Secret Academy Episode - Ian IppolitoIan Ippolito is a serial tech company founder and CEO. He is the creator of vWorker.com: a site which connected 150,000 employers and 350,000 remote workers around the world and made the process safe with money-back and payment guarantees. vWorker was named one of the “100 most innovative and brilliant companies" by Entrepreneur magazine, and was awarded the Inc. 5000 "Fastest growing private companies" award 4 years in a row. Ian started the company from an extra bedroom in his house and grew it to 15 employees and 11.1 million yearly revenue ($135 million total) before successfully selling and exiting in 2012 to Freelancer.com for an undisclosed price in the millions.
Before that, he created Planet Source Code, one of the 1st open-source websites on the Internet. It's currently home to millions of lines of code, hundreds of thousands of visitors a month, and winner of numerous awards including Best of the Planet People’s Choice Award, Microsoft Web Men Talking Award, Starting Point Hot Site. In his spare time he mentors entrepreneurs, supports Feeding America and enjoys spending time with his lovely wife, Elise, and their little baby boy.
- How he fell 10 times, before he learned to run.
- His background, and his start in corporate America.
- His first entrepreneurial experience as a child.
- How to make sure your tech job doesn’t steal your rights to your own business.
- The product that didn’t sell one copy.
- How to recognize your failure and move on.
- How he used forums and learned about marketing.
- How the .com crash hurt his business.
- How Microsoft destroyed his business overnight.
- The innovation of vWorker.com
- How Freelancer.com bought him out.
- How to go through an exit/acquisition.
- The power of money and the freedom it buys.
- How to know when to splurge.
- His best tips for today’s entrepreneurs.
- Why flexibility is the key to succeeding.
