Santa Monica-based Tsavo Media, the online media startup headed by former Userplane founder Michael Jones, said today that it has hired on Sean Percival as Director of Content at the firm. Percival was most recently at Docstoc, where he was Content Manager, and has also previously headed up social media and search engine marketing at Mahalo. According to Tsavo, Percival will Percival has previously served at Trading Places International and Nova Development. READ MOR

Santa Monica-based Tsavo Media, the new startup venture of former Userplane founder Michael Jones, said Tuesday that it has named Steve Schepke as General Manager of Tsavo Agency, a new unit focused on providing monetization services to content providers. According to Tsavo, Schepke joins Tsavo from Commission Junction. Schepke has also served at Proceed Interactive, a search and interactive marketing agency, and Terra Firma Marketing, where he was founder. Tsavo said that its Tsavo Agency will provide search engine marketing, search engine optimization, and

Santa Monica-based Tsavo Media, the startup headed by former Userplane CEO Michael Jones, said today that it has acquired Better Inc, the SEO and pay-per-click marketing software firm headed by Ben Padnos. technology uses technology to help set up, manage, optimize, and report on pay-per-click campaigns for small and medium businesses. According to Tsavo, Better Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. Better Inc.'s

Santa Monica-based Tsavo Media, the new startup founded by Userplane founder Michael Jones, has launched a new division, focused on search engine marketing. The firm announced the division Tuesday afternoon, saying that its new Tsavo Agency will provide search engine marketing and content monetization services for companies. The new unit comes shortly after Tsavo Media's acquisition of Better Inc, which runs search engine marketing business. Jones said in a statement that the new division will focus primarily on text ad placement, and makes the firm's internally developed

Santa Monica-based Tsavo , the online media company which owns Manolith, Twirlit, Kidglue, and Nibbledish, has lost its Vice President of Product and Design, Mike Macadaan. Macadaan is well known in the Los Angeles technology community for creating and running Twiistup, the popular Los Angeles technology networking and startup showcase event. According to Macadaan, this week is his last at Tsavo. Macadaan's departure closely follows the departure of Tsavo founder and CEO Michael Jones, who recently became COO of MySpace. Tsavo develops content-focused web sites which apply

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What if you can’t get funding for your startup? Before launching Tsavo , his current startup, Mike Jones funded a startup through consulting work. Do you have any advice for a startup that can’t raise money? If you have a good concept that you really want to pursue, and there’s absolutely Here’s an edited excerpt from his interview. But it is a substantial distraction and a lot of people might not either have the discipline to do it or the stomach for it.

Most of the folks in Los Angeles will know Michael well, from his days bootstrapping Userplane (sold to AOL), as well as his recent efforts with both Tsavo , as well as his efforts (along with Peter Pham and others) to get the technology elite networking here. btw, I checked in with Mike Jones about what’s going to happen over at Tsavo Media; he said he will stay on the board there, and will assist in strategy. Michael Jones and Jason Hirschhorn have just been appointed COO and Chief Product Officer, respectively, over at MySpace. Jason was most recently at Sling Media

As a bonus, the boom-and-bust history of the web provides valuable lean startup lessons for any business. Building on the Cheap: Starting Up When the Economy is Down, Mike Jones, Tsavo Media Scaling for Startups: Planning for the Masses Without Losing Your Head, Jim Benedetto, MySpace Build it and they will come, right? Everybody is going to love this, won’t they?

I recently interviewed Michael Jones, founder of Tsavos . Since he’s also a top startup adviser and angel investor, in addition to asking him about Tsavo, I asked him how about how and why he advises companies. I asked about the vision behind Tsavo: To see Here’s an edited transcript of some of what he told me. (Download Download the full program for more.)