Vancouver Internet Millionaires
Vancouver, Canada connects some of the richest people on the internet. Flickr creators Caterina Fake & Stewart Butterfield , $300 million "domain name king" Kevin Ham, John Chow of TheTechZone.com, Markus Frind of PlentyofFish.com & Rosalind Gardner affiliate marketing expert. Find out how they made their fortunes......
Flickr - Caterina Fake & Stewart Butterfield - Social Media Pioneers.
Flickr - one of the most popular sites on the planet was created in Vancouver. Caterina Fake and her husband Stewart Butterfield created the site after Butterfield had a dream about a multiplayer game built around sharing photos, after a bout of food poisoning.
The idea which seemed odd at the time had a lot of merit and the pair quickly set about creating Flickr from a Vancouver, BC loft apartment. The first version was based around instant messaging, allowing users to add photos to their instant messages.
The feature that really got Flickr going though, was tagging. People were adding tags or keywords to photos to help describe their meaning. This really helped users search and find photos in a way that they really hadn't been able to do before. The idea of tagging really caught on and was one of the defining ideas of Web 2.0 and social media.
The huge user base and buzz around Flickr attracted attention from a number of companies, and numerous offers were put to the couple. Time Magazine even listed listed them in their list of the world's most influential people. They were eventually bought by Yahoo! in March 2005 for a rumoured $40 million and offered top jobs at Yahoo! to help spearhead their social networking plans.
Kevin Ham - $300 million Dot Com Mogul
Kevin Ham has a very low profile for someone that owns a good chunk of the Internet. Until recently, no one knew this Vancouver based entrepreneur was sitting on a $300 million empire.
As the owner of 100,000s of domain names, Ham is able to make $70 million a year from hosting ads on his portfolio of domains which include Hoteldeals.com as well as the more interesting God.com and Satan.com. He gets the traffic to his domains via "type in traffic" when people do a search in the address bar of their browser rather than doing a search on say, Google.
His biggest deal to date, was gaining the rights to mistyped domains that end in.cm instead of .com eg. he gets the traffic if someone types Google.cm, instead of Google.com. In what seems like a script from a movie; Ham put this deal together by visiting the Government of Cameroon in Africa and offering them a percentage of the revenue if they directed all their traffic to him. Why Cameroon?....because their country's domain names end in .cm, much like .co.uk in the UK or .de in Germany. He also plans to arrange a similar deal with Colombia, who have the prefix - .co.
You can read his full story here.
John Chow - Technology & Blogging King.
Probably Vancouver's most infamous blogger, John Chow is a man not afraid to speak his mind and not ashamed to let people know he makes a boatload of cash!
With his love of fast cars and fine dining in Vancouver restaurants, he can come across as brash, arrogant and a know it all. His enthusiasm and willingness to help others though has brought him a loyal, dedicated following.
John got started on the internet in 1999, after a series of menial jobs at McDonalds and a printing firm. His first web site was a technology site focusing on computer hardware and peripherals - The Tech Zone. I doubt even John realized at the time how big the site would become.
In the space of a few short years it has become one of the most successful technology sites on the internet with over 200,000 page views a day. With this amount of traffic in a very lucrative market, you can see how he is able to make a substantial income. Big enough to be able to put on a private party in the penthouse of the most expensive hotel in Las Vegas - The Bellagio.
Apart from his portfolio of technology sites, John Chow has become more infamous and richer through his entrance into the blogging arena. From a standing start in September 2006, he has grown his blog to be one of the most popular on the net.
As well as his outspoken views and love/hate affair with Digg users, what has been of most interest to his loyal readers has been his postings on his blog income. To John, the money he earns from his blog is miniscule compared to his technology sites, but even so, he has managed to get his earnings from his blog to a respectable $7000 a month, (see chart below).
With increasing traffic and search engine love from Google, he looks set to be on his way to further "Dot Com Mogul" success.
Markus Frind - Dating Site Supremo & Adsense Money Machine.
How would you like to earn at least $10,000 a day, working from your Vancouver apartment home, with no staff to manage or large expenses and the money just keep passively rolling in 24/7 365 days a year?
