MessageMedia Inc., a provider of
e-mail-based customer relationship and direct marketing services, signed a
deal with Yahoo! Inc. to deliver personalized,
permission-based direct marketing e-mail messages to users of Yahoo! Mail and
other e-mail programs.
Yahoo!’s e-mail direct marketing programs present special offers, promotions
and discounts to an opt-in audience on a variety of topics including personal
finance, entertainment, sports, health and travel.
MessageMedia’s capabilities allow e-mail messages to be
sent in a variety of formats depending on the user’s preference. In addition,
MessageMedia’s services will include full service list management, bounce
processing, customer service management, and reporting on e-mail messaging
campaigns. Financial arrangements were not disclosed.
“MessageMedia’s full-service e-mail solutions will enhance Yahoo’s successful direct
marketing and permission-based programs,” said Larry Jones, president and CEO of MessageMedia.
Yahoo!’s e-mail marketing programs are a part of the company’s overall Fusion
Marketing Online (FMO) platform, designed to leverage Yahoo!’s worldwide
audience, traffic, and database to provide customized, targeted, and
measurable marketing solutions to advertisers.
MessageMedia clients include E*TRADE, USA Today, GeoCities, Intuit, CMP
Media, Yahoo!, Barclays Bank and Bertelsmann.
SOFTBANK and its affiliates own approximately 49 percent of the outstanding common
stock of MessageMedia Inc. Pequot Capital Management, a Connecticut-based
research-intensive investment firm with more than $5 billion in assets under
management, is also a major investor.