BackSMALLTOWN LAUNCHES NEW WEBSITES IN THREE BAY AREA COMMUNITIES, ANNOUNCES NEW RICH MEDIA FEATURES, AND HIRES VP OF SALES
Momentum Builds as Smalltown Adds Foster City, Belmont and Millbrae to Its Network; New Functionality Including Video and ReplyBack Arrives as Adoption Rates Increase; Company Names Daniel Payomo Vice President of Sales
SAN MATEO, Calif. – March 5, 2007 – Based on the accelerating adoption of their first two sites in San Mateo and Burlingame, Smalltown™ (www.smalltown.com) today rolled into three new Bay Area communities, publicly launched its Version 2.0 platform, and announced the hiring of Daniel Payomo, who joins the company as Vice President of Sales.
Launched last October, Smalltown is a user-generated content website where businesses and neighbors post, discover and share everything about their town using Webcard™ postings, virtual multimedia index cards that are redefining local advertising.
"We intentionally developed a simple advertising service that addresses the needs of local merchants," said Hal Rucker, CEO and co-founder of Smalltown. "In just five months, we have accumulated over 15,000 basic Webcards in our first towns, hundreds of enhanced Webcards, and dozens of paying customers – all validation that it's working. We did this without a sales organization, so we're expecting great things in 2007 with our expansion into new towns and the addition of Daniel to our team. This progress exceeds our expectations."
Foster City, Belmont and Millbrae are the latest communities to launch in the Smalltown "Local Web" network. All five Smalltown communities will benefit from the Version 2.0 release, which showcases the ability to upload and play videos inside an enhanced Webcard™ posting. Customers will also be served by the new ReplyBack™ feature that sends an email alert to Webcard owners when someone posts a review about them, and then allows the owner to post a response to the review.
These new features are punctuated by the addition of Daniel Payomo to the executive team. Joining with an extensive history in the "local" market, Payomo was hired to architect a first-class sales organization.
Daniel Payomo is a career media professional with an extensive background in print and online local media. He's held management positions with major media properties from Knight Ridder, MediaNews and America Online, and was the VP of Sales for the San Francisco Examiner and Independent Newspaper Group. His experience with early-stage online companies includes Backfence.com, where he was the Bay Area General Manager, and Webstakes (a.k.a. Promotions.com), where he was head of sales through a successful IPO before the company was later acquired by NBC's iVillage.
"Smalltown is much more than just local search or yellow pages with user-generated reviews," said Payomo. "Smalltown is building powerful products for businesses to connect with the local community. Its patent-pending 'secret sauce' is the Webcard, a totally new type of local media that delivers the functionality and affordability local advertisers are looking for. I am excited to be part of an innovative team focused on developing new opportunities in the local advertising market, which exceeds $100 billion."
New Functionality in Smalltown Version 2.0 Smalltown is rolling out its latest version after interviewing merchants and business owners to determine what they'd like to see in a local advertising service. Merchants, service providers and local community organizations can now easily publish video as an enhancement to their Webcards. For example, the Version 2.0 platform allows realtors to upload videos of new listings taken with their phone. A garage band looking for a new member can post a video demo, or event planners can show their portfolio of weddings. Businesses that have produced TV commercials for local cable can now add those commercials to their Smalltown Webcards, extending the value of media they've already created.
In addition, the new highly requested ReplyBack feature offers merchants a voice back to consumers. Until now, merchants have been at the whim of user-generated reviews, with anyone able to write about their business and no way of knowing when this occurs, unless they visit the site regularly. Smalltown customers will not only be alerted when a review occurs, they will have the ability to reply back with their own message. This powerful tool enables merchants to respond to criticism in a positive way, as well as provide gratitude when they are recognized for excellence.
"I was immediately impressed with the concept and work done by Smalltown," said Lisa Fitzgibbons Charney, owner of Millbrae Jewelers and Chairman of Millbrae's Chamber of Commerce Board of Directors. "Being a small business owner, I quickly realized this is an excellent way to publicize your business and get the word out about great cities, such as Millbrae. I'm happy to see Smalltown launch a Millbrae site; this announcement is awesome news for us!"
About Smalltown Webcards
Webcards are analogous to an index card that one might post to a bulletin board at the local grocery store, yet they are enhanced by rich content and functionality, and can be linked to form a unique "word of mouth" knowledge exchange. Users can also access information found on Smalltown Webcards through popular search engines on the World Wide Web. Powered by Webcards, Smalltown websites create an integrated network of hyper-local sites, which the company is creating one "Smalltown" at a time.
About Smalltown
Privately held and headquartered in San Mateo, California, Smalltown was founded in 2005 and publicly launched in 2006. Smalltown is building the infrastructure for today's Local Web, which will support a network of hyper-local Smalltown community sites equipped to empower local economies and promote the vitality, individuality and immediacy of each local community. Smalltown is funded by Formative Ventures, an early-stage technology venture capital firm launched by partners with firsthand operating experience in growing start-ups into successful companies. Currently open for business: Smalltown, Belmont; Smalltown, Burlingame; Smalltown, Foster City; Smalltown, Millbrae; and, Smalltown, San Mateo. For more information visit Smalltown at http://www.smalltown.com.