When Jay Bean was struggling to make his American Fork-based company, OrangeSoda, a success, he faced the usual funding challenges and growing pains of any ambitious business.
But things were a bit easier for Bean than they might be for others, because he'd been through it all before.
Bean's first company, Ah-ha.com, a family-friendly pay-for-placement search engine, experienced significant challenges in its early years, including a moment in 2000 when Bean and his fellow executives had to tell their 50 employees that the company had run out of money.
About 30 of those workers showed up the next day, demonstrating their faith in both the product and in the ability of the company's leadership to see them through that difficult time. Their loyalty was rewarded when, in 2003, Ah-ha was sold in a deal that provided significant shareholder return.
This time around, Bean and his partners, Derek Miner and Chris Finken, focused OrangeSoda on providing small-business owners with the tools they need to promote their businesses through major search engines like Google, Yahoo! and MSN.
Though these search engines have a global reach, OrangeSoda helps people searching locally find the goods and services they need. While its competitors focus mainly on managing paid search advertising campaigns, OrangeSoda expands that service to include a firm's rank in natural and local search listings.
That expertise is thanks to innovative technology developed by OrangeSoda, making Bean's company a leader in understanding where small businesses can find true value in their online marketing efforts.