Professional matchmaking the eHarmony way

June 29, 8:35 PMTechie to Trendy ExaminerAsa Murphy

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It used to be that if one needed to find a gardener or a nanny, one would open a local tome of the Yellow pages. Once businesses starting moving services on the web, yellowpages.com was created.

Over time a number of business directories sprung up. Among them are craigslist.com, yellowbook.com, servicemagic.com for home improvement, and angieslist.com. In February this year, a company named Bintro launched as an opportunity matchmaking service.

I met with Bintro CTO Marcus Trevisany, who says his company can help individuals and businesses find services, jobs, or products. When asked what differentiates Bintro from other service directories, Mr. Trevisany pointed out a few things.

First, the Bintro system searches for matches 24x7, not in batch mode. Second, the Bintro engine has enough semantic intelligence to understand natural language. And third, Bintro’s matchmaking is done anonymously until the matched parties decide to disclose their personal information, the eHarmony way.

Marcus Trevisani was the VP of engineering for eHarmony prior to joining Bintro; so it’s not a surprise that Bintro places so much emphasis on anonymous introductions. Mr. Trevisani’s immediate goals for Bintro are expanding the service to real estate, apartment finding and vacation getaway planning. He is a firm believer in the company’s potential to expand its continuous matchmaking to any industry.

If you are wondering how much the service costs, it is free. Once a user logs into the site, she can create a profile describing who she is and what she is looking for. The profile gets broadcast out and the user starts getting matches as they become available.

Bintro has an advertising-based model for revenue generation, and also plans expansion in the enterprise segment, where it can be used as a productivity tool.