QuinStreet, Inc. is a publicly traded

marketing Marketing is the process of exploring, creating, and delivering value to meet the needs of a target market in terms of goods and services; potentially including selection of a target audience; selection of certain attributes or themes to emph ...

company based in

Foster City, California Foster City is a city located in San Mateo County, California. The 2020 census put the population at 33,805, an increase of more than 10% over the 2010 census figure of 30,567. Foster City is sometimes considered to be part of Silicon Valley ...

. QuinStreet offers performance-based marketing and

search engine marketing Search engine marketing (SEM) is a form of Internet marketing that involves the promotion of websites by increasing their visibility in search engine results pages (SERPs) primarily through paid advertising. SEM may incorporate search engine op ...

services. QuinStreet was founded in 1999, and has launched or acquired dozens of websites and other media properties. The company was investigated in 2012 by 20 U.S. states for using deceptive marketing tactics to promote for-profit schools to U.S. veterans. QuinStreet agreed to pay $2.5 million and made several changes to its practices to end the investigation. Despite the sanctions, as late as 2016 QuinStreet continued gathering information which it sold to

for-profit colleges Proprietary colleges are for-profit colleges and universities. They are operated by their owners or investors, rather than a not-for-profit institution, religious organization, or government. Because they are not funded by tax money, their long ...

History

QuinStreet was formed in 1999 by Doug Valenti (chairman and CEO). Bronwyn Syiek, another founding team member, was president and COO. The company was first profitable in 2002 with revenues of $13 million; by April 2009, QuinStreet reported $300 million in annual revenues and approximately 450 employees. In February 2015,

Nielsen NetRatings Nielsen Media Research (NMR) is an American firm that measures media audiences, including television, radio, theatre, films (via the AMC Theatres MAP program), and newspapers. Headquartered in New York City, it is best known for the Nielsen rat ...

named QuinStreet the eighth top advertiser, after Education Dynamics, USA & StudentsLeads, India spending $9.4 million on 1.9 billion ads viewed. QuinStreet Inc. acquired U.S. Citizens for Fair Credit Card Terms, Inc, which operated the CardRatings.com website in August 2008 for an initial cash payment of $10.4 million. In the beginning of August 2009, QuinStreet Inc. used some of its cash reserves to acquire the Internet.com division of

WebMediaBrands Mecklermedia (formerly Internet.com LLC, Jupitermedia Inc., Mediabistro Inc. and WebMediaBrands Corporation) was a U.S.-based corporation. The original WebMediaBrands was established in 1994, and headquartered in New York. Founded by Alan M. ...

Inc. for $18 million. Among the sites that QuinStreet Inc gained with the acquisition of Internet.com were InternetNews.com, Datamation.com, Webopedia.com, ServerWatch.com, EnterpriseNetworkingPlanet, SmallBusinessComputing.com, LinuxPlanet.com and Developer.com. In September 2009, QuinStreet purchased Insure.com for $16 million. The company's other financial-services properties include MoneyRates.com, Get Rich Slowly, ConsumerismCommentary.com and HSH.com. An

initial public offering An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investme ...

on February 11, 2010, raised $150 million, with the shares listed on Nasdaq under the symbol QNST. In India, QuinStreet operates IndiaEducation.net, IndiaEduNews.net, and ExamResults.net, which it acquired in 2011 by incorporating QuinStreet India Marketing And Media Private Limited (QSIMM.) In September 2011, QuinStreet acquired the IT Business Edge (ITBE) network of web publications In February 2012, the company acquired the media assets of

Ziff Davis Ziff Davis, Inc. is an American digital media and internet company. First founded in 1927 by William Bernard Ziff Sr. and Bernard George Davis, the company primarily owns technology-oriented media websites, online shopping-related services, an ...

"Enterprise", which included eWeek.com, CIOInsight.com, Baseline.com, ChannelInsider.com and WebBuyersGuide.com, and others. In 2018, the company acquired AmOne, an online marketing company. In 2019, Quinstreet acquired CloudControlMedia, LLC and MyBankTracker.com, LLC. For its second quarter of fiscal 2013, the Company reported total revenue of $71.8 million. Adjusted EBITDA was $11.2 million, or 16% of revenue. For its fiscal 2016, QuinStreet reported total revenue of $297.7 million Quinstreet reported first quarter fiscal 2017 revenue of $73.4 million with an EPS of $0.01, missing analyst targets. For its fiscal year ending June 30, 2018, QuinStreet reported net revenue of $404 million and basic net income per share of $0.34. Net revenue for fiscal year ending June 30, 2019, was reported to be $455 million with basic net income per share of $1.26.

Partnerships

The company has partnerships with other organizations including Bob Vila and Credit.com.

Deceptive advertising investigation and settlement

In June 2012, the company was under investigation by the Attorneys General's offices of 15 separate US states, led by the

Attorney General of Kentucky The Attorney General of Kentucky is an office created by the Kentucky Constitution. (Ky.Const. § 91). Under Kentucky law, they serve several roles, including the state's chief prosecutor (KRS 15.700), the state's chief law enforcement officer (K ...

, Jack Conway. The company was accused of targeting military veterans with deceptive recruiting practices for its for-profit school clients. The company agreed to pay a $2.5 million fine and relinquish the website GIBill.com. Quinstreet's education clients have included

Art Institutes The Art Institutes (AI) are a collection of private for-profit art schools in the United States. Since 2019, the schools have been owned by Education Principle Foundation (aka Colbeck Foundation), a non-profit that also owns South Universi ...

DeVry University DeVry University () is a private for-profit university with its headquarters in Naperville, Illinois. It was founded in 1931 by Herman A. DeVry and is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. DeVry is predominantly an online educator but ...

Kaplan University Kaplan University (KU) was a private online for-profit university owned by Kaplan, Inc., a subsidiary of Graham Holdings Company. It was predominantly a distance learning institution, maintaining 14 ground locations across the United States. T ...

University of Phoenix University of Phoenix (UoPX) is a private for-profit university headquartered in Phoenix, Arizona. Founded in 1976, the university confers certificates and degrees at the certificate, associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degree level ...

, Westwood, and other

.https://www.help.senate.gov/imo/media/for_profit_report/PartII/DeVry.pdf

References

External links

* * {{Finance links , name = QuinStreet , symbol = QNST , hoovers = QuinStreet_Inc.bd242fb6cb1fa1e1 , sec_cik = 1117297 Companies based in Foster City, California Internet properties established in 1999 Marketing companies established in 1999 2010 initial public offerings Companies listed on the Nasdaq Online advertising services and affiliate networks 1999 establishments in California