Movember SEO Moustache Competition Raises $17,000 For Cancer Research

What started out as a friendly rivalry between Bing’s Duane Forester and Google’s Matt Cutts  resulted in $17,000 for the Movember, a moustache campaign to raise awareness and funds for cancer research, specifically prostate cancer. Mike Halvorsen set up the competition while at SMX Advanced. There were 83 participants in the Search For The Cure […]

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What started out as a friendly rivalry between Bing’s Duane Forester and Google’s Matt Cutts  resulted in $17,000 for the Movember, a moustache campaign to raise awareness and funds for cancer research, specifically prostate cancer. Mike Halvorsen set up the competition while at SMX Advanced.

There were 83 participants in the Search For The Cure team, many familiar faces from the search community. Duane Forester, the team captain, raised $3,667. Matt Cutts raised $3,721. SEOs were exchanging photos as well as quite a few digs at each other all month via Twitter using the #seostache hashtag. We’ve been positing mustache progress throughout Movember on our Facebook page.

Duane Mike And Matt Sporting Their Final Staches1

Duane, Mike and Matt sporting their final 'staches for Movember.

Along side the Search For The Cure team, Halvorsen also coordinated The Manta Moustaches, which raised $3,000.

According to Movember.com:

  • 1 in 6 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime
  • 1 in 8 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer
  • Every 15 minutes, a man dies of prostate cancer in the US.
  • Prostate cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer death in men
  • In 2010, there were only 64,927 Americans who participated in Movember, but they raised $7.5m.

The numbers from this year are not in yet, but given the amount of press it has received this year, it should be an even bigger year. Of course, donations are accepted year round.

Halvorsen says, “Next Movember, I would like to see more people in our industry grow a mustache for a good cause. Men’s Health issues often go overlooked. What better way to bring awareness than with a lip sweater?”


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Monica Wright
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Monica Wright serves as Vice President of Growth and Engagement for Third Door Media, producers of digital marketing leaders Search Engine Land, MarTech, and the SMX and MarTech Conference series. With 20 years of experience in product and audience development for media companies, she focuses on data-driven growth and consumption that initiates user engagement across multiple channels.

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