Profound
| Private | |
| ISIN | 🆔 |
| Industry | Marketing technology; Artificial intelligence; Software as a service |
| Founded 📆 | August 2024 |
| Founder 👔 | James Cadwallader; Dylan Babbs |
| Headquarters 🏙️ | New York City, United States |
Area served 🗺️ | |
| Members | |
Number of employees | ≈40 (est.) |
| 🌐 Website | https://tryprofound.com |
| 📇 Address | |
| 📞 telephone | |
Profound is an American technology company that develops software to help brands control and measure how they appear in AI-powered search and answer engines. The company creates tools for "Generative Engine Optimization" (also referred to as AI Optimization/AIO), which monitor AI visibility, track how AI bots interact with company websites, and help create content optimized for AI answers.[1][2]
History
Profound was founded in August 2024 in New York City by James Cadwallader and Dylan Babbs, following their participation in the South Park Commons incubator.[3]
In August 2024, the company launched publicly and closed a $3.5 million seed round from investors including Khosla Ventures, Saga, South Park Commons, and several angel investors.[4]
Throughout late 2024 and early 2025, Profound developed its platform for Generative Engine Optimization (AIO), aimed at helping brands appear and be cited in AI-powered answer engines.[5][6]
On June 19, 2025, Profound announced a $20 million Series A round led by Kleiner Perkins with participation from NVIDIA's venture arm and Khosla Ventures to accelerate product development and go-to-market.[7][8][9][10]
On August 12, 2025, Profound closed a $35 million Series B led by Sequoia Capital, with continued backing from prior investors to scale growth and expand its enterprise sales efforts.[11][12]
Products and services
Profound develops software that helps companies understand and control how they appear in AI-powered search engines and answer tools.[13][14] The platform tracks how often and in what context a brand is mentioned by all ten major AI Answer Engines systems, such as ChatGPT, Google AI Mode, Google AI Overviews, Google Gemini, Microsoft Copilot, Perplexity, Grok, Meta AI, DeepSeek, and Claude.[15][16] It also monitors how AI crawlers interact with company websites and provides recommendations for creating content that is more likely to be used in AI-generated responses.[17][12]
Comparable or adjacent platforms in the generative engine optimization and AI visibility space include Evertune, Peeq AI, and Purple Fish, which also develop tools aimed at improving how brands are represented or surfaced in AI-driven answer systems.[18][19][20]
References
- ↑ Shrivastava, Rashi. "Here Comes SEO For AI Search". Forbes. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "How Reddit is influencing brand visibility on AI search—and what marketers can do about it". adage.com. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Szkutak, Rebecca (August 13, 2024). "Move over SEO, Profound is helping brands with AI search optimization". TechCrunch. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "Profound Raises $3.5M to Manage Brands' AI Search Presence". August 13, 2024. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Sarmah, Sumana (June 19, 2025). "Profound Review in 2025: Pros, Cons, and Pricing". Writesonic Blog. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Rankability (August 24, 2025). "Profound AI Review for 2025: Is It Worth the Investment?". www.rankability.com. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "AI Marketing Insights Platform Profound Raises $20M Series A | Built In NYC". Built In. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "Profound raises $20M as Brands Race from Blue Links to AI Answers" (Press release). PR Newswire. June 19, 2025 – via Yahoo Finance.
- ↑ FinSMEs (June 19, 2025). "Profound Raises $20M in Series A Funding". FinSMEs (Press release). Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Only, Subscription (June 24, 2025). "Inside Profound's $20M Pitch Deck, Helping Brands Show Up in AI Search". Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "Profound Secures $35M Series B For AI Search Visibility - Dataconomy". August 13, 2025. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ 12.0 12.1 Goldman, Sharon. "Exclusive: Profound raises $35M as Sequoia backs its ambitious bid to become the Salesforce of AI search". Fortune. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "Meet the 7 Hottest Startups Shaping the Future of AI SEO". August 20, 2025. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "AI agents are taking over e-commerce—how brands can prepare". adage.com. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "How Do You Change a Chatbot's Mind? (Published 2024)". August 30, 2024. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Swant, Sam Bradley, Marty (December 20, 2024). "Marketers have a new audience to worry about — large language models". Digiday. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ Amsive (June 23, 2025). "Amsive Expands Proven Search Capabilities with Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) to Navigate the AI Search Era". Amsive. Retrieved September 3, 2025.
- ↑ "Three Startups Racing to Shape the Future of AI Visibility — Profound, Evertune.AI, and Peeq". Adweek. September 10, 2025. Retrieved October 13, 2025.
- ↑ "From SEO to AIO: How Profound, Purple Fish, and Evertune Are Reimagining Brand Optimization for AI Search". TechCrunch. August 29, 2025. Retrieved October 13, 2025.
- ↑ "Emerging AI Marketing Startups: Profound, Evertune.AI, Peeq, and Purple Fish". VentureBeat. September 2, 2025. Retrieved October 13, 2025.
This article "Profound (company)" is from Wikipedia. The list of its authors can be seen in its historical and/or the page Edithistory:Profound (company). Articles copied from Draft Namespace on Wikipedia could be seen on the Draft Namespace of Wikipedia and not main one.
