Timothy Armoo, co-founder and former CEO of Funbyte.
timothy armoo
Timothy Armu is a 29-year-old billionaire who became wealthy after selling his influencer marketing company for eight figures, but this young black entrepreneur had to overcome obstacles to succeed.
Mr Armu, co-founder and former CEO of Funbite, comes from one of the poorest areas in south London and as a teenager lived in a council house on the borough’s Old Kent Road. He lived with his father in public housing on the fourth floor. of Southwark.
“It was the poorest place,” Almu said in an interview with CNBC Make It. “It was the height of the beef (British slang for fighting) in Peckham, Brixton and Old Kent Road, so it was the height of the gang wars. Between 2005 and 2012, South London It was the heyday of the gang.
The Trust for London has named Southwark as one of 19 boroughs with “significantly” higher levels of poverty compared to England as a whole.
Although Armu knew he was poor, he had a keen entrepreneurial spirit and managed to raise money by starting his own tutoring business at the age of 14.
He taught math to other students, and when more students asked for instruction in other subjects, he connected them with tutors he knew and received a portion of their tuition fees.
“I remember very specifically the first time we brought these two together,” he said. “Jane needed help with chemistry, so I connected her to Harry, who helped her, and I received a fee of £5 (about $6.60) for connecting Jane. Because[the business]was paying £15 an hour.”
Armoo’s entire outlook on wealth changed only when, at just 16 years old, he received a scholarship to attend a private boarding school to complete his A-levels (the US equivalent of the Advanced Placement program). did.
“I remember one day this kid came to pick me up in a helicopter,” he recalled. “It opened my eyes that there are ways to build wealth and you don’t have to be Richard Branson. There are people out there all over the world.”
He began to realize that “money was a tool” to change his life, and the quickest way out of poverty was to start his own business.
“When I grew up in that fourth-floor municipal building, I always said to myself, ‘This is temporary, this is temporary, this is temporary,'” he said. “I didn’t get to choose the situation I was in when I was 10 years old…but at least I could decide what happened in the end.”
Find out how Armoo went from living on a council estate to starting his own business and becoming a millionaire before he was 30.
Your first business doesn’t have to be a “billion dollar idea”
Armoo was 17 and still completing his A-levels when he sold his first business, an online blog called Entrepreneur Express, for £110,000 after just 11 months in operation.
“Everyone’s desire was to go to Oxbridge (Oxford and Cambridge), but my desire was just ‘I want to make money and get out of this situation’,” Armoo said.
The 29-year-old has interviewed celebrities for Entrepreneur Express, including Virgin Group co-founder Richard Branson, Alan Sugar, the face of British TV show The Apprentice, and actor James Caan, but has not blogged. It was important to monetize it. It’s a challenge.
Initially, he was preparing a print version of his blog to be accepted by the university’s society, but as the deadline approached he realized that there was not enough advertising to sustain the print version.
The young entrepreneur then turned his attention to advertising on online blogs. “This is where I succeeded,” he said.
He said his “hacking” involved distributing the blog’s content through viral social media accounts on Instagram and Facebook, including a meme page and a feel-good quote page on Instagram and Facebook. .
Armoo packages his articles into social media posts with hooks like “10 quotes to…” that drive people from the post to his site.
“There were two ways we made money. One was programmatic advertising, just banner ads, and then we sold sponsored spots to tax firms, law firms, accounting firms. so they can get a direct ROI (return on their investment).
Armoo said your first business doesn’t have to be a “billion-dollar idea.” Instead, “your first business is enough to get you on your first money ladder.”
He echoed the advice of the late investing guru Charlie Munger that making your first $100,000 is the hardest, saying, “But you have to do it.”
Armoo agrees, saying: “If you optimize for your first £100,000… if you work hard and work hard at it, life gets easier because then you know part of the strategy… now Well, at least you know that. It gives you the financial cushion to make less risky choices.”
“You can build wealth by selling your business.”
Armoo co-founded Fanbytes in 2017 with Ambrose Cooke and Mitchell Fasanya.
Tim Armoo
Armoo considers himself an early pioneer in the burgeoning creator economy industry, having co-founded influencer marketing company Fanbytes with Ambrose Cook and Mitchell Fasaniya in 2017.
Fanbytes’ goal was to connect brands and influencers to create advertising campaigns. This was a popular marketing strategy at the time when companies moved from traditional advertising to using influencers on social media to sell their products.
Their strategy has paid off, with Fanbytes gaining high-profile customers such as Nike, Samsung, Amazon and ITV, Almu said.
As reported by CNBC, a 2016 study by TapInfluence found that social media influencer marketing is 11 times more effective than banner ads on websites, and this is why brands flock to influencers. It is said that
“We saw the rise of influencer marketing in the US,” says Armoo, and decided to replicate the idea in the UK.
As an entrepreneur, you don’t always have to invent something new, but instead can “meet existing demand,” Almu advised.
The company went through various stages of “raising more and more money” until it finally raised £2m.
“The first investment was 15 grants, then 40 grants, then 120 grants, then 300 grants, then 600 grants,” Almu said.
His work with Fanbytes landed him on the Forbes 30 Under 30 list in 2021, and shortly thereafter, in October of the same year, offers started pouring in from people looking to buy Fanbytes.
He then appointed a bank to coordinate the deal with the company, and subsequently identified six companies interested in acquiring FunByte.
Armoo, then 27, and his co-founders sold Fanbytes to global digital marketing agency Brainlabs in May 2022 in an eight-figure deal, making them all multi-millionaires.
“The goal was always to make something that could be sold,” Almu said. “I spoke to this guy once, pretty early on in my journey, and he said, you can make money while running a business, but you can build wealth by selling a business. .”
Armoo always knew he didn’t want to run Fanbytes for the rest of his life.
“Funbite may have been selling shoelaces to frogs, but if we believed that this was the business we were building, with the end goal of becoming something that would allow us to achieve financial security, we would “I would still have that passion,” he said.
“I’ve never thought of myself as a black entrepreneur.”
Armoo and his co-founders sold Fanbytes to Brainlabs in May 2022.
timothy armoo
Black founders often struggle to raise funding. In fact, Black-founded startups in the U.S. raised only 0.48% of all allocated venture funding in 2023, according to Crunchbase data previously reported by CNBC.
This comes as funding for Black-owned businesses has been reduced since 2020 in the wake of the killing of George Floyd and the social justice movement that followed his death.
Meanwhile, 87% of non-white founders say they face more barriers to raising capital than 79% of white founders, according to Atomico’s European State of Technology Report 2023.
Armu said it was all a matter of perspective and that she believed being black did not hold her back.
“In a room full of white people, everyone remembered the black guy with the beard. Everyone remembers that, so to me, it makes you even more memorable. ,” he said of his experience going to events to meet investors.
He explained that you can feel insecure when you walk into a room because there aren’t many people who look like you, or you can believe that this element helps you stand out.
“I’ve never thought of myself as a black entrepreneur. I’ve always just thought of myself as an entrepreneur,” he said.
“Maybe I’m being too logical for my own good. I think, ‘Investors want to make money. This business will bring them money. I’m going to show you how to make money.’ They didn’t care if it came out of a white man’s mouth or a black man’s mouth. ”
Now a 29-year-old billionaire, Armoo is confident that this worldview “serves me well.”
