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SEOmoz Pitch Deck July 2011

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Rand Fishkin
Rand Fishkin

The document summarizes the history and growth of SEOmoz, an SEO software company founded in 2001 by Rand Fishkin and his mother Gillian. It details how SEOmoz grew from a small consultancy into a profitable software company with over 10,000 subscribers. The document outlines SEOmoz's plans to raise $20-25 million in funding to expand its product suite, team, and marketing in order to serve a wider audience and become the leading software for organic marketers. The goal is for SEOmoz to become Seattle's next billion dollar company.

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The Next Stage of Moz:How a tiny Mom + Son consultancy became the world leader in SEO Software, and our roadmap to being Seattle’s next $1 Billion companyRand Fishkin, CEO & Co-founder, SEOmozJuly 2011
A Little Moz History (now in color!)Deeply in debt, and failing to get traffic to clients’ sites, Rand starts the SEOmoz Blog as part of learning the SEO process.Moz’s collection of tools becomes a singular, campaign-based web app. Prices rise to $99 / $499 / $1999 per month.Rand starts working w/ Gillian building websites for small, local businessesSEOmoz takes an investment of $1.1M from Ignition Partners & Curious Office20041997Nov. 2007Sept. 201019812001Feb. 2007Oct. 2008July 2011Linkscape, SEOmoz’s web index and link graph, launches. By December, moz is profitable.SEOmoz is moving from just “SEO” to social media, content marketing, analytics, local and video. To this end, we’ve acquired “Moz.com.”Gillian (Rand’s Mom) founds the company that will become SEOmozSEOmoz launches its first subscription software product, “PRO” for $39/monthRand drops out of UW, 2 classes from graduation to work full time w/ GillianDid you know? At one point, Rand + Gillian had just under $500K in personal debt. By 2007, it was all paid off, thanks to the magical super-awesomeness of SEO!
2011 will be our first 8 figure year, and we maintain margins of 83%+MonthlyVisitsWe took one round of financing in 2007; $1.1MM from Ignition + Curious OfficeApril of 2011, we hit 1.2+MM visits/month and 10K+ subscribersIn 2009, we dropped consulting entirelyMore about our history http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-story-of-seomoz
How’d We Do That?
News/Media/PRSEOEmailResearch/White PapersBlogs + BloggingInfographicsComment MarketingSocial NetworksOnline VideoINBOUND MARKETING!(AKA all the “free” traffic sources)Local PortalsForumsWebinarsWord of MouthSocial BookmarkingPodcastingDirect/Referring LinksType-In TrafficQ+A SitesUp until 2010, SEOmoz had never spent money directly to acquire customers! (No PPC, no ads, just conferences and content production, aka “sweat marketing”) 
That’s what we want to help othercompanies measure + improve through our cloud-based software.
Macroeconomic Trends that Benefit Moz
Marketing Spend is Still Unbalanced vs. BehaviorVia http://www.ftijournal.com/images/uploads/Journal_p6-7.pdf
Organic Marketing is Under-InvestedOrganic drives 90%+ of traffic(but garners only ~$5 billion of investment in 2011)Paid drives <10% of web traffic(but wins a whopping $31+ Billion of investment in 2011)Percent of Web Traffic from Various Sources to the Average WebsiteWeb Traffic is driven almost entirely by organic/earned media, yet nearly all of the investment in driving traffic to websites is through paid channels… This is an unsustainable dichotomy.
It’s a Data-Driven World and Efficiency is KingThese challenges require scalable, high quality software to solve. Very few companies are investing in this space in a serious way, and almost none target the SMB market.
Problem(s) We’re Here to Solve
Organic Web Marketing is Poorly UnderstoodInvest in Content, Search, Social, Local and/or Participatory Online ChannelsMeasure Traffic and ROI EffectivelyEarn Outsized Traffic/Branding/Customer Acquisition Rewards vs. Paid Marketing ChannelsRe-Invest in ROI-Positive ChannelsEven those marketers who have an understanding of the process often get lost in the details or mired in the complexity of tying creative to metrics.
The Web Marketer’s Weekly Analytics ChallengeEvery week (sometimes daily), web marketers need to log in to each of these services (or a suitable substitute) to collect their KPIs:Many (75%+):Most (~50%):Some (~10%):Google AnalyticsBing Webmaster ToolsSEOmozFacebook InsightsGoogle AlertsPostRankTwitter (Topsy/Hootsuite)FeedburnerFourSquareGoogle Webmaster ToolsBit.lyGoogle LocalYahoo! Site ExplorerYelpWhy should a marketer log into 10+ sites/tools just to get the basic numbers they need to measure and improve their campaigns? Moz can (and should) put this all in one place.
