Joel Comm

Joel Comm
Born Joel Comm
(1964-05-05) May 5, 1964
Chicago, IL
Nationality American
Known for InfoMedia, ClassicGames
Notable work The AdSense Code, Twitter Power, iFart Mobile
Website http://www.joelcomm.com/

Joel Comm (born May 5, 1964)[1] is an American author and Internet marketer. Comm is the CEO of InfoMedia, a social media consulting company.

After a career as a radio personality, Comm started generating revenue from his Internet business ventures. In 1995, he created WorldVillage, a virtual village that offers games and trivia competitions. He created DealofDay.com, WorldVillage's sister website, as a directory of hundreds of retailers' discounts. Comm founded ClassicGames, a family-friendly multiplayer gaming website he sold to Yahoo! in 1997 and was the precursor for Yahoo! Games.

In 2006, Comm authored The AdSense Code, a book about how to maximize revenue through Google's AdSense. The book that year reached the The New York Times Best Seller list and the Bloomberg Businessweek bestseller list. Comm also authored Twitter Power, a book that describes how to create a Twitter account, gain a large following, and market products on Twitter.

In 2007, Comm conceived of and hosted The Next Internet Millionaire, the first Internet reality show. Based on the NBC show The Apprentice, it offered contestants the chance to win $25,000 and join one of Comm's business ventures with the goal of making $1 million. In 2008, Comm created iFart Mobile, an app that makes fart noises. 14 days after he published the app, it had been bought 100,000 times and was ranked first on Apple Inc.'s App Store.

Business ventures

Joel Comm began his career as a radio personality, where he played music and was a weatherman. He later became a mobile disc jockey and then moved to Internet marketing because he knew he could become wealthier with an online career.[2]

Comm began using the Internet in the 1980s, experimenting with modems and bulletin boards related to playing computer games.[3] In 1995, Comm started his first website, WorldVillage.[4] WorldVillage is a virtual village where created by Comm's company InfoMedia.[5] The children's website offers trivia competitions and games.[6] He maintained the site solely through online advertising.[7] According to Radio Ink, he made several hundred dollars daily from Google's AdSense.[2] Comm also founded DealofDay.com, WorldVillage's sister site, in 1999. DealofDay.com is a directory of several hundred discounts. Comm receives money from businesses every time his site refers a purchaser. The network of sites in 2003 had 130,000 members.[8] Comm is the CEO of InfoMedia, a social media consulting company.[9]

He created ClassicGames,[4] a family-friendly multiplayer gaming website that offers widely played card games and board games like bridge, checkers, chess, Euchre, Go, hearts, poker, and spades.[10][11] In 1997, he sold ClassicGames to Yahoo! for $1 million.[4][12][13] Yahoo! used the acquisition as a basis for starting the website Yahoo! Games in April 1998.[14]

In 2007, Joel Comm conceived of the show The Next Internet Millionaire with Eric Holmlund.[15] Based on the NBC show The Apprentice, it was the first Internet reality show.[16] Hosted by Comm, the show pitted 12 contestants against each other who vied for the $25,000 finalist prize and the opportunity to join Comm on a project with the goal of earning $1 million.[17]

Comm in 2008 created iFart Mobile, a best-selling app that he sold on iTunes Store.[4] The app plays a fart noise when triggered. It has a "stealth" addition that enables people to set a timer for when the app will emit the fart sound. iFart further has a "security" feature that triggers a fart sound if the phone's position changes.[18] The $0.99 app[19] was ranked first on Apple Inc.'s App Store after its initial 14 days, having been bought 100,000 times.[20] It used to be in the 20 most downloaded iPhone apps ever and in October 2010 had 20,000 reviews.[20] VentureBeat in December 2008 noted that the app was making Comm almost $10,000 daily.[21]

Books

He authored The AdSense Code: What Google Never Told You about Making Money with Adsense, which describes for businesses how to achieve the highest revenue from Google's AdSense.[7] It started as an e-book readers could purchase on his website, and in 2006, it was published by Morgan James Publishing.[7] The book was on the The New York Times Best Seller list and the Bloomberg Businessweek bestseller list in 2006.[22][23] The New York Times described the book as a "user's manual for how to attract targeted traffic by a deeper understanding of Google Adsense code".[24] In his 2007 book Clear Blogging, Robert Walsh wrote that despite The Adsense Code's having a "'Make Money Now!' tone", it was an "extremely useful book" for being successful with AdSense.[25]

