July 9, 2024 • 6 mins
Paul Corvino sits down with Rob Towles! Robert is a successful consumer product and mobile gaming entrepreneur and investor with multiple multi-million dollar exits. He has an eye for investing, analyzing trends, asset acquisition and a diverse sales and marketing background. Robert is often a lead investor in the gaming space, one franchise alone now generating 27MM MAUs and $1.2MM in daily revenue.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:02):
This is CEOs you should know.And now from iHeartMedia, here's Paul Corbino.
Today I'll be speaking with Robert Toles, the CEO and co founder of
Ink Holdings, a groundbreaking AI drivenplatform that revolutionizes how gamers transact online.
Before we start the interview, though, I'd like to have a quick,
(00:26):
fun, rapid fire Q and A. We'll get our mouths moving, our
brain's working, and you've got toanswer a question as quickly as I give
it to you. I like it. Okay, you ready, I'm ready?
Okay, summer a winter, summerTom Brady or Michael Jordan. Oh
boy, I should say Michael Jordan. So I don't make my wife upset.
(00:46):
Beatles are stones, stones, GodfatherA Star Wars Godfather. Daniel Craig
is Seoan Connery, Daniel Craig,same Taylor. Celebrity people say that you
remind them of when I was earlier. Tom Cruise, but I think I'm
I think I'm wearing that one out, and so Tom Cruise, Tom Cruise,
(01:07):
Oh no, not a scientologist.I'm not sure. I'm not sure
what's going on there. Let's getgoing out. I want to learn a
little bit more about your journey.So you were working at Costco you came
up with an idea. Yeah,working at Costco seven and a half years,
and then I started to look atwhat manager managers were making and I
thought, well, I can't youknow what am I? What am I
(01:29):
going to do? I worked myway up here. I always had these
ideas different, you know, differentideas for you know, mass adoption or
scale. You know. I wasalways a big fan of watching what Amazon
was even doing early around the twothousand, but I started getting burnout on
retail. Owned a small restaurant,was making some small investments, not a
whole lot of opportunity, entrepreneurial opportunityin the High Desert, And was actually
(01:55):
at Disneyland one day and my wife'saunt's friend and he said, hey,
you know what, you'd be reallygood in the mortgage industry. And I
thought, well, maybe I'll maybeI'll switch gears. So this was in
two thousand and four. I justquit everything I was doing, moved down
to Orange County, started you know, doing mortgages right right in time for
(02:16):
the crash, right in time forthe crash. So it had a good
like three year run and ended up. You don't really liking the space,
learned a lot about banking. Facebookstarts to get pretty powerful on the scene
two thousand and four, two thousandand five, and that's why I realized
I had a knack for building thesebig audiences. So you were helping people
(02:38):
build audiences. Yeah, yeah,how did you build your audience? The
first time I built an audience,I started running campaigns to push energy drinks,
and with affiliate codes built into Facebook, so we could track if they
started talking about an energy drink thatreally liked, we could track all the
volume of all the sales, andthat just started generating millions of dollars a
(02:58):
month during that time, coming upon twenty ten, I started to get
a lot of attention from builders inthe game space because that's how you build
audiences, especially when mobile games weresomewhat new at the time twenty ten,
it was all about building audiences andthen getting those audiences to spend money in
game transactions, in game upgrades,monthly subscription, season passes, And what
(03:23):
we started doing is giving people moreaccess, Like we created the largest bingo
game in the world, Bingo Blitzon iOS, and that was part of
INC. That was before INC.Before that was before INC, so kind
of how we got the catalyst toINC. But that game now it does
about one point two million a dayin revenue. It's over a billion dollars.
