• by Shankar Gupta , January 16, 2006

Word-of-mouth marketing firm BzzAgent plans to use a new cash infusion to expand by upgrading its reporting architecture and hiring new executives, the company said Friday. Late last week, BzzAgent announced that it had received $13.5 million in venture capital funds from General Catalyst Partners and IDG Ventures, Boston.

BzzAgent retains volunteer field agents, or BzzAgents, who both talk up merchandise and listen for word on the street about products, then file reports back to the company. The agents, who are unpaid, are required to disclose their connection with a word-of-mouth marketing firm.

Currently, the company typically handles between 4,000 and 9,000 of their reports every week; BzzAgent founder and CEO Dave Balter said the company wants to expand that capability. "The more we scale the system and the more we grow the network, the more we're going to need to process the reports," he said.

BzzAgents now make reports by logging into the company's Web site, and filing on a Web-based system. With the capital, the firm plans to explore building out new methods of filing, including via telephone and SMS. In addition to building out its architecture, Balter said the firm plans to hire in several executive- and manager-level positions.