In this Side Hustle Spotlight Q&A session, we introduce Darpan Munjal, founder and CEO of Atom, the AI-powered startup ecosystem “on the path to becoming the go-to source for naming and branding.”
Image source: Courtesy of Atom. Darpan Munjal.
When did you start your side business and where did you find the inspiration for it?
The inspiration for my side hustle came in 2011 when I started another company. I was having a hard time deciding on a name for this business, so in a moment of inspiration or desperation, I posted a comment on an entrepreneur forum. I don’t remember the exact wording of the post, but it basically asked for ideas for a business name and offered a small reward – I think $50 – to whoever submitted the name I ultimately decided on . It worked! A few people jumped in and submitted ideas. I really liked one of them and so I came up with a name for the company.
It was at this point that I began to notice that my original problem of coming up with a name was far from unique. Friends, entrepreneurs I knew through work or networking, and others on the forum were familiar with this struggle. I’ve come up with a framework for naming in a contest – why not streamline that and offer a solution to a common problem?
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What were some of the first steps you took to get your side business off the ground?
The big first step in starting my side business was that I had a problem that I needed to solve. It’s a classic rule of entrepreneurship and side hustles that lead to successful businesses. You start by finding a problem or unmet need and then figuring out how to fix it.
Contest-based crowdsourcing is common these days, but back then it was far rarer and I didn’t know of anyone offering crowdsourcing naming contests. So I had to create a place where that could happen!
This meant building the platform itself, which was the next big step after the concept. I have a background in technology and marketing, so I was able to develop a simple product with minimal viability on my own. The platform allowed people to sign up, list information about the business they wanted to start, and share that information with a community of creative people interested in winning money by participating in naming contests.
Once the platform was up and running, we received numerous customer service requests. So the next step was to hire a freelance customer service representative. This is how business took off. It was all very simple, and although I had confidence in the usefulness of the platform, I was a little surprised at how quickly interest grew.
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What were some of the biggest challenges you faced while building your side business and how did you overcome them?
The biggest challenge for me was finding the time. I was running a completely different company and this was a passion project. It was something I was very interested in, but I didn’t have much time to invest in it.
The good thing was that my technical background gave me an understanding of how everything works on the backend. I also had experience with customer service and marketing, which is fundamental to pretty much every business. All of this helped me deal with the lack of time as there was no learning curve when it came to running a business. So I spread the word through my friends on some forums and from there it started spreading.
How long did it take for you to achieve consistent monthly sales? How much did the side hustle make?
I remember the excitement when we got our first paying customer on the second day of launching the website. It was an enjoyable experience and gave me more confidence that we were addressing a real need that customers were willing to pay for. Although sales were a little unstable at first, within three months we were generating about $2,000 per month. Since revenue was a little more consistent, I brought in a resource to help me build the platform on the technology side.
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When did you take over the business full-time? What do growth and sales look like now?
I’ve been working full time about seven years ago, about three and a half years ago. I had left the other store and was looking around for my next opportunity. I realized that Atom (then Squadhelp) Was this opportunity.
We had a solid community of extremely talented creatives who wanted to make money naming companies, and we had already helped thousands of customers. There weren’t many people in the field trying to solve or understand naming, so there was a lot of room for the company to grow.
Since the beginning, the growth has been really exciting! We are now one of the fastest growing companies in Chicagoland with annual sales in the eight-figure range. We have helped over 50,000 customers including Pepsi, Dell, Nestlé and Philips. One of our most recent milestones was about a year ago when we raised our first round of funding – a $10 million strategic investment.
At the beginning of April 2024 we completed an exciting rebranding from Squadhelp to Atom.com. It’s kind of surreal that this all came about from a part-time job. The business is really growing and changing. Of course, we still have a crowdsourcing naming platform, but Atom will be a complete startup ecosystem for ambitious new companies, giving startups everything they need to build their brand, starting with a domain. Similar to how atoms are the core building blocks of everything in the universe, we want to be the building blocks of the startup ecosystem.
I am confident that a premium A+ level domain name like Atom.com will provide a solid foundation to accelerate our growth. With this name and this brand, we are really betting on ourselves as a name startup.
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What do you enjoy most about running this company?
Being an entrepreneur is a lot of hard work, but it’s a lot of fun. What I like most about it are the continuous opportunities to grow and learn. It’s very fast-paced. You always solve problems. You’re always doing something new. You work with fascinating people. When it comes to innovation, we push the boundaries. This is definitely one of my passions – applying technology in new ways.
For example, we’ve jumped on the AI revolution and applied it in a lot of cool ways, like as a brand targeting tool, training AI personas that can generate tailored names based on patterns and trends, and so on.
What advice would you give to others who want to turn their part-time job into a successful business?
First, continue to innovate and don’t be afraid of failure. The interesting thing about our business is that it started as crowdsourcing, but then we quickly evolved, which allowed us to expand into a different area. Most of our business is now a brandable domain marketplace, and this has done tremendously well. The thing about iterating quickly and failing early is that it can give you some very valuable insights into what works and what doesn’t, ultimately leading to a much stronger foundation.
You simply need to continue taking steps based on these quick insights. You have an initial idea, and it probably won’t be the right one, and that’s okay as long as you keep trying.
Second, continue to listen to your customers and stakeholders and make necessary adjustments. If you hear something isn’t working, change it, and change it quickly. Sure, a few entrepreneurs are unique geniuses, but most of us are successful in part because of who we surround ourselves with and who we listen to!
Finally, you need to understand the basics of running a business. This allowed me to get Atom off the ground when I had very little time. You will need some understanding of marketing and operations, product development and technology. They may not be the most glamorous, but they bring entrepreneurship with them. So you have to have all these aspects and be willing to work hard and push the limits.
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