Moz (Marketing Software): History
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Moz is a software as a service (SaaS) company based in Seattle that sells inbound marketing and marketing analytics software subscriptions. It was founded by Rand Fishkin and Gillian Muessig in 2004 as a consulting firm and shifted to SEO software development in 2008. The company hosts a website that includes an online community of more than one million globally based digital marketers and marketing related tools. Moz offers SEO tools that includes keyword research, link building, site audits, and page optimization insights in order to help companies to have a better view of the position they have on search engines and how to improve their ranking. The company also developed the most commonly used algorithm to determine Domain Authority, which is a score between 1-100, that is often used by many SEO companies to estimate a website's overall viability with the search engines.

  • software as a service
  • inbound marketing
  • software development

1. History

In 2004, Moz was founded by a son-and-mother team Rand Fishkin[1] and Gillian Muessig as 'SEOmoz'.[2] In September 2007, the company raised $1.1 million in Series A funding from Ignition Partners and Curious Office.[3] In 2012, it raised $18 million in funding from Foundry Group and Ignition Partners.[4][5]

In June 2012, SEOmoz acquired Followerwonk, a tool for searching, filtering and managing Twitter bios with other Twitter management functions like analytics.[6] The terms were not disclosed, but SEOmoz said the acquisition was for somewhere between one and four million US dollars.[5] In December 2012, SEOmoz acquired GetListed for $3 million.[7] In May 2013, the company rebranded as 'Moz' and relaunched the website at Moz.com.[8] During the period 2008 to 2011, SEOmoz grew from $1.5 million to $11.4 million in revenue.[9] In January 2016, Moz secured a $10 million investment from the Foundry Group.[10]

In January 2014, Rand Fishkin stepped down as the CEO of Moz.[11] The position was taken by Sarah Bird who was already the President and COO of the company.

In August 2016, Moz laid off 28% of their staff to double down on SEO and focus on earning profitable revenue.

On February 27th 2018, Moz co-founder, Rand Fishkin, parted company with the business he started and made the announcement via his new company blog at "SparkToro"[12]. Fishkin is self quoted in the blog post saying, "On a scale of 0-10, where 0 is “fired and escorted out of the building by security” and 10 is “left entirely of his own accord on wonderful terms,” my departure is around a 4. That makes today a hard one, cognitively and emotionally." Fishkin goes on to discuss his other plans for the future in the post which include a book and non-profit initiative for making conferences and events safer places for women. This book appeared in the course of 2018[13].

2. Tools

Moz has a series of tools in its SEO Toolbox, including Moz Keyword Explorer,[14] a keyword research tool that provides keyword suggestions, SEO competition, opportunity, SERP features, saved lists, and accurate search volume data.

MozPro provides SEO site crawl checkups, prioritized SEO fixes, rank tracking, competitor tracking, SERP feature tracking and more.

Open Site Explorer is a free SEO tool that provides link data such as spam analysis.[15]

mozRank is an alternative to Google PageRank.[16][17] Moz also has a tool for researching popular search trends.[18]

Moz offers an SEO browser tool called MozBar.[19]

In August 2016 Moz announced that it was dropping the Followerwonk tool to focus more on SEO.[20]

In 2018, Moz announced that it will replace Open Site Explorer with Link Explorer for beta version[21]

3. Culture

When it raised funding in 2012, the CEO Rand Fishkin blogged about his personal opinions, doubts, and analyses as the company went through the process.[22][23] In September 2007, more than 400 readers posted opinions on Moz on the CEO's facial hair based on six photos he posted. According to the New York Times , he arrived to a conference in Stockholm "unshaven and bristly" based on the crowd-sourced decision.[24]

4. Business

The organization's business model is largely based on inbound marketing. 85% of Moz's revenue comes from SaaS subscriptions.[25]

5. Events

Moz is the host of the annual digital marketing conference MozCon in Seattle every July. MozCon is a three-day, one-track conference centered around SEO, Growth Marketing, Content Marketing, and more.

The content is sourced from: https://handwiki.org/wiki/Software:Moz_(marketing_software)

