May When his last employer up and moved to Florida in 2004, Bernard May decided to stick around rather than move his family from the Calabasas neighborhood they all loved. With a background in technology and marketing, he decided to launch his own Internet advertising business. It was a wise decision. Seven years later, the company he launched from his Calabasas garage, National Positions, is the Valley’s eighth fastest growing private company with $10.9 million in sales in 2010, up 165.9 percent over a three-year period. He started with a handful of local clients such as Woodland Hills-based TBDental, who wanted to understand how online advertising could help their small cosmetic dentistry business. He added other local companies such as Fretted Americana, which sells vintage guitars and Well MD, a Tarzana based company that sells vitamins online. “It was a lot of hard work initially,” May said. “My first clients were really my friends.” As the business grew, he graduated to bigger clients such as Land Rover, LG and Samsung. Today, National has offices in the UK, Israel, South Africa and India and employs 700 people globally. Like the other Valley internet advertising and SEO companies, National Positions has benefited from the movement online by not only the largest, but now the smallest companies who are ditching the Yellow Pages in favor of a robust on-line presence. Advertisers — even small mom and pop shops — have discovered that placing high on Google or Google’s local listings is critical. And with online advertising and SEO, these clients can pretty accurately measure the return on their investment dollars, May said. Headquarters: Agoura Hills CeO: Bernard May three-year growth rate: 165.9 percent REVENUE 2010: $10.9 million revenue 2009: $6.9 million Revenue 2008: $4.12 million As the business has changed, so has National. These days, clients are looking for better mobile marketing approaches, conversion optimization — which involves helping clients to not only rank higher on Google, but to convert those rankings into higher leads or sales, and with helping clients build a powerful presence in social media. The next hot new business opportunity will be reputation management, May said. With so many people posting comments about businesses, it can be a full-time job to stay ahead of the naysayers. “We counter them by positing as much positive information as we can,” he said. “The business is constantly evolving,” May added. “We have to keep up with all the changes.” He thinks business will double or triple in the coming years, and with that, the challenge will be keeping up with fast growth. But that’s one problem May doesn’t mind.
