I am excited to announce that Ben Huh will be our guest for this weeks ShoeMoney System webinar this Wednesday at 8PM CST.
Ben Huh is the CEO of icanhascheezburger.com and founder/creator of failblog.org. As well as many other wildly popular web properties.
icanhascheezburger (the most popular blog in the world with over 600,000 page views a day) was actually inspired by a young Hawaiian couple who stumbled across my AdSense Check and were inspired to start their own blog.
In Photo: Me, Ben Huh, Eric (original lolcats creator)
Only instead about writing about their adventures making money online they decided to make a site which focused on what cats would say if they could talk.
Then a couple years later they sold their site for over 2 million dollars to Ben and his investors. Who took the site and expanded it.
And it all started from a free WordPress.com blog! Love those stories!
I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Ben for the last five years and acting as an adviser to their network. Ben currently oversees three of the top 10 most read blogs in the world, and will be an excellent resource to all the ShoeMoney System users who will be able to ask him questions live during the Webinar.
I am pretty excited! See you guys one Wednesday!
About the author...
Jeremy Schoemaker – who has written 2424 posts on ShoeMoney.com.
Hi I am Jeremy Schoemaker and ShoeMoney.com is my blog. 99% of the post here are done by me but you will see others occasionally make guest posts. This blog is fun to write but for my day job I run several online companies.
Images provided by ShutterStock
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{ 91 comments… read them below or add one }
thats an awesome story 2million bucks for a funny cat webstie.. Nice!!
This just proves how differentiation can set you apart. Who would think a domain like icanhascheezburger.com would do ANYTHING?
THat is so funny you said that. I had to type in that domain name like 10 times before I finally got it right. I think that this site wins for craziest name in terms of its success.
Not me. I didn’t even know cats ate cheez… I mean, cheeseburgers.
Where does the cheezburger come into it? I’m guessing that the first pic was of a cat with a burger??
cool story, I didn’t know he bought that site.
when are you going to post Q & A answers
sorry about that…. working on it
I love that blog network! I am actually working on a similar blog right now, LMAODogs.com
I’m pretty sure I’m going to end up selling it one day, but who knows maybe I’ll keep it if it can be very profitable without requiring too much effort as a website like that shouldn’t require hours and hours of work per day.
Make sure you find out those revenue numbers shoe!
There are close to 10 updates on lolcatz everyday. A MMO would be easy
Thats just a bit of bullshit. He bought Icanhascheezburger.com from a couple who got the idea from 4chan.
Additionally, they arent the largest blog in the world with only 600,000 pageviews per day. Dont you count blogs like Gizmodo who receive over 3,000,000 pageviews per day.
I started digging around a little to see if who is right. I got some mixed info online (imagine that), but still think that Shoemoney probably has a story that’s closer to the truth than what you’ve said. Anyways, who cares? It’s a killer site, and that is some serious cash!
Blog fight! Blog fight!
Steven planted a seed of doubt in my mind, so I just checked Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I_Can_Has_Cheezburger%3F The article quotes 1.5M hits a day, and says the site was sold for 2M back in 2007.
Gizmodo probably gets that many hits from people who revisit the site to use its information as a reference to stuff they post in their own blogs. I think Icanhascheezburger is unique in that people really go there purely for entertainment.
Well, Steven, all I can tell you is what they told me and many others.
This gives me hope… If he can do it… I surely can!
No way! I visit that site DAILY! Huge incentive to attend the webinar. I’m sure everyone here has visited that site at least once. If you haven’t, I highly recommend it!
That makes two of us. I’m even guilty of sharing pictures of lolz I particularly like on my FB page.
Looking forward to this webinar. I’m sure there are lots to learn from Ben Huh and his Cheezburger Network.
I forgot about this site!!!! Loves it!
This is one of those sites that I discovered a few years ago at work. I think I was originally drawn to it because of the drawing of that smiling gray cat.
Proud cat owner / animation enthusiast… I was hooked when I saw the pic of the smirking gray cat asking, “I can has cheezburger?”
That’s how the site got it’s name, BTW.
And that cat became known Happycat, and it was goooood. The rest is Internet history.
This site has given rise to a lot of cat-rachters. Aside from Happycat, there are interesting purrsonalities such as Ceiling Cat (who watches you do stuff), Basement Cat (who wants your Cheetos and, you know, your soul) Monorail Cat, and Dr. Tinycat. These guys have even found themselves in prominent references to popular culture.
Don’t forget the Itteh Bitteh Kitteh Committeh!
Does anyone know if this site is from the same owners? http://ihasahotdog.com/ Or is this just a me too site?
ya same network
Success from a free wordpress site. It’s proof anything can be done.
Oh yay! I actually just did a case study on this site for my Online Marketing class. We had to research different sites within different demographics and discuss what made them successful.
I learned that this site his site mainly reaches mostly females, fairly wealthy, mostly Caucasian, around the age of 35. I also learned about half the visitors have college degrees and about 3/4′s don’t have kids. About 40% are regular visitors who come back more than once a week.
