This is an interview with Luke Keller, Founder of MatchGrant. Luke was the winner of our $100K+ inaugural tech startup pitch event last June.
Question: Luke, a huge congratulations again on winning our inaugural $100K+ startup pitch event. Your pitch was excellent, and we’re excited to be working with you and MatchGrant. What motivated you to apply?
Luke Keller: “What immediately drew me to Kingdom Founders was that they were building something I had been looking for myself.
They’re a startup too. They’re building a community around founders who want to build exceptional companies, but who believe the purpose of business has to extend beyond the bottom line.
As a Christian founder, I think a lot about what it means for our work itself to become a form of worship. How do we build with excellence, serve people well, create something valuable, and steward the opportunities we’ve been given—all as an expression of our faith?
Kingdom Founders is creating a community for entrepreneurs asking those same questions. When I saw what they were building, I knew I wanted MatchGrant to be part of it. Winning the inaugural pitch made it even more special because we get to grow alongside Kingdom Founders from the very beginning.”
Question: What problem does MatchGrant solve?
Luke Keller: “There is an enormous amount of funding available to organizations doing good in the world, but finding and winning that funding is incredibly difficult. The process is fragmented, time-consuming, and often favors organizations with large development teams.
MatchGrant uses AI and funding intelligence to help organizations find the right funding opportunities, understand the funders behind them, and ultimately submit stronger applications. Our goal is simple: help great organizations spend less time searching for funding and more time doing the work they exist to do.”
Question: What types of customers do you serve?
Luke Keller: “We primarily serve nonprofits, schools, and municipalities, as well as foundations and other organizations that support them. Today, MatchGrant is being used by organizations across the U.S. and around the world—from small community nonprofits to organizations doing work internationally.
What they all have in common is that funding is critical to their mission, but they often don’t have the time, team, or tools to navigate the grant landscape effectively.”
Question: What’s one piece of advice you would give to other founders right now?
Luke Keller: “MatchGrant exists because we went through an incredibly difficult season where funding disappeared and we had to figure out another way forward. What felt like a setback ultimately pushed us to build something we never would have built otherwise.
A year and a half ago, MatchGrant was an idea. Today, we’re serving organizations around the world and helping them unlock millions of dollars for their work. You don’t need to have the entire journey figured out. Start building, listen obsessively to the people you’re trying to serve, and keep going.”
Question: What’s the best way for a potential customer to get engaged with your company?
Luke Keller: “The best way is to visit MatchGrant.co and schedule a demo. We love showing organizations what’s possible when grant discovery, funder intelligence, and grant management live in one place. We can usually tell pretty quickly whether MatchGrant can help an organization find more funding and build a stronger grant strategy.”
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