At just 15 years old, Kian Babaee took a £100 loan from his mum and turned it into a thriving iPhone accessories business. He imported phone cases from China and sold them on eBay and Amazon, earning over 30,000 positive reviews. That teenage hustle planted the seed for a career that would take him across industries, into luxury real estate, and now, to the forefront of tech innovation.
Today, Kian is the founder of Refer, a platform turning everyday people into paid influencers, helping local businesses grow, and rewriting the rules of marketing.
The idea for Refer came to Kian during a sushi dinner with friends three years ago. He noticed how everyone pulled out their phones to take pictures of their food, promoting the restaurant for free.
I thought to myself, we do this every day, why aren’t we being paid for it? he recalls.
That spark led to Refer, an app that pays users to share experiences from local businesses on social media. In return, venues only pay for results. It is performance-based marketing that levels the playing field for high street businesses and gives everyday people a way to earn cash doing what they already love.
Think of Refer as a Deliveroo for customers. Instead of delivering food to people, it delivers people to businesses. And it is working. The platform is rapidly expanding across London and Manchester, with plans to launch in Dubai soon. Refer is currently raising £5 million to support global growth.
The feedback from businesses has been incredible, Kian says. No upfront costs. No hidden fees. They only pay when someone actually shows up.
Kian’s entrepreneurial spark didn’t just come from schoolbooks. It came from necessity. Too young to get a job, he decided to create his own. That £100 venture was a crash course in sourcing, branding, customer service, and digital marketing.
But it wasn’t all smooth sailing.
One of my biggest early challenges was credibility, he says. Suppliers didn’t take me seriously because I was a teenager. I had to prove I was professional, reliable, and committed.
As his online sales grew, so did the complexity of managing orders, stock, and expectations. But these growing pains laid the foundation for everything that followed.
After his ecommerce success, Kian stepped into luxury property development, helping manage prime projects with Gross Development Values of over £75 million. He also played a major role in expanding AU Vodka’s presence in London, landing the brand in exclusive venues like Annabel’s and Tramp Members Club, an achievement that usually takes years.
These ventures taught him the importance of branding, networking, and precise execution. Skills that would become vital in launching Refer.
Kian has always been drawn to technology. Growing up around his father’s circle of self-made tech billionaires, he learned early that innovation, automation, and scale are the pillars of lasting success.
One of them once told me, if you want to be a billionaire, build something that makes money while you sleep. That idea stuck with me.
Refer is his answer to that philosophy, a system that scales itself, empowers others, and solves real problems.
Despite his early success, Kian learned the hard way that growth without structure can backfire. During the height of his phone accessory business, he scaled operations too quickly without the backend systems in place to handle demand. Delivery issues, customer complaints, and supplier setbacks soon followed.
That experience taught me that momentum is dangerous if your foundation isn’t solid, he says. Now I focus on scalable systems, lean operations, and being ready before stepping on the gas.
Right now, Kian is all-in on building Refer. He sees it not just as a business, but a movement reviving local economies by turning word of mouth into a real economy.
The future of marketing is personal. People trust people more than ads. Refer taps into that by making everyone a micro-influencer.
He is also focused on building a strong team that shares his values of ambition, discipline, and adaptability.
Kian credits much of his mindset to the influence of two modern business icons, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.
From Bezos, he learned the importance of long-term thinking, customer obsession, and building systems that scale. Musk’s fearless approach and first principles thinking encouraged Kian to challenge norms and pursue bold ideas.
They taught me not just how to build businesses but how to think differently.
Setbacks are inevitable, but Kian embraces them as part of the process.
What keeps me going is my vision. I know what I’m building and why. That clarity pulls me through tough times.
He surrounds himself with ambitious peers and mentors and focuses on first principles to solve problems step by step.
If it were easy, everyone would do it. The fact that it’s hard is what makes it worth it.
As Kian’s journey evolves, so does his definition of success.
Success isn’t about flashy headlines anymore. It is about building something meaningful that empowers people and creates long-term value.
He hopes to be remembered as someone who took risks, stayed authentic, and helped others succeed along the way.
I want Refer to be more than an app. I want it to represent a new way of thinking about influence, marketing, and community.
Kian credits his father, a self-made entrepreneur in real estate, as a major influence. His dad taught him to always ask What if before diving into any venture.
It’s not about fear, it’s about preparation. That mindset saved me from countless mistakes.
If he could talk to his 15-year-old self, he would say, stay curious, stay grounded, and don’t be afraid to question everything. That is where clarity begins.
At just 26, Kian is only getting started. With Refer gaining traction and expansion on the horizon, he is focused on building businesses that change how people live, work, and connect.
I am building for impact. For scale. For freedom. And for the people who believe bold ideas can change the world.
Do follow him on Instagram
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