About Me
I grew up in the northern Virginia suburbs of Washington DC. I was a skinny, scrawny, nerdy kid who was always interested in computers. Luckily, I was also interested in sports, which kept me active. I played unorganized football in my neighborhood during middle school / high school and later got into street hockey. My interest in street hockey turned into an interest in roller hockey and ice hockey. By time I was 17, I found myself playing organized roller hockey and ice hockey. I continued to play roller hockey for several years until my professional life and travel schedule became too much of a burden. My other hobbies and interests growing up included collecting football cards, collecting coins, playing video games, watching NFL football, tinkering with computers, working on cars, and racing radio control cars.
I’ve always been an entrepreneur at heart and on the day I turned 18 I started my first business. Armed with a starting capital of $200 I bought a box of business cards and a pager. My new business was called Discount Computer Consultants and I provided computer support mostly to home computer users. My business grew, mostly by word of mouth, from doing home computer consulting to helping businesses with their computing needs. One of these businesses that I consulted for offered me a full-time job as their Director of IT. The job was at a fast-growing sales organization where I felt like the opportunity to learn, not only about corporate networks, but also about corporate lifestyle outweighed my desire to own my own company. I worked in this position for seven years and the experience was invaluable. I learned how to hire people, manage people, and unfortunately fire people. I also got a feel for how larger companies work; from the inside. Learning about human resource issues, growing pains, budgets, interacting in a corporate structure, and dealing with layoffs was great real world experience.
Even though I enjoyed almost every minute of my corporate position as Director of IT, it was impossible to hold back my entrepreneurial spirit much longer. In January 2004 I discovered online affiliate marketing when checking out Party Poker’s website. Their website offered “a whopping” $75 for every player you referred to their site. At that moment I immediately had the idea of giving away a free book in exchange for someone signing up under my affiliate link. Since I had a background as an eBay power seller, I put two and two together, and listed an auction for my free book offer. This offer was very successful and it prompted me to discuss my ideas with Party Poker. At that point, they offered me a higher commission which allowed me to give away a free set of poker chips versus the meager book I was giving away originally. In 2004 and 2005 poker chips were the number one gift in the United States; everybody wanted a set of poker chips. To say the least, we were at the right place at the right time and from this idea Poker Source Online was born. Our business continued to grow which allowed us to invest in, purchase, or merge with several top online poker affiliate companies. However, by late 2010, our business and the industry evolved to a point where I was ready for a change.
On January 1, 2011 I officially got out of the online poker affiliate business and started a new company called Terran Marketing. The focus of Terran Marketing is also in the online affiliate business, however outside the online poker arena. My initial projects include working in the WordPress themes and RV affiliate spaces. My interest in WordPress themes stems from my use with WordPress over the past couple of years. We also purchased an RV in late 2010 and want to build a successful network of affiliate websites around our experiences traveling with it. As the business continues to evolve I will post updates on this page.
Ten facts about me:
- I’m originally from the Northern Virginian, Washington DC suburbs.
- I’m one of those guys who never went to college, but managed to become successful in life.
- I lived abroad for 4 years. Three years in Costa Rica and one year in the Cayman Islands.
- I currently live in Las Vegas.
- I’m the worst speller ever. THANK GOD for spell check!
- I played roller and ice hockey for several years as a young adult.
- My favorite type of dog is a German Shepherd.
- I started my first business when I was 18 (doing computer consulting).
- I do my best to eat mostly vegan, but fail often at this.
- I have two left feet and two right arms. It makes it hard to dance, do anything requiring coordination, or even walk and chew gum at the same time.
Hometown: Fairfax, VA