Ep 55: Karl Mak (Co-Founder, Hepmil Media Group - SGAG, MGAG, PGAG) - Running a Meme Business - a podcast by Ling Yah
from 2023-12-13T20:10:48.958577
Karl Mak is a Singaporean entrepreneur and co-founder and CEO of HEPMIL Media Group: a holding company that owns SGAG, MGAG, PGAG, SGEEK and HEPMIL Creators’ Network.
If you’re a fan of memes, then you’re in for a treat because that is precisely what HEPMIL specialises in!
Karl shares how he almost became a professional swimmer, how he built a flourishing real estate career while in school, his experiences (and failure) with his first startup & how he ended up co-founding SGAG with Adrian Ang, whom he had first met back in 2005 in junior college.
Highlights:
- 3:32 Swimming competitively
- 9:53 Entering the real estate business
- 13:28 The gift of the gab
- 20:26 Learning from Professor Soon Loo
- 22:23 Attending a coding bootcamp to find a co-founder
- 26:26 “Crazy” things Karl did to get enterprise clients
- 28:22 Why Televate, Karl’s first startup, failed
- 33:43 Meeting Adrian & starting SGAG
- 38:27 How they come up with memes
- 40:32 The Ah Lian meme, which was picked up by mainstream media
- 42:36 Milestones to track
- 47:47 The early days of SGAG
- 49:04 Land grabbing tactics used by SGAG
- 51:42 Distinguishing SGAG from other similar pages
- 56:40 Selling vulgar T-shirts
- 59:18 How the business deal with Scoot happened
- 1:00:57 Changing the engine of a plane in mid-air
- 1:06:03 Your failure makes you more valuable
- 1:07:26 Building a creators’ network
- 1:15:58 How COVID-19 impacted Karl & HEPMIL Media Group
📍Show notes: www.sothisismywhy.com/55
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