Tuesday, December 19, 2023

The startup - SearchEye

The founders - Chris Porteous and Chris Thurston

The nugget - Help SearchEye hire and get new customers. Learn how at the end of this feature.

The startup

SearchEye is a B2B marketplace that connects brands with publishers. Brands get their name out there with better link-building and digital PR. Publishers find new businesses to partner with and add a new revenue stream.

Industry: Marketing Tech
Headquarters: Toronto
Year founded: 2021
Employee Count: 11
Funding: Raised a $1M CAD pre-seed from AfterWork Ventures, Everywhere VC, Archangel Ventures, and angel investors Casey Winters, Roger Dickey, Alan Rutledge, and Charlie Songhurst.
Business Model: Marketplace with two revenue streams. 1) transactional revenue when a brand purchases a mention in a publisher’s piece of content and 2) subscription revenue when brands and publishers pay to gain access to more SearchEye features.
Early Traction: Cleared $205K monthly revenue in October. Users include Hubspot, Vimeo, Monday.com, and more.

Competitors:

• Loganix is a digital marketing agency that provides search engine optimization, pay per click, and content services.

• fatjoe a content marketing company providing outsourcing services in link building & content creation.

• NO-BS Marketplace an agency that provides link building services.

• Traditional PR agencies

• In-House Outreach Team

Press Release: Betakit on SearchEye’s pre-seed fundraise

The founder(s)

Chris Porteus (Co-Founder). LinkedIn. Email.

Chris Thurston (Co-Founder). LinkedIn.

The problem they see: Digital PR incurs significant cost because of how difficult it is to set up partnerships between relevant brands and publishers. This process contributes to the estimated 5 billion spam emails sent daily to do so. These practices result in costly in-house PR teams and ineffective partnerships.

How they solve it: SearchEye has created a marketplace that helps relevant brands and publishers discover each other more efficiently. They estimate a reduction of approximately 100-150 unnecessary emails for each partnership they help set up.

The nugget - how you can help

If you’re interested in startup jobs…

SearchEye is currently hiring a Publisher Success Manager to run their publishing arm.

Know someone who’d be a good fit for this role? Forward them this email.

If you’re an investor…

SearchEye is not actively fundraising its next round. However, they are speaking with investors to help their portfolio companies scale up their SEO and brand presence effectively. You can read more about it here.

Know a portfolio company you want to help? Forward them this email.

If you’re interested in helping SearchEye find new customers…

SearchEye is looking to connect with brands who are looking to scale their SEO and link-building.

Know an SEO expert looking to increase traffic through content marketing efforts? Forward them this email.

Happy panning, 
David Riley
Chief Batea, Klondike

Know a founder who wants to be featured? Introduce us at [email protected]