Growth Geeks, a startup that's built a marketplace to connect companies that have marketing needs with freelance marketers, isn't exactly "based" anywhere. The three founders work remotely out of Florida, Arizona and Kentucky, and have launched the the five-month-old company without having a central location.
That changed for the first time last month after Growth Geeks was selected to the 2015 Techstars Chicago class, where the team will now work out of 1871 until demo day in mid-October. Growth Geeks Co-Founder and COO Mike Hardenbrook said it's nice to finally have a place for the startup to call home, and the company is contemplating staying in Chicago after the program ends.
"We love Chicago, and we see the value of being in one centralized place and having a team together," Hardenbrook said.
Techstars Chicago bills itself as an accelerator program that can not only bring startups to Chicago, but keep them here as well (2014 member MartMobi being one such company). If Chicago were to hang on to Growth Geeks, the city would be getting a startup that's already seen some nice traction since launching in March. More than 4,000 freelance marketers have already signed up on the platform, and the company has done over $250,000 in sales, Hardenbrook said.
Growth Geeks allows marketers to join the platform and list the skills they can perform for companies, such as social media growth, inbound marketing, lead generation, or PR. Companies use the service to search and hire marketing freelancers, and clients have included HubSpot, Brightbox, and 500 Level. Freelancers, or “geeks,” can be hired hourly or on a pay-per-task basis.
Growth Geeks beat out nearly 900 other companies to become one of the 10 Techstars Chicago members, and Hardenbrook said the program has been a great networking experience for the young startup.
"The mentorship has been amazing," he said. "The access to all the great minds in Chicago at almost any time ... The support network is indescribable."
Growth Geeks was born out of Growth Hacker TV, a popular site in marketing circles that featured video interviews with executives from prominent startups. Growth Geeks has so far focused only on marketing, an area that often gets forgotten in recruiting compared to design and development talent, Hardenbrook said, but the platform could expand to offer a marketplace for more professionals and companies to connect.
"Right now we're focused on growing both sides of the marketplace," Hardenbrook said. "Growing the user base and keeping the quality high."