Markus Frind is a Vancouverite that is already living that dream.
Amongst the large office blocks and posh hotels in Downtown Vancouver, Markus Frind runs his site "Plentyoffish.com" from his apartment. This site is one of the busiest in the world. According to Alexa, it is the top dating site in Canada and the fifth largest in the USA (Hitwise).
Markus originally created the site as a way of learning ASP.NET - a programming platform. He quickly realized there was a market for a free dating site, as most were a paid subscription.
By offering the service for free, the site got a lot of traffic quickly and the word of mouth promotion meant that the site did not have to pay for expensive advertising and promotion. The site also managed to keep its overheads such as server costs down through a strategy of clever programming and lean site design.
When Markus added Google Adsense advertising to his site - a future millionaire was created. He has been pulling in on average $10,000 a day from advertising income. The photo below is a check he received from Google for just 3 months worth of income.
He's that famous for making money online that he was recently targeted by an extortionist - Adsense extortion scheme
Rosalind Gardner - Affiliate Marketing Expert.
Rosalind Gardner is known as one of the most influential and successful affiliate marketers in the world. She is most famous as the author of the “Super Affiliate Handbook: How I Made $436,797 in One Year Selling Other People’s Stuff Online”.
This was the bible of many a budding internet entrepreneur a few years ago and doubtless increased Rosalind's already sizable income by a few $100,000s more.
Although not strictly a resident of Vancouver - she actually lives in the picturesque town of Penticton, she spent many years working as a local air traffic controller. When she realized that the stress of the job was likely to affect her health, she started at looking at ways to make an income online.
In 1997 she began creating web sites mainly focusing on the internet dating niche. In those early days there wasn't anyone really reviewing and promoting the various internet dating sites out there. Rosalind set up a site reviewing these dating services and included an affiliate link to the sites in question which allowed her to make a commission if her readers signed up with the dating service.
This allowed her to enjoy an income of around $500,000 a year. As well as the income from her affiliate sites, Rosalind has moved into the internet marketing area, helping others to make an income online, resulting in even more success and income.
Flickr - Caterina Fake & Stewart Butterfield - Social Media Pioneers.Flickr - one of the most popular sites on the planet was created in Vancouver. Caterina Fake and her husband Stewart Butterfield created the site after Butterfield had a dream about a multiplayer game built around sharing photos, after a bout of food poisoning.
The idea which seemed odd at the time had a lot of merit and the pair quickly set about creating Flickr from a Vancouver, BC loft apartment. The first version was based around instant messaging, allowing users to add photos to their instant messages.
The feature that really got Flickr going though, was tagging. People were adding tags or keywords to photos to help describe their meaning. This really helped users search and find photos in a way that they really hadn't been able to do before. The idea of tagging really caught on and was one of the defining ideas of Web 2.0 and social media.
The huge user base and buzz around Flickr attracted attention from a number of companies, and numerous offers were put to the couple. Time Magazine even listed listed them in their list of the world's most influential people. They were eventually bought by Yahoo! in March 2005 for a rumoured $40 million and offered top jobs at Yahoo! to help spearhead their social networking plans.
Kevin Ham - $300 million Dot Com Mogul
Kevin Ham has a very low profile for someone that owns a good chunk of the Internet. Until recently, no one knew this Vancouver based entrepreneur was sitting on a $300 million empire.
As the owner of 100,000s of domain names, Ham is able to make $70 million a year from hosting ads on his portfolio of domains which include Hoteldeals.com as well as the more interesting God.com and Satan.com. He gets the traffic to his domains via "type in traffic" when people do a search in the address bar of their browser rather than doing a search on say, Google.
His biggest deal to date, was gaining the rights to mistyped domains that end in.cm instead of .com eg. he gets the traffic if someone types Google.cm, instead of Google.com. In what seems like a script from a movie; Ham put this deal together by visiting the Government of Cameroon in Africa and offering them a percentage of the revenue if they directed all their traffic to him. Why Cameroon?....because their country's domain names end in .cm, much like .co.uk in the UK or .de in Germany. He also plans to arrange a similar deal with Colombia, who have the prefix - .co.
