Continuing to Bring You More Local Customers

Since my cofounder, Wayne Yamamoto, and I founded MerchantCircle and started building the company with a great team, including Doug Kilponen and Jason Culverhouse, we've never forgotten our mission of bringing local merchants more local customers. Throughout our growth, we've always emphasized and strived to make sure that local business owners had a place on the web where they could attract and engage new customers, regardless of tech knowledge, or costs.

From the day our first merchants signed on over 17 months ago and now almost 250,000 merchants later, we've become the largest and fastest growing network of local business owners in the nation. That's a fact we're very proud of and we take that responsibility very seriously. From the partnerships we form, to new features we implement on MerchantCircle, we want to make sure we represent you well - getting you seen by as many new customers as possible.

The web may be a complicated mix of adwords, .coms, .orgs, user-generated content, and three letter acronyms, but we want to make sure that's it not so complicated. After all, your business livelihood depends on it. More and more people are turning to the web to search for their goods and services and it's imperative you be found on top search engines. We want to help you get there, and it's a mission and view we've held steady from day one.

Our recent news, announcing another round of funding, will help us bring you more customer engaging opportunities. We've got a lot more in store for you, as we expect the MerchantCircle network to grow to 1 million merchants by next year. Thank you for all your support over the last year and a half, and we look forward to your business success.

Sincerely,
Ben Smith
Chairman and Cofounder, MerchantCircle

A Look Back and Beyond

As we begin to approach the one year anniversary since our launch, I can't help but take a look back at all we've accomplished and what's still in store. My co-founder, Wayne Yamamoto, and I started MerchantCircle with an idea that local merchants needed a venue on the web to reach out to customers and interact with one another. Almost 1 year and 120,000 merchants later, I can say with heartfelt conviction that it's truly been a joy to see our 'idea' and our merchants prosper.

From Healing Therapeutic Massage in Claremore, OK to Wedding Supplies Unlimited in Warwick, RI, our merchants are getting more than just hundreds and thousands of impressions to their MerchantCircle page - they're definitively getting new customers. From Kelvin A. Schroeder's August Jewelers in South Milwaukee, WI to Sims Plumbing Company inc in Des Moines, IA we're bringing new businesses to the web and giving those already with a web presence more tools to play with.

10 years ago, if you asked me to upload a picture onto the computer, I would have needed someone with a computer science degree to help me out. Today, thousands of dry cleaners and contractors are uploading pictures onto MerchantCircle without any help at all. The web began as a way of bringing the globe of information to every user. It's now bringing every user a way to connect to a globe of people, either thousands of miles away or right down the street.

Small businesses create about two thirds of all new American jobs. Not only do local merchants deserve to have the local internet brought to them, but they deserve to not be strong armed into paying thousands of dollars for a print listing in the Yellow Pages. Local merchants are the key to building vibrant local communities. That's why from main street in Los Angeles to main street in Fairhope, Alabama downtown rejuvenations and redevelopments can always be found centered around small businesses.

The future for small businesses on the web is now. At 120,000 merchants signed onto MerchantCircle, we know there's legitimacy in that statement. Merchants are signing on in our nation's biggest cities, but far more frequently in cities many of us have never heard of: Van Buren, AR, Cedar Lake, IN, Lutz, FL, Parker, SD, Mcdonough, GA, Priest River, ID, Atascadero, CA and I could go on.... We are going to bring the local internet to millions of merchants, because millions of merchants today, do not have a website of their own.

As a child growing up in Alabama I learned a lot of valuable lessons from my parents which I now pass onto my own two kids. The joy of this experience is a huge source of pride for me. As I read our MerchantCircle Forum, I gain a similar source of pride watching as merchants from California to North Carolina give tips to a merchant in Florida on coming up higher in search engine results or merchants offering each other tips on blogging.

The internet is fundamentally changing how local businesses operate. Consumers can now express themselves on the web to a legion of viewers. Venues to vent about businesses continue to increase. We realized the mounting concern for merchants to keep track of every place their business shows up and what people are saying about them. That's why we introduced a feature that scours the web for all content on a business so that a business owner can take proactive steps in either changing their business practices or moderating their online reputation.

We're not done evolving because we realize the needs of a business owner are not getting any easier. Many merchants are beginning to get themselves out in a number of different forums on the web. They're creating profiles on Myspace and even Facebook, both outstanding services to network and engage, and we want to make sure their personality on the web can be found on their MerchantCircle page. We're including a section where merchants can list and link their entire web presence for a customer to see.

Web companies like Craigslist, InsiderPages, StepUp/Intuit, and Topix have set the stage for future development and innovation in the local internet space. Craigslist was one of the first websites that gave people from all walks of life a voice on the web and an easy-to-use experience that influenced a generation of potential entrepreneurs. Insider Pages taught us the relevance of finding local businesses using the wisdom of friends and neighbors. StepUp and Intuit have been making life easier for business owners to manage their store online and off. While Topix is inspiring engaging and meaningful discussion on news and events that local people have made relevant. It's exciting to be a part of the local space these days.

We share a passion for local that we believe will get us to 3 million merchants in just a few years. We want to make sure we can always deliver 5 things to our merchant base:

- A voice for them on the local web
- The ability to manage their online reputation
- Simple and effective ways to tap into the value of web advertising
- A permanent presence on the web
- The ability to engage with new and current customers online

We've been fortunate in the fact we have a small cohesive team at MerchantCircle. Everyone in the office chooses to be here, not because they need the money or couldn't find another job, but because they want to be here and believe in what we're doing. My Co-founder and I, wrote our first blog post about MerchantCircle before we launched in November of 2005. You can read it here. Not much has changed, besides the fact that the idea turned into a reality.

So as I look back, I also look forward - A vision is only so grand before something must be done about it.

Sincerely,
Ben T. Smith, IV
Chairman and Co-founder, MerchantCircle

Red Herring Juice

While Red Herring may or may not be in default. There's still a lot of quality folks who work within the organization. They may have received some knocks on their previous conferences - particularly in Cannes, but I'm still looking forward to attending the conference starting today in Monterey, CA. (BTW, I believe everything ValleyWag writes).

Our Co-Founder Wayne Yamamoto was invited to join a panel speaking on "Search Marketing 2.0"

Here's the panel summary:

There is no question about it; search is the hottest topic in marketing. Even hotter is local search, with over 14 million SMBs missing out on the revolution, simply because they do not have a website. Even with this enormous opportunity, many brands are not taking advantage of this opportunity. What is the biggest mistake paid search marketers are making today? Will pay-per-call every truly catch on? How problematic is click fraud? Search has transformed the world of marketing and new technologies are changing the world of search. How can your company best take advantage of this transforming communication strategy? On this roundtable, a group of industry experts will analyze this ever changing landscape and help us make sense of what to expect for the future.

I think we've solved that first part of the equation. We're speaking on Thurday, here's the agenda. Stop by if you've got an extra $2,000 lying around! If not, we'll let you know how it goes from our MerchantCircle blog for free.

Sincerely,

Kevin