Corey Wilton of Pegaxy: How to Overcome Business Inertia and Turn Big Ideas Into a Thriving Enterprise

As a part of our series called “Making Something From Nothing”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Corey Wilton.

Corey Wilton is the co-founder of Pegaxy, a free-to-play and play-to-earn game. The game went live just a couple of months ago and has experienced massive success in a short time. Pegaxy is currently ranked as the fifth-largest P2E game by volume. Remarkably, the team built a community of tens of thousands of users starting with less than $10,000.

Thank you so much for doing this with us! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us a bit about your “childhood backstory”?

I was born and raised on the Gold Coast in Australia in a household with a single mom and two brothers. We lived in housing commission (public housing), but we always had food on the table and a roof over our heads. I worked hard in school to get into University, but I ended up not making it. I went into sales instead — and at the same time, I started an eCommerce company. It failed miserably but I learned, even if it was the hard way, what works and what doesn’t.

The next few years were a period of trial and error — I worked on teams that started three or four companies before we hit something good. And then finally, in 2018, I made the decision to quit my job and go full-time into entrepreneurship.

After taking the leap in 2018, I founded my first first crypto based company. It was called HelpDesk, and it was a live chat support service for Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs). Then, in 2019, I co-founded Tactoys, an e-commerce company that sells toy guns.

Then, in 2021, I co-founded Pegaxy — and I guess the rest is history, so-to-speak. Pegaxy a play-to-earn NFT and horse racing simulator game that has garnered over 70,000 daily active users worldwide.

Can you please give us your favorite “Life Lesson Quote”? Can you share how that was relevant to you in your life?

“One never fails, there is always a lesson.” This quote is tattooed on my neck in arabic calligraphy. I’ve really tried to embed this in my brain — both as a reminder that all experiences have value, and not to repeat mistakes.

Is there a particular book, podcast, or film that made a significant impact on you? Can you share a story or explain why it resonated with you so much?

Reading both Robert Greene’s 48 Laws of Power and Mastery were really pivotal for me. Particularly the latter — in some of my earlier business ventures, I was working with someone who I really looked up to and learned a lot from. But after a certain point, I felt that I (as the student) was starting to become self-sufficient and capable of working on my own. Unfortunately, I felt that my former mentor didn’t like to see me becoming so independent — the relationship became toxic, so I decided to move on. But it ended up being the right decision: just six months later, I discovered NFTs through Gary Vaynerchuk.

Besides that, I can highly recommend The Four Agreements: A Practical Guide to Personal Freedom by Don Miguel Ruiz.

Ok super. Let’s now shift to the main part of our discussion. There is no shortage of good ideas out there. Many people have good ideas all the time. But people seem to struggle in taking a good idea and translating it into an actual business. Can you share a few ideas from your experience about how to overcome this challenge?

I’m certainly no authority on the subject — but I can say that Newtons’ first law of motion — the law of inertia — states: “An object at rest stays at rest, and an object in motion stays in motion until something changes its motion.” This means that on a physical level, objects have a natural tendency to resist change — and the bigger something is, the harder it is to get it in motion. I think that a similar principle applies to the process of turning ideas into reality: the bigger, more innovative, and more valuable an idea is, the harder it can feel to make it happen.

In my experience, the best way to turn big ideas into reality — to overcome the inertia of doing — is to think of your work as the ongoing process of finding solutions. It starts with the end-user or customer: what problem am I solving for them? What new value am I bringing into their lives?

From there, the process becomes more granular. Discovering what you’re creating for end-users is the first step, or ‘goalpost,’ if you will. Reaching that goal post — creating that solution — becomes another series of questions and answers: how will I reach the users I’m targeting? How will I make sure that the community I’m creating will last for the long-term?

This solution-oriented approach helps to break down big ideas into smaller, process-oriented steps. It also makes it more likely that each step you take is serving the purpose of your ultimate goals — kind of a “hack” to develop a great strategy, if you will.

Often when people think of a new idea, they dismiss it saying someone else must have thought of it before. How would you recommend that someone go about researching whether or not their idea has already been created?

To a large extent, I think that it really doesn’t matter if something has been created before or not. Rather, it’s all about whether or not the thing you’re creating is bringing new kinds of value to the world. Just think: what if Thomas Edison’s design was the only one that was being used to create light bulbs today. LEDs wouldn’t exist.

Still, if you’re unsure about whether or not the thing you’re building will be useful to people, it’s always good to find ways of quantifying what it is you’re doing. How much more efficient is it than existing solutions? How much time or money does it save your users or clients? Does it bring enjoyment, or other kinds of less-tangible benefits? Thinking about these things can help you get clear on how to position yourself in the market.

For the benefit of our readers, can you outline the steps one has to go through, from when they think of the idea, until it finally lands in a customer’s hands? In particular, we’d love to hear about how to file a patent, how to source a good manufacturer, and how to find a retailer to distribute it.’

(I work in the blockchain gaming industry, so I’ll speak from that perspective. ^^)

• Once you’ve got your idea, the first thing to do is to get as specific as possible with your idea. What exactly is it that you’re trying to create? What unique value will it bring to the world?
• The next thing you’ll need to do is to research similar projects. Has anyone else been trying to accomplish or build the same things as you? If so, what kind of unique angle or added value can you bring?
• After that, identify the things that you can accomplish alone and the things you’ll need help with. This will help you decide what to do next.
• Make a plan of action. Begin working on the things that you’re ready to start immediately, and search for the people who will be able to help you achieve your goals in the longer term. In the blockchain world, this could be anything from developers to designers to marketing and beyond.
• When your project or platform has been built, launch — but go slowly. Beta is your friend! Do not skip the testing phase, and don’t scale faster than what you’re absolutely sure you can support. It’s better to serve a smaller number of people well than it is to serve a bigger number of people poorly. You will know when scale is required and possible.

