Strategic Advisory · Marketplace Founders · $1M–$30M GMV
Your marketplace
is growing.
Your margins
aren't.
I help marketplace founders between $1M and $30M GMV build repeatable growth engines in SEO, marketing, operations, product, and team.
Let's work together→Companies I've worked with
Is This You?
The problems no generalist advisor can solve.
Your CAC is climbing
Paid channels are getting expensive and you are not sure which organic levers to pull instead.
Supply quality is inconsistent
Returns and chargebacks are eating your margin, and bad listings erode buyer trust faster than any ad can fix it.
You hire by gut feel
Your team works hard but you have no repeatable process for finding and onboarding the right people.
SEO is basically zero
Google does not know you exist. Your competitors rank for every keyword your buyers search.
Too many priorities
You have 12 legitimate growth ideas and no framework to know which one to work on first.
Ops held together with Slack
Your operations run on spreadsheets and tribal knowledge. One person leaving would break everything.
How I Work
Two engagement models. No retainers for retainers' sake.
Retainer Advisory
Ongoing strategic partnership
Monthly engagement, minimum 3 months. You get direct access to me on your highest-stakes decisions: hiring, prioritization, fundraising, and growth strategy. I stay close enough to your business to catch what you miss.
- →Weekly or biweekly working sessions
- →Async Slack access between calls
- →Strategic reviews and audits
- →Introductions to my network
Project-Based
Defined scope and deliverables
Specific problem, specific output, defined timeline. Audits, growth plans, SEO strategies, hiring frameworks, operations playbooks. You own the output and can run with it.
- →Fixed scope and timeline agreed upfront
- →Clear, tangible deliverables
- →No long-term commitment required
- →Designed to be handed off to your team
Services
Where I can help.
Growth and SEO
Organic acquisition, SEO strategy, marketplace-specific growth loops, SEM, and partnerships.
Learn more →02Product and Operations
Reducing friction across search, buying, and returns. Operational systems that scale without breaking.
Learn more →03Supply-Side Growth
Supply acquisition, onboarding, quality control, and fraud prevention. The side most advisors miss.
Learn more →Engineering
Need to build something, not just plan it?
I work with talented engineers and we operate on a monthly basis to meet your project needs. Marketplace-specific technical execution, without the overhead of hiring full-time.
We have helped founders migrate off no-code platforms, build fraud systems, improve pagespeed, integrate AI, and ship the product work that was stuck on the roadmap. You name it, we have done it.
See What We Can Build→
About Bryan
17 years building the kind of marketplaces you are trying to build.
I have spent my career inside marketplaces, not advising from the outside. I built supply-demand systems, managed operations teams, set growth strategy, and hired through every stage from idea to international scale.
At Getmyboat, I led the company from a regional boat rental marketplace to the #1 boating marketplace in the world. That meant solving every problem you are dealing with now: rising CAC, supply quality, fraud, product-market fit across geographies, and building a team that could keep pace with growth.
Across four marketplaces and 17 years, I have learned that the problems that kill marketplace businesses are almost always predictable. The founders who scale well are not smarter. They make better decisions, faster, with cleaner information.
That is what I help you do.
The Flywheel
Thinking for marketplace founders.
How to Acquire Your First 100 Buyers in a Cold-Start Marketplace
Getting to 100 buyers in a cold-start marketplace is not a growth milestone. It is a proof-of-concept milestone. Here are the channels and tactics that work before you have budget, brand, or traction.
Retention vs. Reactivation: Where to Spend Your Demand-Side Budget
Most marketplace founders spend their demand budget on the wrong problem. Here is how to diagnose whether you have a retention problem or a reactivation problem before you spend anything.
The Conversion Audit Every Marketplace Should Run Before Spending More on Growth
Spending on acquisition before fixing conversion is the most common waste in marketplace growth. Here is the five-stage framework for finding where your marketplace is losing buyers before you add more budget.
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
- What does Marketplace Collective do?
- Marketplace Collective provides strategic advisory and engineering for marketplace founders at $1M to $30M GMV. Services cover growth and SEO, supply-side strategy, product and operations, team and culture, fractional advisory, and hands-on engineering support.
- Who is Bryan Petro?
- Bryan Petro has 17 years of experience building marketplaces. He led Getmyboat to become the number one boating marketplace globally and has built 4 marketplaces from the ground up. He now advises marketplace founders on growth, SEO, supply strategy, product, operations, and team.
- What stage of marketplace is the right fit?
- Marketplace Collective works with founders between $1M and $30M GMV. Typical problems at this stage include climbing CAC with no organic alternative, inconsistent supply quality, near-zero SEO, operations held together with spreadsheets, and hiring without a repeatable process.
- How do engagements work?
- Two models. Retainer advisory is an ongoing monthly engagement with a 3-month minimum that includes weekly or biweekly working sessions and async Slack access. Project-based work has a fixed scope, defined deliverables, and a set timeline with no long-term commitment.
- How do I start working with Bryan?
- Apply through the form at marketplacecollective.co/work-with-me with a short description of your marketplace, its approximate GMV, and your biggest challenge. Bryan takes on a limited number of clients at a time and follows up within 2 business days if it looks like a good fit.
Ready to Grow?
Let's figure out what's holding your marketplace back.
I take on a limited number of clients. If it looks like a good fit, I will follow up within 2 business days.
Let's work together→