5Q: Ryan Holmes, CEO of HootSuite

HootSuite Chief Executive Ryan Holmes is sometimes pictured wearing a plaid shirt with his longish hair brushed back in a bit of a wavy mess, a portrait of which is more stereotypical of a West Coast university student, indie music or film star, rather than savvy business executive.

Privately-held HootSuite, which recently received $165 million in funding from Insight Venture Partners, Accel Partners and OMERS Ventures,helps people and companies manage social media networks including Twitter and Facebook.

The concept has caught on fast with some 200-plus Fortune 500 companies now using HootSuite's dashboard and other services, while ordinary folks are also using the tools to manage social media feeds, bringing the total number of users to nearly seven million worldwide.

So it's no surprise that the limelight is increasing around the 38-year-oldentrepreneur and his staff of 300-plus. Speculation is rife about how much the company is worth since its inception in 2008, an offshoot of Holmes's digital agency Invoke Media.  Recently, HootSuite revealed its revenues had grown by 300 per cent without disclosing figures, while media reports suggest the private company is valued at anywhere from $200 million to nearly$1 billion.

For now, Holmes is staying mum on the hard numbers, but does say "the value placed on HootSuite by investors is a good reflection of what we've built and where we're going."

I like the stories about you growing up in the interior of B.C. without electricity. Is this payback to your parents for raising you off the grid?

I guess I spent a lot more time by myself than other kids. At the time, I wanted to be like every other kid and live on a cul-de-sac and have a skateboard and hang out with other kids in the neighbourhood. I had goats and a motorbike and went motorbike riding through the mountains. I spent a lot of time reading because of that and I guess developed a unique perspective.

Was there a clear moment when you thought up the HootSuite concept and can you describe it?

I think of Malcolm Gladwell's 10,000-hour concept, where it takes 10,000 hours to become an expert in something ... The core team that started on it, they were also in the 10,000-hour range of being the best people I'd worked with in my life to date, and we were really good at building product at this point [through Invoke Media]. We started to see this viral adoption and that was my big 'aha moment' that we may have found 'the thing' here. This may be the big home run.

As a young entrepreneur you've talked about the temptation to sell out. What are your thoughts around building to grow, rather than building to flip?

I don't have disdain or any judgment of people who take an exit. It's a personal decision and there's so much criteria that lead into that for every single person. So I always want to be careful that if someone is taking an exit at $100,000, $1 million, $10 million, $100 million, that's their personal choice because it's not an easy decision.

You've mentioned before the big hurdles for tech companies in trying to create a Silicon Valley North. One solution, you've suggested, is to create a"Maple Syrup Mafia in Canada." What is that?

Back in 2002, PayPal was sold to eBay for US$1.5 billion, and overnight, many of PayPal’s core employees got very rich. Rather than calling it a day, this “PayPal mafia” went on to found and invest in a wave of new start-ups ... Hoot Suite can be one of the nucleus companies that will create an alumni who will share their success and go on to reinvest in the community. This is what I like to call the “Maple Syrup Mafia,” a Canadian version of the PayPal mafia.

You've  said you want the company to eventually reach $100 million in annual revenue and realize a $1-billion market valuation through either a sale or an initial public offering. Is that still the target?

I put that $1billion out there a couple of years ago because at the time it was an audacious number. I'm sure half my team was, like, yeah, we're going to do it, and the other half was like, this guy is crazy. It's a number to think about. I now am just saying I want to build a multi-billion dollar company, a legacy company, I want to create an alumni of people that have a great financial outcome.

Given your recent funding, a lot of tech analysts are watching as you expand. Can you provide a peek into the future?

I want a world-class team and to find the best and brightest people to build out this company. We've got an amazingly youthful company. I look at our average age.We're mid-20s. We've got some grey-hairs around, but we've got just such a young, energetic workforce that is passionate about doing something big ... We're looking at international expansion, of course, we're looking at increasing our marketing budgets across the board and we're looking at M&A. 

Sounds heady. Can I assume sofas and foosball tables around the office. 

We've built in a yoga room, we've built in a gym.We've got a huge lunchroom where we do lunch and learns, meet-ups ... We have beer, wine, coffee. We sit around on a Friday at 5 p.m. and enjoy beer, and talk about the week. It's basically creating a social culture at our office where we're not just working together, but we're also socializing together.

*Interview has been edited and condensed.