Introducing Irish Startup ‘Weedle’
The New Irish/American Networking site with global ambition Weedle.com talks to startups.ie about their business…
Company: Weedle
Website: http://weedle.com
Founders: Iain Mac Donald, Michael Gallagher
Age: < one year
Based: Dublin, Palo Alto
Staff Number: 20
Date started: Beta site live March 2010
Tell us what your business does?
Weedle enables people to get found by people that need their skill. You can easily create a skill page where you can showcase your skill using text or rich media such as imagery, video or presentations. Weedle enables you to get onto the first page of Google. Weedle also enables you to promote your skill through your family, friends, contacts and social networks. Each time someone searches for your skill they can see in how many ways they are connected with you and what people they know and trust say about you.
Where did the idea for your business come from?
Our founders noticed that while searching for people with skills they needed that there was no single large scale or simple option for people to promote their skills through their social and business networks or to the world through the search engines. There are millions of people around the globe who have under-utilised skills and are looking for low cost effective ways to promote them. At the same time there are millions of people around the globe who are searching for skills from people that they know to be credible. Traditional search and advertising leaves you dealing with strangers. Word of mouth can be slow and ineffective at finding the right person.
There are no other social utilities that optimize for people’s skills. If I am searching for someone I know I search for them by name on other social networks. I can use Weedle to search for people with the skills I need who I know I can trust because of our shared connections.
People trust their real friends far more than anonymous strangers. Weedle enables anyone to tap into their trusted networks of family, friends, social and business connections to find credible people with the skills they need.
Weedle is a free service for anyone anywhere who wants to get found by people who need their skills. It is also free to use for anyone searching for skills they can trust.
Have you always wanted to run your own business?
Iain Mac Donald is a serial entrepreneur having successfully established several other businesses in Ireland over the past ten years, including Perlico which was sold to Vodafone in 2007 for €70m.
Which entrepreneurs do you admire?
Dr. Michael Smurfitt
Dr. Jim Mountjoy
(both of whom are investors in our business)
How have you promoted your business?
The beta site has only been promoted through word of mouth. Fifteen Irish bloggers were introduced to the website on the evening prior to the beta site going live. We continue to keep our community and the public up to date on our activities through our own blog at http://blog.weedle.com
What has your growth been like?
The Weedle beta has been live for just nine weeks and already several thousand people have joined from 52 countries across the globe. This growth has been witnessed on the back of practically no publicity, but has grown singularly through word of mouth.
What are your hopes for 2010?
We are growing our community organically through word of mouth and continually listening to our users’s feedback on all aspects of the website. In 2010 we will be focused on ensuring that the platform continues to deliver on our promise that it will enable anyone anywhere to get found by people who need their skills.
