It’s everyone’s dream to become a millionaire but to accomplish it before the age of 30 is almost unheard of. Sure you have guys like Mark Zuckerberg that found the right idea and exploded but that’s not normal. I’m just an average Joe from a small coal town in West Virginia and I’ve successfully become a multimillionaire before the age of 30 (I’m 28). But how?
It was weird… When I was 13 years old I was obsessed with wanting to create a website where the content I produced in my bedroom could be viewed by people all around the world. I didn’t want to make money I just wanted people to read my shit! I thought it was AWESOME that I could influence thousands of people on a daily basis.
In 1998 I started a sports website on Geocities much like many of the early webmasters. The only money I had to invest was money I had saved in my “piggy bank” from Birthdays, Christmas, etc. I never asked my parents for help because I wanted to accomplish my online empire all by myself.
When the year 2001 came around I had developed a website alongside my brother that was reaching over 10,000 unique visitors a day. Out of the blue a very large advertiser approached us and had us sign a contract guaranteeing a monthly minimum amount of revenue all based on the number of impressions we served. Understanding this, we multiplied the pages on our website to where we eventually started to make a good bit of money.
Unfortunately the “dot com” crash killed our ad deal and we had to dip into our “reserves” to pay our $600+/month web hosting bill until we finally decided to sell and enjoy a bit of our high school years. Still not millionaires, we learned a lot of valuable lessons and continued to pursue our education as a solid backup plan.
As I began to enter my senior year of high school I decided it was time to get back in the online game and see what I could do. That moment would change my life forever…
My brother and I decided to go right back to our roots and get back into the pro wrestling industry. Since we had already had a lot of success with it, we knew it wouldn’t take much to get back to the top. A long story short, in 2003 we were once again reaching 15,000 – 20,000 unique visitors a day and had regained ad deals that provided us with revenue to pay our hosting bills and support our lifestyles.
Stemming from the “dot com crash” we both decided to pursue college degrees just incase such a catastrophe would happen again. While taking college classes during the day both my brother and I rushed to our dorm daily to make sure our websites were running flawlessly. By that time we not only owned a number of pro wrestling websites but we also owned a very popular web hosting company. It was my goal to never have to go out and get a “real job.”
The years past and we both graduated college in 2007. The day we arrived back home we immediately opened up our office where we could pursue our goals full-time and take things to the next level. Unlike many of our peers, we didn’t take a couple of weeks off to enjoy summer, we got our asses to work and did so 18 hours a day; we weren’t going to fail.
Once the year 2009 came around we had very stable lucrative businesses that were growing by the day. We didn’t have time to spend the money we were making so as soon as rent was paid we continued to invest into our online empire. Eventually we took on another partner (John Kirkpatrick) and started an international media buying company. Within the first six months we had successfully made over one million dollars in revenue. A goal many Americans dream of; we had accomplished by the age of 25.
The years passed and we all grew as businessmen going our own ways to different ventures. In 2011 I joined forces with Ralph “Ruck”Ruckman (an Entrepreneur that had already led a company to over $30 million) when we created IMGrind. Our goal was to offer a website where those that had never worked online and those that had experience making money online could come and learn from our experiences and better their skills to leverage their businesses for the future.
Another long story short, Ruck and I not only thrived with IMGrind but also developed one of the world’s largest mobile advertising agencies, Revived Media and the leading performance marketing tracking platform, iMobiTrax along with our partner Bill Bradow. While most people in the industry thought we were “selling out” to become gurus we were actually traveling the United States looking for the “best of the best” to work with that could help us leverage our businesses and develop them for the future. That’s exactly what we did.
As I write this, we’re leading the way to having one of the fastest growing companies in United States, if not the entire world. IMGrind, Revived Media, and iMobiTrax are all thriving and continue to double in growth each month. It’s hard to predict were we will be in a year from now because things are growing THAT rapidly.
But what made us different from everyone else? So many people have GREAT ideas that have the potential to be lucrative but very few people have the balls to put their ideas into an actual business plan and follow through.
It’s not easy… When I was first getting my start back in Junior High I gave up a lot of my social life. While all of my friends were out running the streets and hooking up with girls I was sitting behind my computer learning HTML. When I was in college, rather than participating in the hottest fraternity event I was in my dorm room expanding my web presence. I made sacrifices that really paid off.
