by Michelle McIntyre

It’s always an exciting time when the “Forbes 30 Under 30” list comes out. Today is no exception.

Each year when the story goes live, young start-up founders wake up early to check the Forbes website to see if they have won. When they find their names, they message their investor, mom or significant other and start planning their big trek to the uber fun celebration dinner and party. (Yes, someone from Uber is on the list.)

Some also thank their publicists. No doubt that the publicists help build the relationships with Forbes, finesse the messages and fill out the forms on time but the winners are typically of substance to begin with.

There are a whopping 600 winners this year. Wow, that’s a lot.

It’s brilliant marketing on Forbes’ part because all of them will be socializing the story and giving the media outlet a ton of attention which attracts advertisers.

Check out the list here.

It includes tech entrepreneurs, marketing folks, actors, and even pro athletes like Golden State Warriors’ Stephen Curry.

I found this list of their 13 common traits below interesting. A whopping 84% are single and they love their iPhone’s. The most winners come from New York City and San Francisco.

The most popular undergrad schools are not surprisingly Stanford which is #1 (and pictured above), followed by U. Penn and Cornell.

Their top dream mentors are Elon Musk and Sheryl Sandberg who reside in the Silicon Valley.

Here are the 13 things the winners have in common.

“The Class of 2016 By The Numbers*:

15,000+: Nominations

600: Winners

64%: Want to ‘Change the world’

50%: Define success as ‘Liking myself and what I do’

5 top cities of residence (in order): New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Chicago

3 most popular undergrad schools (in order): Stanford, U. Penn, Cornell

69%: Earned college degrees

50%: Have zero college debt

63%: Identify as growing up middle class

36%: Immigrants or first-generation Americans

84%: Single

No. 1 and 2 dream mentors: Elon Musk and Sheryl Sandberg

No. 1 can’t-live-without gadget: iPhone”

[Source: Forbes website 1/11/16.]

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Michelle McIntyre runs MMC PR, a Silicon Valley consulting firm for tech start-ups. @FromMichelle on  Twitter

Photo credits: The trolley car photo was purchased from Canva and the Stanford image is from Stanford’s website.