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

Colin Campbell: I’m actually a farmer from Canada. It was very tough work. Even though I worked on a farm, I still lived in the suburbs of Toronto. I was able to get the best of both environments. I went to the University of Toronto and graduated from there. As soon as I graduated, I went right back to working in the farm for about four to five months. >>>

The Story of a $9M Lifestyle Business: Kean Graham, CEO of MonetizeMore (Part 1)

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

Kean wanted to be able to build a digital business that he could work on from anywhere in the world, a lifestyle business that fulfils a very specific desire. Read his fascinating story, as the business has now started to scale.

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?

Kean Graham: I was born in Alberta, Canada. My family moved to a small town called Golden, BC when I was eight years old. It’s in the Rocky Mountains of Canada and they started a bed and breakfast in the mountains. We actually lived for five years on solar power. I grew up appreciating having electricity and being conservative and sustainable. From there, I went to Victoria, BC which I now call home. >>>