Specific, Painful Web Marketing TasksEach of these requires special tools, large amounts of manual labor or custom-built, in-house/agency solutions:Identifying High-ROI ChannelsResearching New OpportunitiesPrioritizing + Managing TasksOptimizing Existing ChannelsFinding Errors + ProblemsTraining New Marketers These challenges require scalable, high quality software to solve. Very few companies are investing in this space in a serious way, and almost none target the SMB market.
Our Target Market
Moz has captured an estimated 5-10% of just these 2 circles to dateToday, Moz focuses on just the red “SEO” circles. In the future, many more of these will become customer targets. (BTW - I cheated by using two bubbles for “SEO” – sorry about that Venn Diagram purists!)
We Help Marketers Who Focus on OrganicWe believe we’ve captured ~5% of this market as paying customers and ~15% as registered members
Immediate Customer Targets:These titles/job functions represent our current (2011-13) targets:In-House(~55% of current members)Consultant/Agency(~35% of current members)Independent(~10% of current members)Director of MarketingSEO ConsultantBloggerSEO SpecialistOrganic Marketing ConsultantSocial Media ExpertSearch MarketerSearch + Social ConsultantSite OwnerOnline Marketing ManagerWeb Marketing ConsultantWebmasterDirector of GrowthDomainerInbound MarketerThese job titles/functions have the most direct use for our current software subscription.
Where are We Today?
2011 Estimated Revenue$12 - $13 millionCurrent Revenue Run Rate (June)~$10.8 millionNumber of PRO Subscribers~13,500# of New Free Trials / Day~100~$900Avg. Customer Lifetime Value~9 MonthsImplied Customer LifeAvg. Cost of Paid Acquisition~$100Avg. Monthly Revenue / Subscriber~$93
% of Free Trials Converting to Paid~57%Churn Rate in 1st 2 Paid Months~25%Monthly Visits to Moz + OSE~1.25 millionEmail Subscribers~300K~82%Gross Margins~$1 millionEstimated Net Profit in 2011Staffing Costs~$650K / MonthCrawling, Serving, Hosting + Processing~$180K / Month
Planned Investment Round
Raising:$20-$25 MillionFounder Equity:$6-7 MillionOnto Balance Sheet:$13-19 MillionNew Board:2 Investors (Michelle +1)2 Insiders (Rand +1)1 Independent (TBD)
Business Risks
Google Integrates Much More SEO & Social Analytics Functionality in the Short Term
The Web Becomes Less Open
We Fail to Adapt/Grow Fast Enough to Keep Up w/ Organic Marketing Shifts
Our Reputation Suffers Due to Missteps in Culture, Data Quality or Reliability
Use of Funds / Growth Opportunities2011-2012
Serve a Wider Audience w/ Expanded ProductBecome the Default Productivity + Research Suite for Organic Web MarketersWhatever organic marketers are using to drive traffic and derive value, we’ll help them measure, monitor and improve it with a suite that’s simple enough for anyone but powerful enough to support advanced-expert level practitioners.
2 Year Team Roadmap from 40-100 MozzersEngineering(Build Amazing $#*!)Marketing(Bring in Customers)Product(Design the Right Software)User ExperienceContent/Media/ResearchBroad Web CrawlDesign + UICommunity ManagementRankings DataLocal DataSubject Matter ExpertsPR / Press / OutreachSocial DataWireframing + SpecsEventsFront End / Web AppTesting / QAPaid AcquisitionFresh Web DataOperations(Make Moz Run Smoothly)Customer Success(Delight Moz Members)Retention(Keep PRO Members PRO)Quant + Cohort AnalysisAPI & Higher-Tier SalesFinancial + AccountingEmail + On-Site MessagingCustomer ServiceFacilitiesQ&A AssistanceCustomer OutreachHR/Mozzer Happiness
Sales/Marketing InvestmentsOrganic(Grow Free Traffic)Paid Acquisition(PPC, Behavioral, Social, etc)Branding(Make Moz Known + Trusted)Technology InvestmentsFresh Web(Compete w/ Google Alerts)Social Graph(Map the Major Networks)Web Crawl(Grow Breadth + Freshness)Product InvestmentsMoz Alerts($10/mth competitor to G Alerts)Classifying the Web(Employing Human Raters)Low Price Model($25/month for lighter use)
Potential Acquisitions
Why Moz is Uniquely Positioned to Win the Organic Market
Passionate community of 300K+ marketers#1:#2:Our technology lead is very hard to catchProven record of 2X+ growth for 4 years#3:Unique, world-changing culture & attitude#4:
We have a rare opportunity to become Seattle’s next $1 billion+ company, and we’d love to have you join us for the ride.

