ENGAGE AND CYBUY INTRODUCE NEW BUSINESS MODEL FOR E-COMMERCE; Business Wire Aug 16 1999 8:09AM ET Visitor Profiling Drives New Service For Buying and Selling Online
Business/Technology Editors
ANDOVER, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug. 16, 1999--Engage Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq:ENGA), a provider of profile driven Internet marketing solutions and a majority owned subsidiary of CMGI, Inc. (Nasdaq:CMGI), today announced a partnership with Cybuy, a wholly owned subsidiary of the NatWest Group, to provide a revolutionary new e-commerce service. This new Cybuy service is designed to increase selling opportunities for merchants and Web sites by offering far more timely and relevant product offers to consumers through visitor profiling from Engage. In contrast to traditional destination-driven Internet shopping, where advertisements and context selling take consumers to other sites, Cybuy brings the merchant's offer directly to the consumer where they can buy "on the page" - no more clicking and leaving. This new model reverses the traditional e-commerce site-centric model by bringing sellers together with their target consumer, regardless of where the consumer is on the Internet.
Cybuy will use Engage's Accipiter AdManager online advertising delivery and management software, in conjunction with Engage Knowledge, an actionable database of 30 million anonymous consumer interest profiles. When used with Engage Knowledge, Accipiter AdManager can be used to target e-commerce offers based on a visitor's profile, increasing the likelihood that each visitor receives the optimal offer to maximize the click to buy ratio.
"Through our partnership with Cybuy we are introducing a new business model for e-commerce," said Paul Schaut, President and CEO of Engage. "As the importance of context based targeting shifts to audience targeting and e-commerce transactions move away from the site, the need for profiling solutions like Engage Knowledge is crucial. Profiling is an effective way to understand consumer interests and match merchants' offers with their target audiences."
"Cybuy is reshaping traditional e-commerce by offering a win-win situation to merchants, consumers, and Web sites," said Sandra Robinson, President of Cybuy. "This inventive approach offers consumers the ability to easily purchase highly targeted products without having to leave the site. This revolutionary business model uniquely positions Cybuy to serve the needs of merchants and Web sites seeking to exploit new revenue opportunities."
About Cybuy:
Cybuy provides end-to-end online commerce solutions that enable merchants and Web sites to more effectively distribute offers and complete a sale, within the confines of any third party Web site. Cybuy, a wholly owned subsidiary of the NatWest Group, one of the largest and most strongly capitalized financial services groups in the world, is supported by a strategic partnership with CMGI, Inc.(Nasdaq: CMGI), a recognized leader in the Internet economy.
The Cybuy service is delivered using advanced ad management and visitor profiling technology from Engage Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: ENGA), a provider of profile driven Internet marketing solutions and majority-owned subsidiary of CMGI. Cybuy uses NatWest's leading credit card services and taps Open Market's (Nasdaq: OMKT) Transact(TM), the preeminent commerce management application for business-to-consumer and business-to-business Internet commerce, for its transaction processing, order management and customer service capabilities. Cybuy teamed with Cambridge Technology Partners (Nasdaq: CATP), a leading software integrator, to develop an end-to-end solution that manages ad placement, offer targeting, ordering & processing, transaction management and customer service.
About Engage:
Engage, (Nasdaq:ENGA) a majority-owned subsidiary of CMGI, Inc., (Nasdaq:CMGI), is a provider of profile driven Internet marketing solutions. Engage offers a range of software products and services that enable Web publishers, advertisers and merchants to target and deliver advertisements, commerce and e-commerce offerings to their audiences and to measure their effectiveness. Engage's core product and services include Engage Knowledge, a database that currently contains more than 30 million anonymous consumer profiles, and Accipiter AdManager, an online advertising management system that automates the scheduling, targeting and delivery of ads on Web sites and the reporting of campaign results. Additionally, Engage offers Web traffic verification, measurement and analysis, and research through its wholly owned subsidiary, I/PRO. For more information about Engage, please visit www.engage.com.
Statement Under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act
Except for the historical information contained in this release, the matters described herein contain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties which might cause the results of such forward-looking statements to differ materially from those anticipated. Such risks and uncertainties include failure of the Engage Knowledge data service to achieve customer acceptance, privacy concerns, slower than expected growth in Internet advertising, increased competition, the timely development of new profile-based products and services, and other risks detailed in the Company's Registration Statement on Form S-1 declared effective on July 19, 1999 under the Securities Act of 1933. |