I think that this site is brilliant because there are so many working women that don’t have kids who make their pets their kids. This has been a trend for a long time, but some people are especially crazy about their pets. And that fact that users can add their own content makes the site even better.
It’s not that the site is brilliant… it’s just that it hit a nerve in terms of timing, and people just fell into it.
That’s interesting. I heard Icanhascheezburger is popular with all ages (and even those without pets), but I didn’t know majority of its readers are 30-something women. It wouldn’t seem like that at all whenever I read the comments. The comments are usually “lolcat talk”, and I’ve always thought they were teenagers. Interesting indeed.
Much as I like this site, I can’t say I’m a fan of extreme LOLcat talk. After a while, especially if there are a lot of comments, it’s very difficult to read, and you just give up.
That’s awesome, Shoe! I love Ben Huh! Err, I mean his site. It’s one of the sites I never forget to visit everyday. And I love viral cat videos and lolcat pictures! Icanhascheezburger actually influenced me to get into online marketing. So yeah, I’m excited! Whee
We all find inspiration in the least expected places.
ICHC changed the way we speak. Srsly… It has it’s own language that hit the mainstream…. I bet people don’t even know where “Oh Hai” came from. I even see “kthxbai” now and again.
That is so funny that you said that. That was part of my paper too. This site actually created a variation on language. I think it’s considered a form of “pidgin” English. The participants use lolspeak, which was created by the cats. It’s really interesting. The site has its own culture, its own community, and its own language.
At first i was skeptical about the whole language thing, but as time went by it really caught on. I’m sometimes surprised when people whom I work with and I thought would never be into “cute” would know, and make references to, lolspeak!
I know what you mean. I find it quite amusing, though, when one of the senior bosses goes on vacation leave and leaves a memo that ends with “kthxbai”.
You forgot “ur doing it wrong.” Did you change your pic just for this post?
Nope, didn’t change it. That’s my picture ever since. Told ya I’m a cheezburger/lolcat fan.
I wonder how that cat got into that trashcan like that. I certainly hope those cute lolcat pics aren’t so staged that the poor kitties are made to be uncomfortable.
I don’t think their people would do that. What’s more, cats seem to get themselves into all sorts of complicated and seemingly uncomfortable positions all on their own, and like it, too.
Like being stuck in the stair railings. That always happens to my cat. He’s always going up the stairs and looks in the railings for spiderwebs, and then he gets stuck. lol I love my cat.
I love that site! The kittehs are always soooo cute, and it’s a super stress reliever to see them and their antics.
Icanhascheezburger is a perfect example of a runaway internet success. Not only has it cultivated its own cult following and spawned its own language, spelling, and ideology, but it has also given rise to several other, similarly successful lolsites. To think it all began from a Wordpress blog!
Weren’t all the lolsites developed by Ben Huh and his people?
Yep. According to Wiki, I Can Has Cheezburger, I Has a Hotdog, FAIL Blog, Engrish Funny (my favorite
), Roflrazzi, and about eight other sites are sister sites.
oops i replied to my own question. WTH.
That’s true, I think, but still, ICHC is the phenomenon that made it all possible. A seed, if you will, of true internet genius.
In addition to running 26 or so sites, Ben Huh published Graph Out Loud, a GraphJam complication book (Icanhascheezburger compilation books “I Can Has Cheezburger” & “How To Take Over Teh World”) This guy truly has an empire going. He’s very entrepreneurial too. If he launches a site and it doesn’t work, he kills it and moves to the next.
Has anybody seen that video of the shocked cat (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J542jLjWa0E)? That’s probably the most popular cat nowadays. I see it ALL THE TIME in forums and communities. Whenever somebody says something unexpected, someone just pulls out a .gif of that cat.
LOL I’ve seen it! I lurk on ohnotheydidnt in LJ, and the people over there love that cat.
Hey you’re off-topic. Just kidding
I wonder what that cat is doing. Is he… yawning? Or is he really shocked? Did he just see his owner naked?
I have cats and my friends and I are totally cat people. I think that kitteh’s just meowing. The little furbabies have such interesting expressions when they do stuff, and it’s so cool to catch them with odd, human-like looks on their cute faces.
I think that ICHC is like Aff marketing. ICHC has its white cats (ceiling cats), which are synonymous with God, and we have our white hatters. ICHC has its black cats (basement cats), which are synonymous with the devil, and we have our black hatters.
Not that anyone would draw conclusions between Aff Marketing… Good… Evil… or Basement Dwelling.
This will interest you. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LOLCODE
Apparently you have to start the program with OH HAI. To terminate the program with KTHXBYE. Pretty awesome, huh?
Is this for serious? LOLCODE? Hmm since it made it into Wikipedia with sources I guess it’s real.
Oh noez! The lolcats, they be taking my Shoe!
Failblog seems to be somewhat cruel at times, especially in the comments section. Anyone ever notice the difference in personalities that commenters on the two blogs seem to have?
This is true. there’s even “comment community” discrimination among the two groups. Like people on the Failblog forums call people on the ICHC forums “retards” for using lolspeak.
