Timothy Armoo is the 22 year old CEO of Fanbytes, the worlds largest Snapchat influencer network helping brands like Unilever, Universal, Warner and Sony to reach Generation Z users.
Through their proprietary “Sandwich Ad” format , Fanbytes helps brands create, distribute and optimize powerful Snapchat campaigns averaging 90%+ completion rates and an average of 6% CTR.
I sat down with the young founder to find out how it all started.
What’s your story?
I had already sold a media startup at 17 which made money via boring programmatic advertising. Once I had exited that company, I was keen to find a new frontier of advertising which did not interrupt customers but actually added value.
Whilst over at my cousins, I saw how easily influenced he was by large personalities on Snapchat and realised that there needed to be a way for brands to tap into that influence.
So we created technology that helped brands to create, distribute and analyse Snapchat influencer campaigns helping the world's biggest brands like Universal, Warner, Sony, Unilever reach younger audiences on Snapchat.
In 11 short months, Fanbytes is now the worlds largest Snapchat influencer network
What’s the biggest mistake you’ve made and what did you learn from it?
My biggest mistakes often have to do with hiring and bringing on board the wrong people. Although I’ve started and sold a company prior, Fanbytes is the first where i’ve had to raise a substantial bit of money and also build out a team and I’ve made a ton of bad calls when it comes to hiring, I put this down to just a learning curve them, still only 22.
Where did the idea for your company come from? (what was the aha moment?)
Seeing my cousin’s purchasing decisions being influenced so easily by these personalities on social media and having experience with the interruptive nature of banner and display advertising I knew there had to be a better way.
Giving the fact that we now work with the world’s biggest brands I’d say that we’re on to something
What was the first step you took after you had the idea?
First thing I did was recruit cofounders and then build product. In my last company, I didn’t have a cofounder and I realised that for the emotional journey and effort that goes into entrepreneurship it’d be important to have someone to share that journey with me.
Fundamentally entrepreneurship comes down to the people and when you have a good set of people around you, you can achieve a lot.
Tell me about an accomplishment that shaped your career?
Selling my first company at 17 was a pretty surreal experience.
Winning the Black British Business Award was also very important to me as it showed I was doing something meaningful.
One achievement which really sticks to mind is the fact that in 11 short months, we now work with the world’s biggest brands and have Universal, Sony and Warner all under our belt as brands who run campaigns with us.
What’s the best advice you’ve ever received?
Everything is a process. This is how I live my life - believing that everything is the outcome of a process and all you therefore had to do is study the process, do the inputs and you’d invariably get the outputs.
I use this attitude when trying to tackle things in the business like fundraising, sales and marketing and even becoming fitter and going to the gym remaining completely objective about how I achieve results and then applying myself doggedly to optimising and improving the process because I know that by doing that, I will get the outcomes I require.