More Related Content

SEOmoz Pitch Deck July 2011

  • 1. The Next Stage of Moz:How a tiny Mom + Son consultancy became the world leader in SEO Software, and our roadmap to being Seattle’s next $1 Billion companyRand Fishkin, CEO & Co-founder, SEOmozJuly 2011
  • 2. A Little Moz History (now in color!)Deeply in debt, and failing to get traffic to clients’ sites, Rand starts the SEOmoz Blog as part of learning the SEO process.Moz’s collection of tools becomes a singular, campaign-based web app. Prices rise to $99 / $499 / $1999 per month.Rand starts working w/ Gillian building websites for small, local businessesSEOmoz takes an investment of $1.1M from Ignition Partners & Curious Office20041997Nov. 2007Sept. 201019812001Feb. 2007Oct. 2008July 2011Linkscape, SEOmoz’s web index and link graph, launches. By December, moz is profitable.SEOmoz is moving from just “SEO” to social media, content marketing, analytics, local and video. To this end, we’ve acquired “Moz.com.”Gillian (Rand’s Mom) founds the company that will become SEOmozSEOmoz launches its first subscription software product, “PRO” for $39/monthRand drops out of UW, 2 classes from graduation to work full time w/ GillianDid you know? At one point, Rand + Gillian had just under $500K in personal debt. By 2007, it was all paid off, thanks to the magical super-awesomeness of SEO!
  • 3. 2011 will be our first 8 figure year, and we maintain margins of 83%+MonthlyVisitsWe took one round of financing in 2007; $1.1MM from Ignition + Curious OfficeApril of 2011, we hit 1.2+MM visits/month and 10K+ subscribersIn 2009, we dropped consulting entirelyMore about our history http://www.seomoz.org/blog/the-story-of-seomoz
  • 5. News/Media/PRSEOEmailResearch/White PapersBlogs + BloggingInfographicsComment MarketingSocial NetworksOnline VideoINBOUND MARKETING!(AKA all the “free” traffic sources)Local PortalsForumsWebinarsWord of MouthSocial BookmarkingPodcastingDirect/Referring LinksType-In TrafficQ+A SitesUp until 2010, SEOmoz had never spent money directly to acquire customers! (No PPC, no ads, just conferences and content production, aka “sweat marketing”) 
  • 6. That’s what we want to help othercompanies measure + improve through our cloud-based software.
  • 8. Marketing Spend is Still Unbalanced vs. BehaviorVia http://www.ftijournal.com/images/uploads/Journal_p6-7.pdf
  • 9. Organic Marketing is Under-InvestedOrganic drives 90%+ of traffic(but garners only ~$5 billion of investment in 2011)Paid drives <10% of web traffic(but wins a whopping $31+ Billion of investment in 2011)Percent of Web Traffic from Various Sources to the Average WebsiteWeb Traffic is driven almost entirely by organic/earned media, yet nearly all of the investment in driving traffic to websites is through paid channels… This is an unsustainable dichotomy.
  • 10. It’s a Data-Driven World and Efficiency is KingThese challenges require scalable, high quality software to solve. Very few companies are investing in this space in a serious way, and almost none target the SMB market.
  • 12. Organic Web Marketing is Poorly UnderstoodInvest in Content, Search, Social, Local and/or Participatory Online ChannelsMeasure Traffic and ROI EffectivelyEarn Outsized Traffic/Branding/Customer Acquisition Rewards vs. Paid Marketing ChannelsRe-Invest in ROI-Positive ChannelsEven those marketers who have an understanding of the process often get lost in the details or mired in the complexity of tying creative to metrics.
  • 13. The Web Marketer’s Weekly Analytics ChallengeEvery week (sometimes daily), web marketers need to log in to each of these services (or a suitable substitute) to collect their KPIs:Many (75%+):Most (~50%):Some (~10%):Google AnalyticsBing Webmaster ToolsSEOmozFacebook InsightsGoogle AlertsPostRankTwitter (Topsy/Hootsuite)FeedburnerFourSquareGoogle Webmaster ToolsBit.lyGoogle LocalYahoo! Site ExplorerYelpWhy should a marketer log into 10+ sites/tools just to get the basic numbers they need to measure and improve their campaigns? Moz can (and should) put this all in one place.