I’ve taken a lot of risks throughout my career. In just the last three years I’ve moved to Florida and Missouri. I’ve had to leave all my family and friends and focus on developing my businesses. It took a lot of willpower but it was something I wanted more than anything in the world and I accomplished it. Now my goal is to become the absolute best in the entire industry and work 25 out of the 24 hours in a day to accomplish it.
America has been coined the “land of opportunity” and that’s the truth. If you’re hungry enough you can accomplish anything. It’s not easy though. You have to be willing to make MAJOR sacrifices and give up many things that are important to you. But if you really want to be successful in this country; you can be. Regardless of what you may hear or see on late night infomercials it doesn’t happen over night. It takes a lot of dedication, drive, and hard work. But you don’t have to be a rocket scientist.
In college I made Bs and Cs. Education is highly overrated. If you want something bad enough in this country and you’re willing to work for it, you will succeed. Unfortunately there will be bumps along the road and it’s likely you’ll get kicked in the ribs when your down, but as long as you don’t quit trying you can achieve the same success that I have. I wouldn’t trade a minute of my life for anything and I am always pleased to see others reach the same level of success.
It is easy to give up. Throughout my career there has been many challenges where it would have been much easier just to pack up shop and move about my way. But had I done that I would not be where I am today. Anyone out there reading this can accomplish this same success; but you have to give it your all even if it means sacrificing your 8 hours of sleep or missing the “big party.” There is nothing special about me. I just have a drive and vision that I remain focused on and fail to quit until I see everything through.
I hope this post provides you all with some serious motivation and allows you to evaluate your goals and dreams and what you’re doing to reach them. The sky is the limit. 🙂
How To Become A Multi Millionaire
Ryan Gray is the founder and CEO of NameHero, one of the fastest growing independent web hosts in the United States. Ryan has been working online since 1998 and has over two-decades experience in Internet Entrepreneurship.
Hey Ryan, I have read a lot of your posts but I must say, this post is one of your best. This has really got me motivated. Great post
Awesome post. I’m 23 in the process of setting up my own company. Not stopping till I hit that 1 million mark.
Best wishes
Sweet man, I use iMobitrax & love it BTW
This made me happy and sad simultaneously;-) Good post, good deal.
Inspiring article Ryan. Since i started on this blog less than a week ago, i have started taking my online monetization more serious. I am in the process of setting up my own company now. My first goal is to become the highest earning affiliate marketer from my country. I am serious and i’m taking in to that point.
Thanks Ryan for this post. Its truly motivating and I appreciate the modesty of its carriage. Online business can help one make so much money if the right strategies are employed. Your experience is one of the many success stories I have read. I must also add that online opportunities are helping many to become millionaires in young age 😀
This comment was shared in kingged.com where this exciting and motivating post has been shared and “kingged”
Sunday – contributor to kingged.com
http://www.kingged.com/how-i-became-a-multimillionaire-before-the-age-of-30/
Truly inspirational. Not because he became a millionaire, which is really awesome and such a climax for all their diligence, but because of all the effort he put into realizing his dreams.
It’s all about the journey, and his is worth the inspiration. Thanks!
Good stuff Ryan! Thanks for sharing some of your success tips on how to make it BIG in this game! It truly takes discipline to be able to forego the wild college parties on a Friday night to work on your websites instead.
Question…what were some of you and your brother’s criteria when seeking business partners for your various ventures? What sort of screening process did you use?
Any other insights you can share on that aspect?
Thanks,
Jerry
While I read your story got me the creeps, I have 24 years I am of Colombia in this country talk about Internet Marketing it’s like speaking in another language, I’m starting in the world of marketing of affiliate, CPA, even I can’t generate 50 dollars a day, but I’m willing to work and learn everything I need to succeed in this businessThanks a lot
Very inspirational! I started a brand new blog just because I read this and wanted to see if I could earn money online, too! Thanks for the awesome post!
A good and realistically inspiring life story. we can all learn a lot from your experiences.
thanks
Very motivational post. thanks and God bless you!
Ryan, thanks for the great post. I had a dream to become a millionaire by the age of 30 also but got distracted by other things in life. Once you get distracted, the years can slip by in a hurry.
Kudos to you for having a laser focus and busting ass day and night to make your dreams happen.
I just stumbled upon your site but plan to hang around for a while and see how much I can learn.
Thanks!
Your article was very inspiring, I just started a small online retail store, and I am working towards making it the next big thing, it has been hard so far, but i will keep working hard to make it happen. thanks 🙂
Hey Ryan,
This was one of the most BS-free pieces of advice I have come across in this field of thinking about making money. Good stuff.
Best,
RahulG