Blipp Business Start Up

IW: We’ll start with the easy questions. Tell me a little about yourselves. EL: Well, I’ve always been a creative person. In fact, when I was younger, I wanted to be a comic book artist. Having traditional Korean parents though, that idea didn’t last very long. Instead, I went to the University of Western Ontario to study economics. I graduated, found a job, and paid my dues. From there, a coworker of mine recommended a book, “Hey Whipple, Squeeze This” [by Luke Sullivan]. After reading it I was inspired – I knew then I wanted to go back to school and study advertising. So that’s what I did. I went to Seneca College and studied creative advertising. After a year of studying harder than I ever had in university, I found myself freelancing and making a decent income helping people with their branding strategies. I discovered I had a knack for helping small companies get noticed and devoted my attention to it. The money was good, the work was gratifying, but I needed more. I don’t know if what I was looking for was more experience, or more education, but I think I found it while working at an events place, which is where I met Colum. He’ll tell you, within minutes of meeting each other, we were already brainstorming ideas for a better future! CD: [ Chuckles] Aye. I met Gino at work and yes, we started hatching plans to take over the world only minutes after being introduced. Within days we had developed

plans on how we could streamline some marketing processes and six months later we decided on a name for our new venture. Every day we come up with new marketing ideas and one of these days you might just see one of these ideas brought to life… Stay tuned.

But, back to your original question, as a kid I wanted to be a professional soccer player, but when it became brutally evident that that was never going to happen, I thought about becoming a bank robber [whisper] too dangerous, or possibly joining the Irish army [sigh] but my ma wouldn’t allow me, so I reluctantly went to college to drink and party! EL: [ To Colum] You should mention how university is free over there. It’s really not fair. CD: Okay, university was free [Laughs]. I actually got a government grant also. In essence, I was paid by the government to drink, have fun and get ‘educated’. I struggled through college with hangovers, eventually scraping a degree together and then did a post-graduate degree in Business with a focus in Marketing. My Interest in eMetrics and particularly with Google AdWords, SEO, and Analytics came when I was turned down for a job I really wanted. Apparently it came down to me and two