(03:46):
You started it, yes, yeah, got a lot of attention from
people in Santa Monica, a coupleguys from EA. They said, hey,
everything you're doing on Facebook by gettingaffiliate codes viral kind of how games
work, you know, people invitingaudiences for more game time or you know,
more beingo cards whatever it was.And so I started writing checks to
(04:10):
different companies in the space. Iwas really good at first with losing money
with writing checks to small two smallteams he joined the club. Yeah yeah,
but one of them ended up beinga hit, and that hit was
founded by my current co founder's namesJosh Goaz. And I just started writing
checks, start writing more and morechecks, and then by the time we
(04:31):
got down with that exit, Ihad made fifty three times my money.
And then I thought I can't everhave a real job ever again. I
mean a printing money online with meon games. This is this is wild.
So definitely a life change. Iwasn't. I wasn't almost like the
x CEO of Activision Blizzard who hadn'theld a controller in twenty five years.
(04:54):
I was kind of that guy.But what I was though, is a
human behavior color theory. I usuallytell what people are going to spend money
on in what they're not going tospend money on, and so it made
sense. Also, it's kind ofnice to come in from the outside with
being able to look at games notas a passion project, but also you
(05:15):
know, how are we going tocreate revenue? Like if we treat everything
like a startup and bootstrap and say, are we going to create something compelling
enough for the user to spend money? So that's on the ink game side.
That was kind of the catalyst comingout of Buffalo Studios and Bengo Blitz.
We said, instead of just givingpeople in game incentives for inviting the
(05:38):
world, how about we just givethem our entire marketing budget. So as
they start to onboard millions of peopleglobally to play our games, what if
we cut them in on the revenueevery time that audience spends money. So
our audiences are tied together by IDs. So this new company inc Games,
everybody has an ink ID. Soon the ink game side, with a
(06:01):
new title that we just put intobeta called price kingdoms. When people are
referring others and they're building these audiencesand they're spending money, they're actually making
money. By the second Well,Rob, I mean I could sit here
talk to you all day long,but we've got to wrap this up.
Once again. We're talking with RobertToles, CEO and co founder of Ink
(06:23):
Holdings, groundbreaking company not just withthe games that you have, but with
your platform that's revolutionizing how gamers aretransacting our lines. Been a pleasure to
have you on. Thank you somuch. This is Paul Corvino, Division
President of iHeartMedia in Los Angeles,California, thanking you for listening to another
(06:43):
episode of CEOs you Should Know.Listen to CEOs you Should Know on the iHeartRadio app
This is CEOs you should know.And now from iHeartMedia, here's Paul Corbino.
Today I'll be speaking with Robert Toles, the CEO and co founder of
Ink Holdings, a groundbreaking AI drivenplatform that revolutionizes how gamers transact online.
Before we start the interview, though, I'd like to have a quick,
(00:26):
fun, rapid fire Q and A. We'll get our mouths moving, our
brain's working, and you've got toanswer a question as quickly as I give
it to you. I like it. Okay, you ready, I'm ready?
Okay, summer a winter, summerTom Brady or Michael Jordan. Oh
boy, I should say Michael Jordan. So I don't make my wife upset.
