DevFest.cz Sponsor Prospector

What does DevFest.cz Sponsor Prospector do?

DevFest.cz Sponsor Prospector finds companies likely to sponsor DevFest.cz, the Prague developer conference organized by GUG.cz / the local Google Developer Group. It's built from a direct analysis of the DevFest.cz, 2025.devfest.cz, and 2019.devfest.cz partner pages: sponsorship there is driven almost entirely by developer-recruitment and employer-branding, not general product marketing.

The Actor runs targeted Google searches (via Google Search Results Scraper) across four sponsor archetypes seen in past editions, de-duplicates the companies it finds by domain, and scores each one against the keyword signals that matched real past sponsors - so you get a ranked list of new prospects with a plain-English reason for each match. Optionally, it can also look up a likely outreach contact on LinkedIn (via LinkedIn Company Employees Scraper) for each top-ranked company.

Run it directly in the Apify Console, via the API, or on a schedule to keep refreshing your sponsorship pipeline.

Why use DevFest.cz Sponsor Prospector?

• Skip generic sponsor lists. Instead of searching "companies that sponsor tech conferences," this Actor targets the exact patterns DevFest.cz sponsors actually fit - dev shops hiring engineers, developer-tool SaaS, recruitment platforms, and enterprises with active tech-hiring arms.
• Avoid re-pitching existing sponsors. By default it filters out companies that already sponsored the 2019, 2025, or 2026 editions.
• Get a reason, not just a name. Every result includes which keyword signals matched and which past sponsor it resembles (e.g. "fits the same pattern as Applifting, Aricoma...").
• Reuse it for similar conferences. Swap the region and categories to prospect for any developer-focused, employer-branding-driven event.
• Go straight to a contact, not just a company. Optionally attaches a likely outreach contact (name, title, LinkedIn profile) in Marketing, Employer Branding, HR, DevRel, or Community for each top-ranked company.

How to use DevFest.cz Sponsor Prospector

1. Click Try for free or Start in the Apify Console.
2. (Optional) Adjust the regions (default: Czech Republic) and categories to prospect for.
3. (Optional) Add your own custom search queries for niches the built-in categories don't cover.
4. Click Start and wait for the run to finish - it depends on how many queries are generated (regions × categories × templates).
5. Open the Dataset tab to view, sort, and export your ranked list of candidate sponsors.

Input

Field	Description	Default
regions	Geographic phrases combined into each search query	["Czech Republic"]
categories	Which sponsor archetypes to search for: devShops, saasTools, recruitment, enterprise	all four
customQueries	Extra free-form Google queries to run alongside the category templates	[]
excludeKnownSponsors	Filter out companies that already sponsored DevFest.cz 2019/2025/2026, based on a hardcoded snapshot	true
excludeCurrentPartners	Fetch devfest.cz/partners live and filter out every partner listed there right now	true
excludeDomains	Additional domains to exclude	[]
maxPagesPerQuery	Google result pages to fetch per query (~10 results/page)	1
maxResults	Cap on the final ranked output list	50
findContacts	Look up a likely LinkedIn contact for the top-ranked companies (see Personal data & compliance)	false
contactJobTitles	Job titles/keywords used to filter LinkedIn employees when findContacts is on	Marketing, Employer Branding, HR, DevRel, Community titles
maxCompaniesForContactSearch	How many top-ranked companies to run the LinkedIn contact search for	10 (max 20)

See the Input tab for the full schema with descriptions.

Output

Each dataset item is one candidate company:

{
    "companyName": "Applifting",
    "domain": "applifting.io",
    "website": "https://applifting.io",
    "regionVerified": true,
    "primaryCategory": "Software dev shop / IT services (employer branding)",
    "score": 8,
    "matchedSignals": ["software development", "custom software", "we are hiring"],
    "whyItMightSponsor": "Fits the \"Software dev shop / IT services (employer branding)\" pattern seen in past DevFest.cz sponsors (e.g. Applifting, Aricoma, Second Foundation, Unicorn, FlowUp, Seyfor). Matched signals: software development, custom software, we are hiring.",
    "sampleSnippet": "Applifting builds custom software and helps companies scale their engineering teams...",
    "sourceQueries": ["software development company Czech Republic careers \"hiring developers\""],
    "foundUrls": ["https://applifting.io/en"],
    "contact": {
        "name": "Jane Doe",
        "title": "Marketing Manager at Applifting",
        "linkedinUrl": "https://www.linkedin.com/in/jane-doe-example"
    }
}

contact is only populated when findContacts is enabled and a match was found for that company; otherwise it's null.