References

  1. Rand Fishkin interview, https://www.forbes.com/sites/robertadams/2016/09/06/how-rand-fishkin-created-an-seo-sempire-the-story-of-moz-com/#7bf122a67503 
  2. Fishkin, Rand (2017-02-27). "My Last Day at Moz. My First Day at SparkToro.". SparkToro. https://sparktoro.com/blog/last-day-moz-first-day-sparktoro/. Retrieved 2018-03-02. 
  3. Kelly, Meghan (August 6, 2007), "SEOmoz is looking for $25M second round (updated)", VentureBeat, https://venturebeat.com/2011/08/16/seomoz-funding-search/#TEWdDTLLFFmlY7ki.99, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  4. Kelly Clay (5 January 2012). "SEOmoz Raises $18 million In Venture Capital From Foundry Group And Ignition Partners". Forbes.com. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2012/05/01/seomoz-raises-18-million-in-venture-capital-from-foundry-group-and-ignition-partners/. Retrieved 16 June 2012. 
  5. Mickey, B. (2012). Marrying SEO and Social Analytics Tools. Folio: The Magazine For Magazine Management, 41(7), 26.
  6. Miller, Miranda (August 20, 2012), SEOmoz Acquires Twitter Analytics Company Followerwonk, http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2199678/SEOmoz-Acquires-Twitter-Analytics-Company-Followerwonk, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  7. Chris Crum (2012-12-04). "SEOmoz Acquires GetListed For $3 Million". WebProNews. http://www.webpronews.com/seomoz-acquires-getlisted-for-3-million-2012-12. Retrieved 2014-02-21. 
  8. Clay, Kelly (2013-05-29). "SEOmoz Rebrands As Moz, Introduces Moz Analytics". Forbes. https://www.forbes.com/sites/kellyclay/2013/05/29/seomoz-rebrands-as-moz-introduces-moz-analytics/. Retrieved 2014-02-21. 
  9. "SEOmoz", Inc., http://www.inc.com/inc5000/profile/seomoz, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  10. Essential Tools That Everyone In the SEO Industry Should Be Using, Dilate, May 24, 2016 https://www.dilate.com.au/blog/essential-tools-that-everyone-in-the-seo-industry-should-be-using-in-2016/
  11. Schwartz, Barry (January 15, 2014). "Rand Fishkin Steps Down As The CEO Of Moz, Sarah Bird New CEO". Search Engine Land. https://searchengineland.com/rand-fishkin-steps-down-as-the-ceo-of-moz-sarah-bird-new-ceo-181880. Retrieved October 31, 2017. 
  12. Fishkin, Rand. "My Last Day at Moz. My First Day at SparkToro.". https://sparktoro.com/blog/last-day-moz-first-day-sparktoro/. 
  13. Fishkin, Rand. Lost and founder : a painfully honest field guide to the startup world. New York, New York. ISBN 978-0-7352-1332-6. OCLC 999589669.  http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/999589669
  14. "Test Driving the New Keyword Explorer Tool from Moz | WordStream" (in en). https://www.wordstream.com/blog/ws/2016/05/12/moz-keyword-explorer. 
  15. "Moz Open Site Explorer Adds Spam Analysis For Risky Links" (in en-US). Search Engine Land. 2015-03-30. https://searchengineland.com/moz-open-site-explorer-adds-spam-analysis-for-risky-links-217694. 
  16. Brent Chaters (14 October 2011). Mastering Search Analytics: Measuring SEO, SEM and Site Search. O'Reilly Media, Inc.. p. 209. ISBN 978-1-4493-1907-6. https://books.google.com/books?id=osAaZHcEbtkC&pg=PA209. Retrieved 11 October 2012. 
  17. Baker, Loren (July 12, 2006), SEOmoz Page Strength Tool : Replacing Google PageRank?, Search Engine Journal, http://www.searchenginejournal.com/seomoz-page-strength-tool-replacing-google-pagerank/3627/, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  18. Schwartz, Barry (August 6, 2007), Spot Trends With SEOmoz's Popular Searches Tool, Search Engine Land, http://searchengineland.com/spot-trends-with-seomozs-popular-searches-tool-11871, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  19. "The Ultimate Guide to the MozBar | Powered By Search" (in en-US). Powered by Search. 2014-06-03. https://www.poweredbysearch.com/blog/mozbar-seo-extension-chrome-firefox/. 
  20. "Moz Dropping Followerwonk & Moz Content, Refocusing on SEO Products - Search Engine Journal" (in en-US). 2016-08-18. https://www.searchenginejournal.com/moz-dropping-followerwonk-moz-content-refocusing-seo-products/171144/. 
  21. "The New Link Explorer (which will replace Open Site Explorer) is Now in Beta | Moz Q&A | Moz" (in en). https://moz.com/community/q/the-new-link-explorer-which-will-replace-open-site-explorer-is-now-in-beta. 
  22. Woodward, Curt (August 25, 2011), SEOmoz's Fishkin: The Most Transparent Fundraising Saga Ever?, Xconomy, http://www.xconomy.com/seattle/2011/08/25/seomozs-fishkin-the-most-transparent-fundraising-saga-ever/, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  23. Greene, Aislyn (August 29, 2011), SEOmoz CEO Rand Fishkin on his 'misadventures in VC funding', TechFlash/Bizjournals, http://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/blog/techflash/2011/08/seomoz-rand-fishkin-on-vc-funding.html, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  24. Grossman, Anna (April 17, 2008), "To Cut or What? The World Butts In", The New York Times, https://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/17/fashion/17SKIN.html?_r=0, retrieved October 12, 2012 
  25. Jonathan Allen (February 1, 2010). "Distillation of consulting business is a win for SEOmoz & Distilled". Search Engine Watch. http://searchenginewatch.com/article/2051251/Distillation-of-consulting-business-is-a-win-for-SEOmoz-Distilled. Retrieved 2014-02-21. 
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