You can read his full story here.
John Chow - Technology & Blogging King.
Probably Vancouver's most infamous blogger, John Chow is a man not afraid to speak his mind and not ashamed to let people know he makes a boatload of cash!
With his love of fast cars and fine dining in Vancouver restaurants, he can come across as brash, arrogant and a know it all. His enthusiasm and willingness to help others though has brought him a loyal, dedicated following.
John got started on the internet in 1999, after a series of menial jobs at McDonalds and a printing firm. His first web site was a technology site focusing on computer hardware and peripherals - The Tech Zone. I doubt even John realized at the time how big the site would become.
In the space of a few short years it has become one of the most successful technology sites on the internet with over 200,000 page views a day. With this amount of traffic in a very lucrative market, you can see how he is able to make a substantial income. Big enough to be able to put on a private party in the penthouse of the most expensive hotel in Las Vegas - The Bellagio.
Apart from his portfolio of technology sites, John Chow has become more infamous and richer through his entrance into the blogging arena. From a standing start in September 2006, he has grown his blog to be one of the most popular on the net.
As well as his outspoken views and love/hate affair with Digg users, what has been of most interest to his loyal readers has been his postings on his blog income. To John, the money he earns from his blog is miniscule compared to his technology sites, but even so, he has managed to get his earnings from his blog to a respectable $7000 a month, (see chart below).
With increasing traffic and search engine love from Google, he looks set to be on his way to further "Dot Com Mogul" success.
Markus Frind - Dating Site Supremo & Adsense Money Machine.
How would you like to earn at least $10,000 a day, working from your Vancouver apartment home, with no staff to manage or large expenses and the money just keep passively rolling in 24/7 365 days a year?
Markus Frind is a Vancouverite that is already living that dream.
Amongst the large office blocks and posh hotels in Downtown Vancouver, Markus Frind runs his site "Plentyoffish.com" from his apartment. This site is one of the busiest in the world. According to Alexa, it is the top dating site in Canada and the fifth largest in the USA (Hitwise).
Markus originally created the site as a way of learning ASP.NET - a programming platform. He quickly realized there was a market for a free dating site, as most were a paid subscription.
By offering the service for free, the site got a lot of traffic quickly and the word of mouth promotion meant that the site did not have to pay for expensive advertising and promotion. The site also managed to keep its overheads such as server costs down through a strategy of clever programming and lean site design.
When Markus added Google Adsense advertising to his site - a future millionaire was created. He has been pulling in on average $10,000 a day from advertising income. The photo below is a check he received from Google for just 3 months worth of income.
He's that famous for making money online that he was recently targeted by an extortionist - Adsense extortion scheme
Rosalind Gardner - Affiliate Marketing Expert.
Rosalind Gardner is known as one of the most influential and successful affiliate marketers in the world. She is most famous as the author of the “Super Affiliate Handbook: How I Made $436,797 in One Year Selling Other People’s Stuff Online”.
This was the bible of many a budding internet entrepreneur a few years ago and doubtless increased Rosalind's already sizable income by a few $100,000s more.
Although not strictly a resident of Vancouver - she actually lives in the picturesque town of Penticton, she spent many years working as a local air traffic controller. When she realized that the stress of the job was likely to affect her health, she started at looking at ways to make an income online.
In 1997 she began creating web sites mainly focusing on the internet dating niche. In those early days there wasn't anyone really reviewing and promoting the various internet dating sites out there. Rosalind set up a site reviewing these dating services and included an affiliate link to the sites in question which allowed her to make a commission if her readers signed up with the dating service.
This allowed her to enjoy an income of around $500,000 a year. As well as the income from her affiliate sites, Rosalind has moved into the internet marketing area, helping others to make an income online, resulting in even more success and income.
Technorati Tags: flickr, john chow, markus frind, plentyoffish.com, kevin ham, vancouver
posted by About Vancouver at 8:58 PM
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