Ben Behrouzi

Ben Behrouzi
Born Behnam Behrouzi
(1981-01-23) January 23, 1981
Tehran, Iran
Occupation Silicon Valley Entrepreneur and Technologist
Founder, President & CEO of DotNext Inc. and Reply.com
Home town Danville, California

Ben Behrouzi (born January 23, 1981 in Tehran, Iran) was raised in California, attending the University of California, Davis.

Early life

Behrouzi was born in Tehran, Iran on January 23, 1981 as a Bahá'í. At age 4½, his family escaped the growing persecution of the Bahá'ís in Iran.[1] With the help of smugglers, his family secretly fled their birth country through the night into Pakistan.[2] His family lived in Lahore, Pakistan for 18 months before moving to Saint Petersburg, Alaska with only $50 to their name. After several months Behrouzi moved to California where he attended the University of California at Davis and studied Philosophy.[1] Behrouzi actively speaks about the history and turmoil of the Baha’i Faith through his blog and articles.[3]

Business Ventures

Behrouzi has founded a number of businesses although currently all companies that he founded are out of business.

Behrouzi founded DotNext and served as the President & CEO.[4] In his late teens Behrouzi founded his first company.[5] His past companies have included Reply.com, iMotors.com, AgentConnect.com, OpenAuto.com, CarClub.com, ePerks, RealtyNow.com, iCastle.com, iHype.com, Brabus Ventures and LeapFish.com.[6]

In 2001 at the age of 20, Behrouzi founded Reply.com (with cofounders John Truchard and Payam Zamani), a performance based marketing company targeting the automotive, real estate, home improvement and lending markets. Behrouzi served as Chief Technology Officer and Chief of Product at Reply.com which achieved several million in funding and over $30 million in annual revenues.[7] During his tenure, the company produced performance based marketing brands including Reply! Real Estate, iMotors.com, AgentConnect.com, OpenAuto.com, CarClub.com, RealtyNow.com, iCastle.com.[5] In February 2010 Reply.com announced the filing of an S1 for a $60 million IPO.

In Q4 of 2006 Behrouzi phased out of his operational duties at Reply.com and in 2007 founded his next business venture DotNext, a privately held performance based marketing company offering search engine marketing, social media branding and search engine optimization services under independent brands including LeapFish and iHype.com.[1] In January 2007 DotNext raised $2 million in financing from Behrouzi who remained Chairman and CEO of the company.[8]

Accolades

Behrouzi has been featured as a “Multi-Million Success Story” by Young Money.[7] He has also made appearances on Fox Business Network, NBC Bay Area and FastCompany.tv.[9] During his period at Reply.com Behrouzi was also recognized in the “Young Millionaires: Class of 2004” by Entrepreneur Magazine.[10]

Controversy

Ben Behrouzi's company LeapFish (which has a telemarketing team consists of 80 sales persons[11][12]) has had a mixed reception from users of sitepoint forums,[13] from bloggers and other regular web users.[14][15] LeapFish has been widely criticized on the internet for its questionable business model and the aggressiveness of its sales team which has also been accused of committing click fraud.[16]

Ben Behrouzi's Realty reward program ePerks was widely criticized over a controversial lawsuit[17] which Brabus Ventures filed against minor blogger Vlad Zablotskyy[18][19][20] on June 4, 2008[21] which led to blogger Greg Swann announcing a legal defense fund[22] and a general community led re-branding of the company as eJerks. Brabus Ventures asserted that Zablotskyy had defamed the company by stating that it had falsely accused Zablotskyy of being a child molester on Yahoo! Answers. Although the allegedly defamatory copy does not directly attribute the molestation charges other bloggers have attempted to tie IP addresses assosiated with Behrouzi Brabus Ventures with the claims.[23][24]

On June 7, 2008 Trace Richardson published evidence that strongly suggested that Ben Behrouzi's company Brabus Ventures had plagiarized the content of its Company Values and Culture web pages from Chevron.com and Mervyns.com respectively.[25]

