Social marketing tool Encore Alert, co-founded by a Georgetown alum and a current student, announced March 17 that it raised an impressive $390K seed round.

CEO James Li (MSB ’13), VP of Product Tammy Cho (MSB ’16) and Chief Technical Officer Felipe Lopes, who joins Encore from Brazil, co-founded Encore Alert. The company aids marketing teams at small to mid-sized brands by scanning brand mentions in social media and sending their customers actionable alerts. The company’s round of investing started in September and ended March 17.

“We’re extremely thrilled to have these investors on board and to continue leveraging their great expertise and advice,” Li stated in the company’s March 17 release.

D.C.-based NextGen Angels led Encore Alert’s seed round, a small round of investing in a company in its earliest stages, and investors included Clarabridge CEO Sid Banerjee, Google Manager of Global Social Strategy Tyler Peterson and Virginia’s Center for Innovative Technology, among many others.

“Every day, Encore Alert learns what actions drive results for marketers, and allows the platform to become more predictive. Over time, Encore is becoming smarter.”

The company plans to use the bulk of the funding on new employee costs,” NextGen Angels Managing Director Brett Gibson said in a statement on Encore Alert’s website.

“We’re trying to definitely hire more people, get to a team of about eight people by the end of one year. The money is supposed to last us for one year,” Cho told The Hoya. The company hopes to hire more developers as well as a marketing and salesperson. Some of the funding will also be used for web services associated with the product itself.

The company changed its name from Encore to Encore Alerts last year and transitioned into its new business model after realizing that nonprofits were not willing to pay enough to sustain the business. Encore Alert’s current clients include Sweetgreen, NASA and the Consumer Electronics Association.

In the case of CEA, Encore’s services will involve sending alerts every day to multiple team members regarding different opportunities that could be taken advantage of, according to Li’s statement to InTheCapital.

Cho believes the way the company’s business model fits the needs of the market attracted investors.

“The problem that we are trying to solve is there’s so much noise out there, and it’s hard for midsized markets to handle all of these tweets, Facebook posts, etc. coming through at once,” Cho said. “I think they feel that we are the right team. We want to be able to just help marketers be able to act on data easily.”

Investors affirm Encore Alert’s usefulness.

“As a marketer, finding actionable insights across social platforms is a tedious task. Encore Alert enables our marketing

and customer support teams to understand social insights as they happen, which allows us to seamlessly take action at the right time,” Sonny Ganguly, investor and CMO of WeddingWire, said in a statement on Encore Alert’s website.

Encore Alert is currently a finalist in the University of Maryland’s Cupid Cup, a student entrepreneurship competition hosted by the university in partnership with Under Armour CEO Kevin Plank, with a prize of $75,000.

Cho cited the importance of support from the university community.

“We really couldn’t have come this far without the help of the Georgetown entrepreneurship community,” she said. “We’ve been able to connect with so many of our great customers, mentors and investors through the Georgetown Entrepreneurs-in-Residence, professors, alumni and grad students.”

Members of the Georgetown community are delighted with the success of Li and Cho.

“James Li and Tammy Cho are two amazing Georgetown entrepreneurs. They’ve worked really hard and made a lot of progress and investors are betting on their future success. It looks a good bet,” Founding Director of the Georgetown Entrepreneurship Initiative Jeff Reid said. “They adapt well when they need to, they listen to the advice of coaches and they learn from their own experiences. … Now they enter a whole new phase. They’re no longer searching for a business model — now it’s all about growing.”