What are your “5 Things I Wish Someone Told Me When I First Started Leading My Company” and why? (Please share a story or example for each.)

• #1: Move slowly and build things. When you’re getting your business up to “cruising speed,” so to speak, it can be tempting to prioritize speed over sanity. And particularly if you’re working in the tech world (or blockchain gaming, like me), the pressure to “move fast and break things” can be intense. But the best way to ensure your success is to build for the long term: no matter what you’re doing, find ways to incentivize your target users or customers to stick around for the long term.
• #2: Choose your associates wisely. Before you make any decisions about who you associate yourself with in the early stages of your business — for example, signing on with a partner, appearing in certain types of media, or taking on new responsibilities — think about how these associations appear from the outside. Always aim for opportunities to connect with companies and individuals who can lift the status of your business in the eyes of the media and your customers. It will benefit you in the long-run.
• #3: If it doesn’t exist, build it. I’m a fan of the saying: “If you’ve found an open task, it might belong to you.” At certain points in your development journey, you may find yourself in need of a solution that doesn’t exist. But instead of giving up (or paying for something that doesn’t totally solve your problem), see if you can find a way to create the thing that you need. Maybe it’s an app, or a service offering, or a certain type of media — it could be anything, really. By creating this solution yourself, you have total control over a new aspect of your business — and maybe even another income stream.
• #4: Honor your passions, and have fun. Creating something big isn’t an easy task. That’s why it’s so important to maintain a sense of fun — and if you pick something that you’re truly passionate about, you won’t lose your sense of purpose.
• #5: Learn from others’ experiences. When you’re at the forefront of something new, everything is an experiment. it can feel like there is no wisdom to rely on. But the truth is that even if there’s no one doing what you’ve done before, there are still people who may be working in parallel to you. Use them and their experiences as guides — they can be some of your best resources.

Let’s imagine that a reader reading this interview has an idea for a product that they would like to invent. What are the first few steps that you would recommend that they take?

The first thing that you need to do is get as specific as possible about what it is you want to create. By starting with a clear idea of what you’re aiming for, it’s much easier to find a way to get there.

After you’ve developed this clear concept, discern the things that you know for sure you’ll be able to accomplish yourself from the things you will not be able to do alone. Once you’ve identified what’s possible right now and what isn’t, you’ll be able to clearly see what needs to happen next.

And if you’re building something new, I think it’s wise to treat everything as an experiment. If you’re always prepared to iterate what you’re doing as you go, you’re in a good position.

There are many invention development consultants. Would you recommend that a person with a new idea hire such a consultant, or should they try to strike out on their own?

I’m a big advocate of bringing in expertise when it’s necessary. That being said, I think that it can be easy for people to default to spending lots of money and time seeking help that they don’t really need.

If you’re considering hiring a consultant, that may indeed be the best option. However, I would first suggest doing extensive research into the challenges you’re seeking help with. When you’ve thoroughly surveyed the field that you’re trying to enter — and you have a better understanding of how your idea will fit into it — you’ll be much better-informed as to whether or not a consultant is the answer. If it is, fantastic — but if it isn’t, you;ll have just saved yourself a lot of resources. And either way, you gain more knowledge about what it is you’re trying to do.

What are your thoughts about bootstrapping vs looking for venture capital? What is the best way to decide if you should do either one?

I’m a strong believer in finding the right tool for the right job. Everybody needs capital, sure — but going straight to a VC isn’t always the best option. Depending on what your goals are, bootstrapping may be a better choice: it can be faster, more innovative, and can also lead to better opportunities with higher-profile VCs down the road (if that’s something you’re interested in.)

As someone who works in the blockchain sphere, I can say for sure that we live in an era of many new and innovative ways of raising funds. So if you’re unable to secure VC funding right away, don’t sweat it — there are many new and innovative ways of getting the capital you need.

Ok. We are nearly done. Here are our final questions. How have you used your success to make the world a better place?

I work in the blockchain gaming sphere, which is quickly expanding into many developing regions of the world. People who previously lived paycheck-to-paycheck — or even day-to-day — on earnings from low-wage jobs have started earning unprecedented income from playing blockchain games.

The problem, however, is that many of these games have become prohibitively expensive for users to play. Pegaxy — the game that I’ve co-founded — has solved this problem by eliminating starting fees for users through a native renting model.

We believe that all people should have equal access to the earning opportunities that blockchain gaming has to offer.

You are an inspiration to a great many people. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger.

The spirit of Pegaxy is really all about the idea that peoples’ time is valuable. We believe that people should be compensated for contributing their time and effort to the experience of the game — and that they should enjoy doing so.

I’d love to see more people being rewarded for contributing their time and energy in many different contexts. The beauty of blockchain is that this concept is slowly becoming a reality: Web3 technology is enabling people to own their identities, actions, and ideas in a way that wasn’t previously possible online. I’m really excited to see where it will lead.

We are very blessed that some of the biggest names in Business, VC funding, Sports, and Entertainment read this column. Is there a person in the world, or in the US, with whom you would love to have a private breakfast or lunch, and why? He or she might just see this if we tag them.

I’d have to say Gary Vaynerchuk (Gary V). I really admire the way that he’s so public about both his successes and failures — He scrutinizes himself and doesn’t care so much about what other people think. He does things wrong and admits it freely. I think that shows a lot of integrity.

He’s also a living affirmation of the idea that no matter how successful you become, you can always be a good person. Success doesn’t have to come at the cost of your soul — you can choose to be a good human and still win.

Thank you for these fantastic insights. We greatly appreciate the time you spent on this.