Iconshock interview: Martin Leblanc, the wizard behind Iconfinder

Millions of designers and graphic enthusiasts use his site daily. His search engine Iconfinder is the ultimate resource in the whole net for finding high quality icons and has been featured in countless reviews since it’s foundation in 2007. Many will even go further and state that Iconfinder is the ultimate resource for designers in the whole wide web. He started this idea out of frustration, since he wanted an efficient way to search through all the icons he had in his hard drive. Who would have thought?

What really impresses me is his high curatorial values. Not any icon is fit to be featured in this search engine. And that is why its simply the best. Show your love to this unique web developer by leaving your comments and go ahead and take the opportunity to congratulate him because he got married in September. Wish you the best man! So here it is; Developer, icon hero, newlywed. Martin Leblanc.

1. Could you introduce yourself to a new audience in a couple of lines?

My name is Martin LeBlanc and I’m 28 years old. I’m working as a web developer and web designer on three different projects: Iconfinder, an Android app called Gigbox and consultancy working with wedesign, usability and webanalytics called Glassbox. Besides that I’m in my last year of a master in computer science and business administration at Copenhagen Business School in Denmark.

2. What is Iconfinder?

Iconfinder is a search engine for icons: You type in a keyword in a Google-like interface and Iconfinder returns icons instead of websites, as a normal search engine would do. It’s more complex under the surface but it’s very simple to use. Many different designers who have released their icons under various licenses - often GPL or Creative Commons in various forms, make the icons. So no matter if you are looking for new icons for your desktop, presentation or web design, Iconfinder can help you.

3. Which were the first steps you took to spread the word after you first got Iconfinder rolling?

I posted it on Digg, wrote on forums and emailed different website-owners that could have interest in writing about the site. You can get a long way, if you spend time to write a personal and honest email to a blog-owner. It really took this year, when I launched a redesign, got a new logo and a lot more icons.

4. RSS or Twitter?

I prefer RSS because it’s more flexible and will be around for a long time. I’m also addicted to news from RSS-feeds. Twitter can be a trend and gone in some years, but it’s still a fun and powerful communication tool at the moment.

5. Do you use Google Ads or any affiliate program? In your opinion, which types of sites should use them?

I use both Google Ads and BuySellAds. Both are great tools, but BuySellAds is primarily targeted the design community at the moment, so if you’re not related to the design community, you’re probably better of with Google Ads. My experience is that BuySellAds gives you a higher cut than Google Ads. I really like the simplicity of BuySellAds, and I hope they can get expand to a wider audience.

6. How much time did it pass for Iconfinder to be self sustainable? Where does Iconfinder’s revenue come from?

It was sustainable within a year because the cost for servers was low and I didn’t have to pay my own salary.

I got my paycheck from doing consultant work at another company at that time. Recently I have been upgrading the servers and paid designers to design new icons especially for Iconfinder, so the cost have gone up.

Right now the only revenue stream is from ads. There are many ways to go from there. It could be selling icons, which would be a natural next step for Iconfinder. Another way to go would be to create a freemium model, where some users pay a small fee for Pro-features. I also really want to give the icon designers more tools to promote their commercial work and get clients from Iconfinder.

7. In your opinion, which are the first three steps to take for somebody that any given day decides to become a full time web entrepreneur?

It really depends on what type of business you want to start. If you want to start a website like Iconfinder, you can keep you day job and work on it in the weekends and evenings. That way you minimize the risk if the business doesn’t take off. If you are going all-in, quitting your job and concentrating on the new business, you should at least have enough money to pay your own salary for six months.

You should be prepared to work hard and love what you’re doing. You’ll never get noticed if you’re doing a mediocre job. Spend the extra time and energy and the reward will be much bigger.

Last thing is to make sure that the people around you support you in what you’re doing. Without the support it’s not going to be fun.

8. In concept, how does Iconfinder differ from Glassbox?

They are very different. Iconfinder is a search engine and Glassbox is consulting for online marketing and webanalytics. When you’re doing consulting you get a steady income, but it’s very hard to scale. Iconfinder, on the other hand, can scale because the work you put into it, is not proportional to the number of users and income. I don’t have to work much harder if there’s 3 million users searching for icons on Iconfinder - basically all I would have to do is upgrade the servers.

9. We know you are recently married. Congrats! How do you manage your time now? How has your work changed?

Thank you! I try to manage my time using calendars and to-do-lists, but there’s a lot to work on with both the education and the different projects. I won’t say my work has changed, but I’m trying to spend a much time as possible with my wife and friends.

10. Your idea for a perfect December Holiday…

Spending time with the family and relax a bit.

Don’t forget to follow Martin on twitter