In 2009, he authored Twitter Power, a John Wiley & Sons–published book that introduces readers to Twitter, describing how it became widely used, how to set up a Twitter account, and how to grow their number of Twitter followers.[26][27] The book received positive reviews in Entrepreneur, January Magazine, and Mint for being written with simplicity and without jargon.[28][29][30] In CNET article titled "Twitter power? For real?", journalist Charles Cooper criticized the book for providing a "phony formula where you just paint by the numbers" to attempt to lure Twitter followers to become customers.[31]

List of books

References

Footnotes
  1. Comm, Joel (2009-05-05). "Attack of the Birthday Monkeys". Joel Comm. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  2. 1 2 "What Can You Learn From A Digital Superstar?". Radio Ink. 2015-05-20. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  3. Banks 2008, pp. 153
  4. 1 2 3 4 Strauss, Steve (2014-07-06). "Ask an Expert: Celebrating entrepreneurs". USA Today. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  5. Szadkowski, Joe (1997-06-17). "Families tap into popular Web site for children". The Washington Times. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  6. Davis, Yusuf (1998-11-01). "Tech News for Kids - Little People Discovery Farm". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  7. 1 2 3 Banks 2008, pp. 154
  8. Stafford, Jim (2003-12-20). "Consumers overcoming online fears". The Oklahoman. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  9. Soat, John (2010-01-04). "7 Questions Key To Social Networking Success". InformationWeek. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  10. Abram, Malcolm X (1997-09-21). "Personal Technology - Tech for Kids - Multiplayer freebies". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  11. Manning, Ric (1997-09-15). "Golf and other games on the Web". USA Today. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  12. Carlson, Nicholas (2009-05-22). "Yahoo's Entire, Sorry Acquisition History". Business Insider. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  13. Glaser, Mark (1997-10-09). "Come Into the Online Parlor, Relax With Board Games Like Checkers, Chess". Los Angeles Times. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  14. Walker, Leslie (1999-05-27). "A Guide to Games on the Net". The Washington Post. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  15. Johnson, Kimberly S. (2007-07-30). "Who wants to be an internet millionaire?". The Denver Post. Archived from the original on 2015-07-17. Retrieved 2015-07-17.
  16. "Ex-Reginan wins online game show". Leader-Post. Canwest. 2007-11-23. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  17. Strange, Adario (2007-06-05). "The Next Internet Millionaire: Startup As Reality TV". Wired. Archived from the original on 2015-07-17. Retrieved 2015-07-17.
  18. Kincaid, Jason (2008-12-12). "iFart And Pull My Finger Battle To Stink Up The App Store. Please Keep These Under Control, Apple.". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  19. Siegler, MG (2008-12-27). "A Christmas iFart explosion: Nearly 40,000 downloads and $30,000 net". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  20. 1 2 Kincaid, Jason (2010-06-01). "Former App Store King iFart Gets Blocked From The iPad". TechCrunch. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  21. Siegler, MG (2008-12-23). "iPhone fart app pulls in nearly $10,000 a day". VentureBeat. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  22. Hendee, Caitlin (2014-04-16). "Q&A: Joel Comm markets his social media message". Denver Business Journal. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  23. "The BusinessWeek Best-Seller List". Bloomberg Businessweek. 2006-07-10. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  24. "Paperback Business Best Sellers". The New York Times. 2006-08-06. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  25. Walsh 2007, pp. 255
  26. Dill, Margo L. (2010-01-10). "The Power of Twitter". The News-Gazette. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  27. Freehling, Bill (2009-05-03). "How tweets can tweak business". The Free Lance–Star. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  28. Werling, Mike (2009-02-10). "Twitter Gets Its Own Book". Entrepreneur. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  29. Richards, Linda L. (2009-03-18). "Non-Fiction: Twitter Power by Joel Comm". January Magazine. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  30. Vadukut, Sidin (2009-06-11). "Shift control, and twitter". Mint. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
  31. Cooper, Charles (2009-02-13). "Twitter power? For real?". CNET. Archived from the original on 2015-09-13. Retrieved 2015-09-13.
Bibliography

Official website

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