The second quarter of the year was a full one, with a mix of family travel, business growth, community involvement, and a few personal milestones.
Summer is officially underway in our house, MarketBeat continues to evolve in meaningful ways, and several projects I’ve been involved with in Sioux Falls are gaining momentum.
This update covers what our family has been up to, some changes at MarketBeat, recent activity with Homegrown Capital and Cresten, and a few community and philanthropy items that are on the calendar.
Work and Family Travel
As soon as school got out for the summer, our family spent a week in Southern California and stayed in a rental on Newport Beach.
I took Micah and Ady to Disneyland so that Ady could ride the “Cars Ride” and the “Tigger Ride” again.
We also drove up to Hollywood to see the Tesla Diner and the Griffith Observatory.
Micah spent a few days at Dakota State University for Middle School Cyber Camp. I am attending a conference in Las Vegas later in July, and then we are spending a few days in Minneapolis to do some shopping and go to WWE Summer Slam at U.S. Bank Stadium.
The first Vikings pre-season game is on August 22nd, and we are looking forward to attending all the home games again this year.
A New Smile
In my middle school and high school years, I had some significant tooth decay as a result of drinking too much sugary soda and bad genetics. This resulted in me losing two of my front teeth, which were ultimately made to look nice with two dental bridges. The bridges were about 25 years old, and I was long overdue to replace them.
My current dentist, Dr. Craig Dillon, took great care in designing a new porcelain bridge that looks natural and blends in with my other teeth. When you see me next, you might notice I look a bit different. I think the new teeth are a substantial visual improvement from what was there previously.
South Dakota Hall of Fame
I am humbled to share that I will be inducted into the South Dakota Hall of Fame this fall. I was nominated by Dr. José-Marie Griffiths, who currently serves as chancellor at Dakota State University. Specifically, I was nominated in the category of “business” for building a great company in South Dakota.
Many people have asked me if I (age 40) am the youngest person in the state to be inducted into the hall of fame. My short answer is, I don’t think so, but I am one of the ten youngest inductees.
I will be formally inducted into the South Dakota Hall of Fame in September at their annual event.
Sioux Falls Chamber Executive Committee
For the last few years, I have served on the board of directors of the Greater Sioux Falls Chamber of Commerce. I was recently elevated to the executive committee of the board after Jason Herrboldt, a former executive at First Bank and Trust, took on a new role as CEO at a bank in Iowa and had to step down from the board. I’m currently serving as board treasurer and am slated to serve as chamber board president in the ’28-’29 chamber year.
While the Chamber is run primarily by paid staff, I hope to use my time on the board to strengthen the Community Appeals program and create more value for the Chamber’s membership.
MarketBeat
MarketBeat has had many different business models over the years: an SEO-driven web media property monetized by display ads, an investment research software subscription business, an investing newsletter business, and now a multi-channel media company monetized with performance advertising.
Our current business model is the best business model we’ve ever had. For example, we made $73,000 from a single YouTube video.
Our audience is our key value driver – rather than any individual product that we may sell.
This means that over time, some of the legacy components of MarketBeat will likely be discontinued to focus on what’s working now. Often, we think the key to business growth is to do new things and more things. However, the right answer is usually to do fewer unique things, better and more frequently.
For MarketBeat, this likely means our premium product, MarketBeat All Access (5.3% of revenue), eventually goes away. We also have a bunch of legacy news sites that contribute opt-ins and display revenue to MarketBeat that don’t require much maintenance but are long past their prime.
Our future is to become a multi-channel media company that produces original investing content through the MarketBeat website, our email newsletters (all 9 of them), our two YouTube channels, Facebook/Instagram Reels, syndication partnerships (MSN, NASDAQ, Yahoo Finance), SMS, our extended network of investing websites (InsiderTrades.com, DividendStocks.com, etc.) and any other channel that we can dream up.
Lots of people can build investing research tools or write stock analysis articles, but very few people can command the audience that we do. Our distribution is our competitive advantage.
Our newest distribution channels include the MarketBeat Clips channel on YouTube, which has attracted nearly 50,000 subscribers in its first month, and our video content on Facebook and Instagram Reels.