(00:46):
Beatles are stones, stones, GodfatherA Star Wars Godfather. Daniel Craig
is Seoan Connery, Daniel Craig,same Taylor. Celebrity people say that you
remind them of when I was earlier. Tom Cruise, but I think I'm
I think I'm wearing that one out, and so Tom Cruise, Tom Cruise,
(01:07):
Oh no, not a scientologist.I'm not sure. I'm not sure
what's going on there. Let's getgoing out. I want to learn a
little bit more about your journey.So you were working at Costco you came
up with an idea. Yeah,working at Costco seven and a half years,
and then I started to look atwhat manager managers were making and I
thought, well, I can't youknow what am I? What am I
(01:29):
going to do? I worked myway up here. I always had these
ideas different, you know, differentideas for you know, mass adoption or
scale. You know. I wasalways a big fan of watching what Amazon
was even doing early around the twothousand, but I started getting burnout on
retail. Owned a small restaurant,was making some small investments, not a
whole lot of opportunity, entrepreneurial opportunityin the High Desert, And was actually
(01:55):
at Disneyland one day and my wife'saunt's friend and he said, hey,
you know what, you'd be reallygood in the mortgage industry. And I
thought, well, maybe I'll maybeI'll switch gears. So this was in
two thousand and four. I justquit everything I was doing, moved down
to Orange County, started you know, doing mortgages right right in time for
(02:16):
the crash, right in time forthe crash. So it had a good
like three year run and ended up. You don't really liking the space,
learned a lot about banking. Facebookstarts to get pretty powerful on the scene
two thousand and four, two thousandand five, and that's why I realized
I had a knack for building thesebig audiences. So you were helping people
(02:38):
build audiences. Yeah, yeah,how did you build your audience? The
first time I built an audience,I started running campaigns to push energy drinks,
and with affiliate codes built into Facebook, so we could track if they
started talking about an energy drink thatreally liked, we could track all the
volume of all the sales, andthat just started generating millions of dollars a
(02:58):
month during that time, coming upon twenty ten, I started to get
a lot of attention from builders inthe game space because that's how you build
audiences, especially when mobile games weresomewhat new at the time twenty ten,
it was all about building audiences andthen getting those audiences to spend money in
game transactions, in game upgrades,monthly subscription, season passes, And what
(03:23):
we started doing is giving people moreaccess, Like we created the largest bingo
game in the world, Bingo Blitzon iOS, and that was part of
INC. That was before INC.Before that was before INC, so kind
of how we got the catalyst toINC. But that game now it does
about one point two million a dayin revenue. It's over a billion dollars.
(03:46):
You started it, yes, yeah, got a lot of attention from
people in Santa Monica, a coupleguys from EA. They said, hey,
everything you're doing on Facebook by gettingaffiliate codes viral kind of how games
work, you know, people invitingaudiences for more game time or you know,
more beingo cards whatever it was.And so I started writing checks to
(04:10):
different companies in the space. Iwas really good at first with losing money
with writing checks to small two smallteams he joined the club. Yeah yeah,
but one of them ended up beinga hit, and that hit was
founded by my current co founder's namesJosh Goaz. And I just started writing
checks, start writing more and morechecks, and then by the time we
(04:31):
got down with that exit, Ihad made fifty three times my money.
And then I thought I can't everhave a real job ever again. I
mean a printing money online with meon games. This is this is wild.
So definitely a life change. Iwasn't. I wasn't almost like the
x CEO of Activision Blizzard who hadn'theld a controller in twenty five years.
(04:54):
I was kind of that guy.But what I was though, is a
human behavior color theory. I usuallytell what people are going to spend money
on in what they're not going tospend money on, and so it made
sense. Also, it's kind ofnice to come in from the outside with
being able to look at games notas a passion project, but also you
(05:15):
know, how are we going tocreate revenue? Like if we treat everything
like a startup and bootstrap and say, are we going to create something compelling
enough for the user to spend money? So that's on the ink game side.
That was kind of the catalyst comingout of Buffalo Studios and Bengo Blitz.
We said, instead of just givingpeople in game incentives for inviting the
(05:38):
world, how about we just givethem our entire marketing budget. So as
they start to onboard millions of peopleglobally to play our games, what if
we cut them in on the revenueevery time that audience spends money. So
our audiences are tied together by IDs. So this new company inc Games,
everybody has an ink ID. Soon the ink game side, with a
(06:01):
new title that we just put intobeta called price kingdoms. When people are
referring others and they're building these audiencesand they're spending money, they're actually making
money. By the second Well,Rob, I mean I could sit here
talk to you all day long,but we've got to wrap this up.
Once again. We're talking with RobertToles, CEO and co founder of Ink
(06:23):
Holdings, groundbreaking company not just withthe games that you have, but with
your platform that's revolutionizing how gamers aretransacting our lines. Been a pleasure to
have you on. Thank you somuch. This is Paul Corvino, Division
President of iHeartMedia in Los Angeles,California, thanking you for listening to another
(06:43):
episode of CEOs you Should Know.Listen to CEOs you Should Know on the iHeartRadio app
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