Ben Anderson
Ben Anderson was born on 25th June 1981 in Minneapolis. Ben is a journalist, writer, television reporter, and investor in New York City. He is the Co-Founder and CEO of Amino Apps which helps many people understand, build and express their interests and passion. He was featured in the top 30 under 30 in the Forbes magazine Consumer Technology Category.
Early Life
During his childhood, Anderson was fascinated with computers and spent a significant amount of time learning how to code and develop software. He was particularly interested in the potential for technology to bring people together and create communities based on shared interests. This interest would eventually lead him to co-found Amino Apps.
Education
Ben went to Moses Brown School for his high school Diploma and later joined Northeastern University in 2007 and graduated in 2012 with a BS in Music Industry.
Early Career
Ben started his career a few years after leaving Northeastern University. He was hired as the marketing administrator at Nimbit in Framingham, Massachusetts. He helped many artists and labels through these platforms which enabled them to share, sell, promote and even fundraise for their content.
In the year 2010, Ben Anderson was hired as the Business Development, Community Team, and Social Media Marketing Coordinator at OurStage. He had a short stint at the company which was helping artists get free streaming of music, discovery, and content. Ben has been involved in the production of the OurStage magazine writing content on topics like marketing best practices. He worked for one year at this company after which he moved to HypeGenius as the CEO.
Ben founded HypeGenious in 2009 and worked as the CEO until 2012. HypeGenious a musician’s marketing application helped artists’ managers grow their brands. The company helped musicians increase their revenue by imploring effective online marketing strategies.
Ben was later hired at PayPal which was helping people get online payments all over the world. He worked as the Consumer Marketing Officer. He worked tirelessly with creative marketing strategies that saw the company grow in site traffic by 10% in only 4 months.
Amino App
Ben later wanted to venture into his own business. He did market research online to determine a solution for users. Ben found out those most online platforms required people to identify themselves for them to use them. Most social media platforms were even getting away from using anonymous names to using real names. The continued pressure on the internet to de-anonymize users didn’t go well with Ben. He believed that de-anonymizing people would affect democracy and self-expression. This made Ben come up with the Amino App where people would interact freely and share their passion and emotions without fear.
Ben and Anderson met in Boston during an Anime convention that brought thousands of people from around the world. This is when they thought of an idea that would help people meet without traveling or buying tickets and costumes. They quickly grasped an idea as they were students at Northeastern University and knew their strengths well.
In January 2013 they officially launched the app together with Yin Wang the co-founder. They brought together their expertise in Amine and robotics to make this app. Ben currently serves as the CEO of this company which has a network of mobile applications working exclusively for a common interest. Users can comfortably blog, chat, take polls, and have discussions on shared topics and passion.
“It was a light bulb moment; we saw that people, these strangers, actually were making friends pretty instantly just because they had this shared passion. So we wanted to bottle that experience up and allow people to kind of experience that, anytime, anywhere through their mobile device.”
The app has already secured seed funding from Union Square Ventures to the tune of $1.6. This has accelerated the growth of the app and Ben has to source for more experts to work with.
Ben and his co-founder have passionately put work into the app and they have seen tremendous growth. They now have a thriving business from a dorm-room experiment.
Ben however admits it’s never a walk in the park. He had to put in a lot of commitment, resilience, patience, and hard work to succeed as an entrepreneur.
“To run a successful startup requires lots and lots of hours of work. You almost need to get to the level of being obsessed.”
Luna Park
Ben Anderson was still motivated to get into new business ventures and frontiers. He cofounded Lunar Park while still working with Amino Apps. He is the current CEO of Lunar Park which is an interactive platform for team building, games, and entertainment. The team can have online interactive sessions with activities to build teamwork, bond, and have fun.
There are games and global competitions in that teams can participate and earn points. Ben thought of this application in order to increase employee engagement and motivation. This helps the employees be happy at work and give better results.
Philanthrophy and Awards
He was listed in the 2017 Forbes magazine 30 under 30 Consumer Technology Category. Ben Anderson has proven that it is possible to develop and run applications that can help solve different life challenges. He portrays commitment, hard work, and passion in solving the tech needs of many people across the globe. His story shows that a black founder can be an exemplary businessperson despite their age. He has innovated business ideas that have brought solutions to a lot of people across the globe.
Ben Anderson is part of our Black Founders50 Series. Download the complete 2023 BBVA Founders50 list here.
