LendingTree CEO Shares How He Turned a $10,000 Investment Into $3 Billion in Market Cap

NEWPORT BEACH, Calif., Nov. 2, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- CEO Coaching International, the leading firm for coaching growth-focused CEOs and entrepreneurs, featured Doug Lebda on its On Your Mark, Get Set, Grow! podcast to showcase how entrepreneurs can go from idea to billion-dollar market cap. Lebda is one of the few entrepreneurs who can found a company, and continue to manage it as it scales from $0 to $3 billion in market cap.

Frustrated by his own experience in trying to get a loan, Lebda founded LendingTree in 1996. Sparked by the idea of looking at the trading of commodities and how efficient and transparent that market was, Lebda asked himself, "If you can have such an efficient, transparent market for every type of other commodity on earth, why can't you have the same thing for money, which is the most fungible commodity on the planet?"

Lebda's insight was to create a business model with exponential growth-enhancing economics. "If I could create a marketplace where, on one side, you've got banks competing for the consumer's business, and I can add value to the lender by reducing their customer acquisition costs, getting them customers that fit their specific profile and do it in quantities that matter to them, then I can actually help them improve their business," said Lebda.

Here are three keys to Lebda's exponential growth.

1. Separate your roles as founder, CEO, and shareholder. "Once you raise money from shareholders, I believe you have no divine right to continue to work at that company anymore, it's not your company except for the percentage that you own," said Lebda. Despite being the founder, or controlling shareholder, if you are not best-suited for the CEO role, you need to step aside and let a more qualified person fill it.
2. You are an entrepreneur forever. "I believe entrepreneurial thinking matters throughout your career," said Lebda. Whether you're a startup or a three-billion dollar market cap company, entrepreneurial thinking needs to permeate the organization forever, or you'll become irrelevant—fast.
3. Never stop learning. In his mid-forties, Lebda went back to school and finished his MBA at the Darden School that he had started years earlier. "If you looked at our stock price chart through both of those periods at Darden, our stock price has done very, very well every time I've been involved there because I apply everything I learned directly back into the business," said Lebda. And the other key is, "I learn through hiring great people who know more than I do."

Best-selling author, speaker and entrepreneur, Mark Moses, created the On Your Mark, Get Set, Grow! podcast to give CEOs and entrepreneurs access to top level speakers whose insight helps solve the challenges that business leaders face. Clients of the firm, like Doug Lebda, generously share their experience and wisdom for business leaders around the world.

To listen to the full podcast episode featuring Doug Lebda, please visit: http://www.ceocoachinginternational.com/lendingtree

About CEO Coaching International

CEO Coaching International is an executive coaching company that works with the world's top entrepreneurs, CEOs and companies to dramatically grow their business, develop their people, and elevate their own performance. For more information, please visit: http://www.ceocoachinginternational.com.

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SOURCE CEO Coaching International

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