BranchOut

BranchOut was a professional networking service designed as a Facebook application, founded in July 2010 by serial entrepreneur Rick Marini. The concept arose when Marini, then CEO of SuperFan, needed to find a mutual connection at a specific company and realized the potential of leveraging Facebook's vast social graph for professional purposes. He pivoted his team from SuperFan to develop the application, which aimed to help users find jobs, recruit employees, and network with professional contacts directly within the Facebook ecosystem. By March 2012, it had become the largest professional networking service on the platform.

The company's primary offering was a Facebook app that allowed users to create professional profiles and tap into their existing friend network to discover connections at companies of interest. It aggregated over 3 million job listings and provided features for companies, such as Levi's, to post job openings directly on their Facebook Fan Pages. BranchOut's business model was centered on challenging LinkedIn by providing access to a much larger user base on Facebook, with the premise that closer personal connections could be more effective for job seeking. The service monetized through enhanced features for recruiters, allowing them to search for and contact potential candidates within the Facebook network while protecting users' personal profile information.

BranchOut secured significant funding, including a $6 million Series A in September 2010 and an $18 million Series B in May 2011, attracting a total of $49 million from investors like Accel Partners, Redpoint Ventures, and Norwest Venture Partners. Despite rapid initial growth, which saw user numbers jump from 10,000 to 250,000 in early 2011, the company struggled with user retention. Acknowledging a lack of focus on keeping users engaged, the user base declined, leading to a pivot towards a 'workplace chat' application. Ultimately, BranchOut sold its assets to HR software company 1-Page in November 2014, and its staff was acquired by Hearst.

Keywords: professional networking, Facebook application, recruitment platform, job search, social recruiting, Rick Marini, career networking, online recruitment, professional profiles, corporate recruiting, startup, venture capital, 1-Page acquisition, social graph, LinkedIn competitor, HR technology