Offerti

Offerti.nl is an online quotation platform founded in 2009 in the Netherlands by Daan Sanders, Bram Ellens, Koen van Santvoord, and Marten van der Veen. The founders identified a shift in the market away from traditional business directories, recognizing that entrepreneurs were increasingly seeking to directly compare service providers. This insight led to the creation of a demand-driven platform where businesses and individuals can post jobs and receive quotes from a wide array of professionals.

The company's establishment is closely linked to Harvest, an online strategy consulting agency co-founded by Bram Ellens and Daan Sanders. Offerti.nl, along with another startup, served as a practical testing ground for Harvest's strategic concepts and market analysis. Both Ellens and Sanders brought valuable experience from eBay, with Sanders having worked at its Dutch subsidiary Marktplaats.nl and Ellens in business development. This background in online marketplaces and strategy was foundational to Offerti.nl's development. Bram Ellens also has a background as a strategy consultant at Roland Berger. Koen van Santvoord, another co-founder, is an experienced freelance journalist and author specializing in entrepreneurship and finance, and he identifies himself as a co-owner of the platform.

The platform operates by allowing clients to post a request for proposals for free. These requests are then reviewed and forwarded to relevant professionals registered on the site. These professionals, in turn, pay a fee to submit their quotes to the potential clients. This model ensures that only serious and relevant offers are presented to the client. The client can then compare the quotes based on price and quality to select the best provider. The platform caters to a wide range of business services, connecting clients with bookkeepers, web developers, translators, coaches, and mediators, among others in 15 different professional fields. By 2014, the platform had already attracted over 25,000 professionals and was facilitating several hundred quotes daily. More recent figures indicate that the number of affiliated professionals has grown to over 50,000.

Keywords: online marketplace, professional services, quotation platform, lead generation, Dutch startups, business-to-business, B2B services, freelance marketplace, service procurement, vendor comparison, Daan Sanders, Bram Ellens, Koen van Santvoord, Harvest, business directory alternative, professional quotes, service marketplace, online proposals, Netherlands, Amsterdam, small business services, independent professionals, client acquisition