Obviously here at BostInnovation we love good content and innovative media plays, so we are thrilled to have the heads up that Good Men Media, which launched in Boston in March, has just secured $500,000 in funding from a handful of Angel investors.
The company’s flagship property, The Good Men Project Magazine, creates content focused on the question, “What does it mean to be a good man?” And perhaps part of what makes this up-and-coming media company so special is that it is actually led by a woman. The content and discussions you can expect from the publication include racy, and otherwise untouched subjects like, “Not Now, Honey. I’m Late for Gay Softball,” “The Top Ten Good Men Politicians,” “I Blow-dry My Son’s Hair,” and “Mostly Straight, Most of the Time.”
The Good Men Project started in 2009 as a book and discussion by Tom Matlack, who now sits on the board and has contributed to this Angel round. CEO Lisa Hickey joined in March of this year and helped build its social media platform, discussions, and brand. The publication’s edgy content alongside what Hickey describes as a “vastly underserved demographic of thoughtful, intelligent men” has drawn nearly a million pageviews this past month. Key to the property’s early success has been its keen focus on discussion, community, and multiple revenue streams. The company works with their community to sell books, films, apps and a theatrical production centered on men’s issues, which means this media company is not relying solely on advertising to thrive.
We had a chance to ask CEO Lisa Hickey a bit more about her decision to build Good Men Media out of Boston instead of media-heavy NYC, as well as her decision to secure Angel funding instead of from an institutional investor.
On the Boston front, Hickey offered, “We’re not an old-media company and we’re not following the same path. Our roots are in Boston, the founding team is from Boston, and we don’t see the fact that Boston is our home base as any hindrance to our growth potential.”
As for their path to funding, Hickey shared that she started with a particular set of Angels that she knew had seen the company’s growth and knew her potential in executing for results. Of the pitch Hickey remarked, “It was a relatively easy pitch to those people – we just had to quantify with actual numbers what they were already seeing for themselves in terms of brand awareness, compelling content, and network growth. Being in Boston actually helped us in that way, because word quickly spread throughout the private investor community about what we were doing.”
Investors in Good Men Media include project founder Tom Matlack and private angel investors Grant Gund, managing partner of Coppermine Capital; Jack Roberts, CEO and president of Consert Inc.; Mike Jackson, former partner at Lehman Brothers and founding partner of Ironwood and Housatonic Partners; and Michael Margolis, founder of the investment management firm Maric LS, LLC, and others.
Make sure you check out Good Men Media’s best practices in community engagement and conversations by following them on Facebook and Twitter.
