Constant Contact has announced that it has acquired privately owned digital storefront provider SinglePlatform, a tool for small businesses to list themselves online and show up prominently in online searches. As the companies described in a statement, the SinglePlatform offering complements the current Constant Contact online engagement marketing suite by helping businesses engage customers earlier in the lifecycle.
As Forbes describes the joint offering, the Constant Contact online marketing suite will offer a stronger online discovery solution for small businesses, which drives leads and sales for their products and services. Constant Contact will adopt a "freemium" model for basic services, and maintain SinglePlatform premium features: SinglePlatform will continue to offer its paid-for Digital Storefront product, allowing small businesses to add rich content to their listings like menus, products and services, photos, and pricing.
SinglePlatform gives small business a one-stop platform to update critical business information and deliver that information across a publishing network that reaches more than 200 million consumers per month, the company claims. Its network includes sites like Foursquare, New York Times, YP, and UrbanSpoon, as well as updating a company's social media outlets, company website and mobile site. The design enables small businesses to quickly distribute rich content from one platform, so consumers can find the business the moment theyare looking to make a purchase decision.
Constant Contact CEO Gail Goodman acknowledges that "There are hundreds of online and mobile sites that consumers use to find local businesses and make purchase decisions. It's literally impossible for time-starved small businesses to keep up with all of them.” With an estimated half of searches happening without a specific business in mind, “It's absolutely critical that small businesses are listed everywhere to ensure they are found when and where consumers are looking.” Goodman believes the SinglePlatform offering “makes that incredibly simple—update your information once, and it's delivered to all of the important search engines, apps, directories, and review sites."
