Is This the Next Instagram?

Its user base more than doubled in the last 12 hours. The company has grown so fast that its co-founder and CEO, Patrick Ambron, had to update his final press release before sending it to Benzinga. "You'll see that we have now more than TRIPLED our user base, with no signs of slowing down," Ambron wrote in an e-mail regarding BrandYourself, a new startup that helps people control their own Google GOOG search results. Why is the site growing so quickly? BrandYourself launched a new feature this week that allows its users to see which companies are Googling their names. "We realized users really wanted a better understanding of who's actually looking for them online," Ambron said in an e-mail to Benzinga. "So we've been building this feature, and now when someone visits your profile, we can tell you how they found you, where they're located, and literally tell you where they work." Ambron provided us with the following example: "For example, let's say an advertising student named Jim is interviewing at agencies in NYC. The tool can alert Jim and let him know that somebody from Ogilvly just Googled 'Jim Armstrong, portfolio' and found his BrandYourself profile. Once Jim realizes he's being Googled by these employers, he's more motivated to use BrandYourself's other tools to improve his own results." "It's similar to LinkedIn's LNKD feature that tells you when someone else searches you on LinkedIn but applied to the entire web," Ambron explained. "There is nobody on the web providing this level of specific intelligence for individuals and our traffic has exploded because of it." Ambron estimates that its user base will quadruple by the end of the day. "We're building the most sophisticated software on the market to help people manage their online presence," Ambron added. "This is just one of many features in the works." BrandYourself is famous for walking away from $750,000 in funding during the company's early stage of development -- a move that paid off when the company scored $1.25 million in funding. "It was a huge part of our round, and I didn't have a back-up plan solidified, but we walked away," Ambron told Benzinga in March. "I just didn't think the investors were the best fit. They were a great firm, but I didn't think they knew our industry, and I never wanted to take money if I didn't think I was also improving the team. It was the hardest decision I made for our company, and I lost a lot of sleep, but it ended [up] being one of the best decisions I ever made." Follow me @LouisBedigianBZ