You can download the dataset in various formats such as JSON, CSV, Excel, or HTML.

Data table

Field	Description
companyName	Best-effort company name extracted from the search result title
domain	Root domain, used for de-duplication
website	Homepage URL
regionVerified	Whether the search result's own title/description/domain actually mentions the target region (e.g. "Czech", "Prague", a .cz domain) - not just that the region name appeared in the query that found it. false means review manually before treating it as a regional prospect.
primaryCategory	Sponsor archetype the company scored highest against
score	Relative ranking score (keyword matches + repeat appearances across queries + a bonus if regionVerified is true)
matchedSignals	Keywords from the winning category that matched the page's title/description
whyItMightSponsor	Plain-English reasoning, naming comparable past DevFest.cz sponsors
sampleSnippet	A representative search-result description
sourceQueries	Which search queries surfaced this company
foundUrls	All distinct URLs found for this domain
contact	{ name, title, linkedinUrl } for a likely outreach contact, or null if findContacts is off or no match was found

Cost estimation

This Actor doesn't scrape pages itself - it orchestrates other Actors, which charge per unit of work:

• Google Search Results Scraper charges per search-results page scraped. With the default settings (4 categories × 1 region × ~2 templates = ~8 queries × 1 page), a run scrapes about 8 pages. Check its pricing tab for the current per-page rate, and multiply by however many queries your regions / categories / customQueries combination produces.
• If findContacts is enabled, LinkedIn Company Employees Scraper additionally charges per LinkedIn profile scraped (around $4 per 1,000 profiles in its cheapest mode, which this Actor uses). With the default maxCompaniesForContactSearch of 10, a run scrapes up to ~50 profiles in a single batched search - a few cents. Check its pricing tab for the current rate.

Tips

• Start with the defaults on a single region to gauge quality before scaling up regions or maxPagesPerQuery - each addition multiplies the number of queries (and cost).
• Set excludeKnownSponsors to false if you want to see how existing sponsors would score, e.g. to validate the model against known-good matches.
• excludeCurrentPartners (live fetch) and excludeKnownSponsors (hardcoded snapshot) overlap for the current edition but aren't redundant: the live fetch stays accurate as the current partner roster changes, while the snapshot also covers past editions (2019/2025) that no longer appear on the live partners page.
• Use customQueries to prospect adjacent categories not covered by the four built-in archetypes (e.g. a specific industry vertical).
• LinkedIn's own job-title taxonomy varies a lot by company, so contact matching is best-effort - not every company will get a hit, and a hit isn't guaranteed to be the ideal person. Treat it as a starting point for outreach, not a verified decision-maker.
• Including regions in a search query doesn't guarantee every result is actually about that region - a globally-known company can still rank for a Czech-flavored query (e.g. via an unrelated case study or blog mention). Check regionVerified before treating a result as a confirmed regional prospect; false results are still worth a quick manual look, just not automatically trusted.

Personal data & compliance

findContacts retrieves personal data (a person's name, job title, and LinkedIn profile URL) via a third-party Actor that scrapes LinkedIn. Before enabling it:

• Only use it for a legitimate business purpose (e.g. sponsorship outreach), and handle the data you collect in line with GDPR or your local equivalent.
• Review LinkedIn Company Employees Scraper's own documentation and terms, since it - not this Actor - performs the actual LinkedIn scraping.
• Scraping LinkedIn may be subject to LinkedIn's Terms of Service; use at your own discretion.

findContacts defaults to false so this is always an explicit, opt-in choice.

FAQ

Is this scraping Google directly? No - it calls the Google Search Results Scraper Actor, which handles that.

Is this scraping LinkedIn directly? No - when findContacts is enabled, it calls LinkedIn Company Employees Scraper, which handles that. See Personal data & compliance.

How accurate is the categorization? Scoring is keyword-based (no LLM call), so treat primaryCategory and score as a first-pass ranking to prioritize manual review, not a definitive verdict.

Can I use this for a different conference? Yes - edit the categories, keywords, and past-sponsor exclusion list in src/sponsorProfiles.js to match your event's actual sponsor history.

Found a bug or have a feature request? Open an issue on the Actor's Issues tab.