In 2014, Ben announced NEO SuperWater, it claims "NEO SUPERWATER™ is a reverse osmosis purified, high pH structured water with the three active benefits of alkaline, electrolytes and antioxidants. The product’s three combined benefits help the body hydrate, balance and replenish faster than traditional bottled waters. NEO is 100% fluoride free, lead free and BPA free."[26] According to a chemist who did a review on Amazon named super burreto, this product does not live up to its claims.[27]

Lastly, UrthBox which has also received complaints on BBB for bad service, mis representation. He also likes to use services and then chargeback on his Amex card essentially committing theft of services. He is a known spammer utilizing terrible 3rd party lists full of SPAM traps. He continually tries to re-dispute the charges if he loses the chargebacks.

References

  1. 1 2 3 "Background | Ben Behrouzi Blog". Benbehrouzi.org. January 23, 1981. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  2. ↑ "25 Years After Escaping Iran | Web 2.0 Journal". Web2.sys-con.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  3. ↑ "Ben Behrouzi's Blog". Benbehrouzi.org. April 6, 2010. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  4. ↑ Archived April 10, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  5. 1 2 "Background | Ben Behrouzi's MaxStartup". Maxstartup.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  6. ↑ "Companies | Ben Behrouzi Blog". Benbehrouzi.org. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  7. 1 2 "Founder of LeapFish.com: Multi-Million Success Story". Youngmoney.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  8. ↑ Archived May 21, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  9. ↑ Archived March 11, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  10. ↑ "Page 5 Sales, business – Young Millionaires: Class of 2004". Entrepreneur.com. November 1, 2004. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  11. ↑ https://web.archive.org/web/20091015223902/http://www.benbehrouzi.org/2009/02/04/leapfish-gets-second-lashing-from-techcrunc/. Archived from the original on October 15, 2009. Retrieved May 28, 2010. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  12. ↑ "Leapfish Launches Another Meta Search Engine No One Will Ever Use". TechCrunch. November 20, 2008. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  13. ↑ "LeapFish.com". Sitepoint.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  14. ↑ Archived March 10, 2010, at the Wayback Machine.
  15. ↑ http://www.thebransonpro.com/leapfish-sucks/
  16. ↑ "The LeapFish Chronicles: "Admitting To Click Fraud Is An Interesting Business Model."". TechCrunch. February 3, 2009. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  17. ↑ "Brabus Ventures v. Zablotskyy | Citizen Media Law Project". Citmedialaw.org. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  18. ↑ "BloodhoundBlog.com | Memo to ePerks.com: You idiots! Trying to censor a real estate weblogger is a poor way to defend your reputation – such as it is… | National real estate marketing and technology blog | Realtors and real estate, mortgage and investment news". Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  19. ↑ "Brabus Ventures Corporation v. Volodymyr Zablotskyy". Realestateradiousa.com. June 15, 2008. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  20. ↑ "MLRC | Lawsuits Against Bloggers". Medialaw.org. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  21. ↑ "Barabus vs Zablotskyy". Scribd.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  22. ↑ "BloodhoundBlog.com | Support the Vlad Zablotskyy Legal Defense Fund: A real estate weblogger is being throttled by corporate bully ePerks.com. The free speech rights you will be fighting for are your own… | National real estate marketing and technology blog | Realtors and real estate, mortgage and investment news". Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  23. ↑ "Brabus Ventures v. Zablotskyy | Citizen Media Law Project". Citmedialaw.org. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  24. ↑ "ePerks IP Address Link to Vlad Zablotzkyy: When the Hunter Becomes the Prey | BrokerScience Mortgage Marketing Blog". Brokerscience.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  25. ↑ "Ben Behrouzi Updates Company "Values" and "Culture" Web Pages. Only One Problem: They're Stolen. | BrokerScience Mortgage Marketing Blog". Brokerscience.com. Retrieved October 20, 2011.
  26. ↑ "NEO SUPERWATER Launches Its Super Water at The 2014 Fancy Food Show in New York".
  27. ↑ "Neo superwater on Amazon".

External links

Articles by Ben Behrouzi

Television appearances

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