By: Joey Pereira

Most founders know when they lose a deal.

There is a meeting that does not go well. A follow-up that gets no response. A conversation that trails off into silence. The loss is visible even when the reason is not.

But Aditya Lamba has spent years thinking about a different kind of loss. The quieter kind. The deals that never become deals because the other person searched, found nothing, and never reached out in the first place.

These are the losses that leave no trace. The investor who almost sent an email. The enterprise customer who almost booked a demo. The strategic partner who almost picked up the phone. All of them stopped by the same thing. A search that returned silence.

And the founder never knew any of it happened.

The Partnership That Disappeared Before It Began

Aditya tells a story about a founder in the logistics space who had been quietly building for 2 years. Strong product. Growing customer base. The kind of traction that tends to attract attention from larger companies looking to partner with or acquire promising startups in their space.

A business development lead at a major industry player came across a reference to their product in a customer conversation. Got curious. Searched for the company.

Found almost nothing.

A website. A LinkedIn page. A Crunchbase entry. No press. No features. No story that validated this company as something worth a serious conversation.

The business development lead moved on. Found another company in the same space that had a stronger media presence. Reached out to them instead.

The founder never knew the conversation had almost happened. Never knew a partnership that could have changed their trajectory had been a single search away. Never knew that two years of building had been invisible to the exact kind of person they most needed to find them.

“That is the loss that haunts me most,” Aditya says. “Not the deal that fell through after a meeting. The deal that never became a meeting because someone searched and found nothing, and quietly moved on. That founder will never know what they lost. And that is the hardest part.”

The Search That Happens Without You

There is a version of business development that most founders never fully account for.

It happens at night. It happens on weekends. It happens in the five minutes between meetings when someone who could change your business gets curious and types your name into Google.

That search is happening right now for founders who do not know it is happening. And the outcome of that search, whether the person searching finds something worth stopping for or closes the tab after thirty seconds, is shaping the trajectory of businesses in ways that never show up in any pipeline report.

Aditya built Targe Media because he could not stop thinking about all the opportunities being lost in those searches. All the conversations that never started. All the partnerships that never formed. All the investments that never got made. Not because the founders were not building something worth paying attention to, but because there was nothing to find when the right person went looking.

“Your visibility on Google matters more than most founders realize,” he says. “You never know which investor is watching you or how many opportunities will open up the moment someone sees your feature in a major publication. One article in the right place can change the entire conversation around your business.”

Why Earned Media Is Different From Every Other Marketing Channel

Most marketing channels require you to know who you are targeting. You run ads to an audience you define. You send emails to a list you build. You reach out to contacts you already have.

Earned media works differently. It puts your story in places where people who don’t yet know you are already paying attention. And when those people get curious about you for any reason and search, they find something that was already there waiting for them.

That is a fundamentally different kind of reach. Not targeted outreach. Ambient credibility. The kind that compounds quietly over months and years, building a presence that attracts the people you most need to find you without you having to know in advance who they are.

The business development lead discovered that the logistics founder, through a customer reference, was not in any database. Was not on any targeted list. Was not reachable through any conventional outreach. But they searched. And if they had found something worth stopping for, the story would have ended completely differently.

“Coverage is not just visibility,” Aditya says. “It is proof. When a credible publication tells your story, it changes how people show up to the table with you. Whether that is an investor, a customer, or a potential partner. It changes the dynamic before you even open your mouth.”

How Targe Media Works

Founders share their story. Targe Media makes sure it reaches the right places. The rest happens quietly, in those searches that occur without the founder in the room.

“We handle everything from content creation to publication so you can focus on running your business,” Aditya says. “You cannot know in advance who is going to search for you tonight. But you can make sure they find something worth stopping for when they do.”

Visit www.targemedia.com to see exactly how it works.

The Founder Who Finally Stopped Losing Deals They Never Knew They Were In

The logistics founder eventually found out, through a roundabout connection, that the partnership had almost happened. That a business development lead had searched and found nothing and moved on.

They called Aditya the same day.

Within weeks, Targe Media had built them a media presence that told their story in the places the right people were already paying attention. The searches that had been returning silence started returning something real.

Three months later, a business development lead from another major player found them. Found three features in publications that they recognized. Reached out.

The conversation they never knew they had been missing finally happened.

“I am not here to build hype,” Aditya says. “I am here to make sure that when the right person searches for you, they find something worth stopping for. That is all it takes sometimes. Just being found at the right moment.”

Somewhere tonight, someone is searching for a company like yours.

Make sure they find you.

Visit www.targemedia.com to learn how Aditya Lamba and Targe Media can help.