I’ve noticed this, too. Myself, I find the people on the LOLcat forums much nicer and less prone to attacking each other than the people on Failblog.
ExclaimedIdeas, I think that it’s in the nature of the page to attract …uh… rowdier people than the people who would like to spend some of their spare time looking at cute, cuddle creatures.
Interestingly enough, they have featured shirts, too, like Jeremy does. The phenom has spread to all sorts of things – gift items, shirts, and books.
I always thought Ben Huh invented the lolcat phenomenon. Guess I was wrong. Anyway, this webinar will be interesting. Looking forward to it.
Me too! Info straight from the inventors of Lolsites! I can’t wait.
Nice. Shoemoney and ICHC together. Good news
And something off-topic: If I can sell my website for two million dollars, I’d spend a week on holiday on the Caribbean.
awesome . . . a niche blog with PR 7… that’s fantastic
Jeremy, that AdSense photo and post must have inspired hundreds of people to hop on the intarwebz to do bizniz!
Who can just buy a business? Seriously? Is this a case of the silver spoon? Please respond. Most people can’t just quit their jobs because they are bored and want to take a shot at something else. If daddy backed this, then I am not impressed.
Please respond.
Nah, Ben is just a smart man. Besides, you don’t have be rich to buy websites. Well, of course you would need money to buy a hugely successful site like Cheezburger. But he probably got the two million dollars from having other sites, marketing other products online, or investing somewhere. Not because his family or he was rich.
People can buy a business, NicMoon. All that such a transaction requires is that you have a) enough money to purchase it, and b) someone to sell it to you. Takeovers happen all the time. You can even take out bank loans and find investors to do this sort of thing, if it promises to give you enough in ROI.
Hi Jeremy!
Thank you a lot for giving me your 2-guides in pdf for free. I am happy that there are a lot of good people like you in the universe as well as bad guys, however, I believe always in a positive side and try always to do good things.
If you want to be successful at anything you first have to believe that you can accomplish something. Your key to success is your belief system. If you have a negative belief system then your success will be limited. If you have a positive
belief system then you will enjoy success after success and a
rewarding life.
I WISH YOU A VERY HAPPY AND PROSPEROUS LIFE!
Thanks once again for your support!
Cordially
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http://www.cityportaldirector.com?id=45841
Didn’t know Jeremy was an adviser to the Cheezburger Network. It seems like a lot of marketers at least know each other, and some are even friends/colleagues. Such a tight group of people.
If you’re online a lot, eventually your un into each other, and the smart ones pick and choose whom to allay themselves with. In the long run, it’s all about networking.
I agree with this. It’s not so much as they’re a tight group per se, but the net is a place where if you make enough noise to be noticed, pretty soon people worth noticing will come and check you out, and you connect over the fact that together, your linking powers are stronger than they are alone.
Much like normal you have presented several terrific info. Been a lurker on the website for a short time and wished to say thanks to you for finding the time to post it.
Ben Huh looks like an average cheerful Asian guy in that picture. If I happen to bump into him somewhere I wouldn’t be able to tell he’s THE BEN HUH.
My one-word lolspeak comment for this post: OHZUM.
I’m tempted to post a sentence: I IZ ESSITED.
You have got your point across a lot better than I ever could, thanks!
Now how are you going to air this webinar right in the middle of the Ultimate Fight Night! Looks like Florian and Gomi will have to get paused until this webinar is over.
Lucky for me, then. All the men in the family will be in the den watching the fight and I’ll be happily watching the webinar in peace and quiet!
Even though icanhascheezburger.com was popular, Ben had trouble at first monetizing its traffic. The financial back story of the web site would be worth hearing, don’t you think.
Looking forward to the interview.
Have a happy day.
Sam and Funny Chix Dot Com
Yup thats something we are going to be diving into.
All this talk about ICHC and Failblog, and this is the first time I realized that huh, with all that traffic, it’s got to have great earning potential. Hmmm. I must be getting soft.
Really? Didn’t know that. That would be very interesting.
Hi – It’s good to find such interesting writing on the Internet as I have been able to discover here. I agree with much of what is written here and I’ll be coming back to this site again. Thanks again for posting such great reading material!!
I won’t be able to catch the webinar. Jeremy, are you going to post it somewhere, or maybe a transcript or such?
I don’t think so… but it would be great if he did! I’m kicking myself for scheduling a dinner at the same time as the webinar, I won’t get to see it either!
Oversees 3 of the top 10 blogs in the world? Dang, I had no clue. Impressive!
I love failblog. Definitely one of my favorites. Thanks
haha some funny pictures on that site.
The fact that millions of dollars can be made off of a blog about what cats would say if they could talk really astounds me. I wish I would have come up with the idea before them. I think I will start working on a blog about what dogs would say if they could talk…
My friend’s cat keeps getting stuck in her venetian blinds, for some reason. It’s not hard to figure out that he can slip underneath, but maybe he likes the crinkly sound the blinds make when he squeezes through.