We expect video to be a big source of audience growth for us in the next year. We are making significant investments in video.
We built out a new recording studio in Cherapa 1. We also hired a video production coordinator, Bryan Middelton, and our summer intern, Lily Witte, is focusing on video and social media. Our mantra for the year is “more video in more places.”
Homegrown Capital and Cresten Capital
Homegrown Capital has made two deals this year and has three more deals in late-stage due diligence.
First, we invested in Brevity, an A.I. sales coaching tool that allows salespeople to practice calls and analyze past sales calls to identify areas for improvement. Second, we led a $2 million round in Cattler, which is aiming to build the “system of record” for the beef industry.
Dealflow has been relatively strong this year, and we expect to do several more deals before the end of the year.
On the real estate side, Raising Cane’s is rapidly building on the former David’s Bridal site on 41st Street. This is a ground lease deal in which my partner, Kevin Tupy, and I own the land and lease it to Raising Cane’s on a long-term basis.
Some people know that my number one rule of investing is to “never invest in a restaurant,” and were confused when they saw the Canes deal come through. I’m happy to lease space to a restaurant, but I have no interest in being an operating partner. This is an important distinction.
Otherwise, my partner Kevin opened a new restaurant called Tilted Trophy on the west side (which I am not a partner in). Karine, Ady, and I visited, and it’s great!
In other news, we have a new 150-unit apartment complex going up on Marion and Benson called The Vertex. We also plan to start on a strip mall on some land that we own on East 41st street this year and have 15 acres of land on Highway 100 that we will build apartments on sometime in the next 2-3 years.
SiouxFalls.Business CEO Summit
MarketBeat and SiouxFalls.Business hosted its fourth annual CEO summit on June 16th at the Canopy in downtown Sioux Falls. Our featured speaker was Shane Smith, President and CEO of Smithfield Industries. Given Smithfield’s recent announcement of constructing a new plant in Northwest Sioux Falls, he was a natural choice to speak.
We also heard from Gen. Mark Morrell and a panel on economic resilience and infrastructure in South Dakota featuring Bill Even (Governor’s Office of Economic Development), Gen. Morrell, Mark Cotter (City of Sioux Falls), and Mark Hoffman (East River Electric).
This event continues to be a great partnership between MarketBeat and SiouxFalls.Business, where Jodi Schwan identifies speakers and topics, and MarketBeat handles venue and other event logistics.
Philanthropy and Event Sponsorships
The MarketBeat philanthropy train continued in the second quarter.
We committed to new event sponsorships for the Sioux Falls Leadership Summit, the 2027 YPN Crossroads Summit, the EMBE awards, Journey of Hope’s “Be the Light” event, Junior Achievement Finance Park, and Bishop Dudley’s “Taste of Goodness” event.
We also made charitable contributions to Owen’s Outfitters, Abbott House, Groove Music, Active Generations, Habitat for Humanity, Girl Scouts Dakota Horizons, Rock Ranch, and Emily’s Hope.
You can learn more about the nonprofits we supported this quarter by reading the impact report here.
In addition to our normal quarterly giving and sponsorships, the following larger sponsored events are coming up on the calendar:
- A new season of Levitt at the Falls kicked off in May. This is the third season that MarketBeat is serving as the season-presenting sponsor for the concert series. You can see the full summer line-up here.
- Lallycooler Music Festival is coming up next week on July 10th and 11th. This year it’s being headlined by Darius Rucker and Jason Derulo. If you haven’t gotten tickets yet, you can still buy tickets online at lallycooler.com.
- The MarketBeat Open Professional Tennis Tournament returns starting on October 25th this year. This is a USTA tournament that is part of the ATP Challenger Tour, which features many up-and-coming tennis stars.
- Soon you’ll see an announcement about the MarketBeat Invitational, an NCAA basketball tournament to be held at the Sanford Pentagon later this year. The formal announcement is coming this week, and it’s going to be a fun addition to the MarketBeat sponsorship line-up.
Wrap Up
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