  • 14. Specific, Painful Web Marketing TasksEach of these requires special tools, large amounts of manual labor or custom-built, in-house/agency solutions:Identifying High-ROI ChannelsResearching New OpportunitiesPrioritizing + Managing TasksOptimizing Existing ChannelsFinding Errors + ProblemsTraining New Marketers These challenges require scalable, high quality software to solve. Very few companies are investing in this space in a serious way, and almost none target the SMB market.
  • 16. Moz has captured an estimated 5-10% of just these 2 circles to dateToday, Moz focuses on just the red “SEO” circles. In the future, many more of these will become customer targets. (BTW - I cheated by using two bubbles for “SEO” – sorry about that Venn Diagram purists!)
  • 17. We Help Marketers Who Focus on OrganicWe believe we’ve captured ~5% of this market as paying customers and ~15% as registered members
  • 18. Immediate Customer Targets:These titles/job functions represent our current (2011-13) targets:In-House(~55% of current members)Consultant/Agency(~35% of current members)Independent(~10% of current members)Director of MarketingSEO ConsultantBloggerSEO SpecialistOrganic Marketing ConsultantSocial Media ExpertSearch MarketerSearch + Social ConsultantSite OwnerOnline Marketing ManagerWeb Marketing ConsultantWebmasterDirector of GrowthDomainerInbound MarketerThese job titles/functions have the most direct use for our current software subscription.
  • 19. Where are We Today?
  • 20. 2011 Estimated Revenue$12 - $13 millionCurrent Revenue Run Rate (June)~$10.8 millionNumber of PRO Subscribers~13,500# of New Free Trials / Day~100~$900Avg. Customer Lifetime Value~9 MonthsImplied Customer LifeAvg. Cost of Paid Acquisition~$100Avg. Monthly Revenue / Subscriber~$93
  • 21. % of Free Trials Converting to Paid~57%Churn Rate in 1st 2 Paid Months~25%Monthly Visits to Moz + OSE~1.25 millionEmail Subscribers~300K~82%Gross Margins~$1 millionEstimated Net Profit in 2011Staffing Costs~$650K / MonthCrawling, Serving, Hosting + Processing~$180K / Month
  • 23. Raising:$20-$25 MillionFounder Equity:$6-7 MillionOnto Balance Sheet:$13-19 MillionNew Board:2 Investors (Michelle +1)2 Insiders (Rand +1)1 Independent (TBD)
  • 25. Google Integrates Much More SEO & Social Analytics Functionality in the Short Term
  • 26. The Web Becomes Less Open
  • 27. We Fail to Adapt/Grow Fast Enough to Keep Up w/ Organic Marketing Shifts
  • 28. Our Reputation Suffers Due to Missteps in Culture, Data Quality or Reliability
  • 29. Use of Funds / Growth Opportunities2011-2012
  • 30. Serve a Wider Audience w/ Expanded ProductBecome the Default Productivity + Research Suite for Organic Web MarketersWhatever organic marketers are using to drive traffic and derive value, we’ll help them measure, monitor and improve it with a suite that’s simple enough for anyone but powerful enough to support advanced-expert level practitioners.
  • 31. 2 Year Team Roadmap from 40-100 MozzersEngineering(Build Amazing $#*!)Marketing(Bring in Customers)Product(Design the Right Software)User ExperienceContent/Media/ResearchBroad Web CrawlDesign + UICommunity ManagementRankings DataLocal DataSubject Matter ExpertsPR / Press / OutreachSocial DataWireframing + SpecsEventsFront End / Web AppTesting / QAPaid AcquisitionFresh Web DataOperations(Make Moz Run Smoothly)Customer Success(Delight Moz Members)Retention(Keep PRO Members PRO)Quant + Cohort AnalysisAPI & Higher-Tier SalesFinancial + AccountingEmail + On-Site MessagingCustomer ServiceFacilitiesQ&A AssistanceCustomer OutreachHR/Mozzer Happiness
  • 32. Sales/Marketing InvestmentsOrganic(Grow Free Traffic)Paid Acquisition(PPC, Behavioral, Social, etc)Branding(Make Moz Known + Trusted)Technology InvestmentsFresh Web(Compete w/ Google Alerts)Social Graph(Map the Major Networks)Web Crawl(Grow Breadth + Freshness)Product InvestmentsMoz Alerts($10/mth competitor to G Alerts)Classifying the Web(Employing Human Raters)Low Price Model($25/month for lighter use)
  • 34. Why Moz is Uniquely Positioned to Win the Organic Market
  • 35. Passionate community of 300K+ marketers#1:#2:Our technology lead is very hard to catchProven record of 2X+ growth for 4 years#3:Unique, world-changing culture & attitude#4:
  • 36. We have a rare opportunity to become Seattle’s next $1 billion+ company, and we’d love to have you join us for the ride.