An Exciting New Chapter for WordStream!
When I joined WordStream last year, the company was already growing at an incredible rate. And yet we have big ambitions in order to fulfill our purpose – to help small and medium sized businesses and the agencies that serve them succeed and grow.
We’ve been working hard since then refining our vision, developing new products and services, and empowering our teams so we can better serve our customers. Today, I’m thrilled to announce that a new chapter for WordStream has begun. We’ve entered into an agreement to be acquired by Gannett, a move that positions us to provide even more value to our customers so they can build their businesses and achieve their most ambitious goals.
Gannett is a $ 3.1 billion media company that owns 270 media properties (both print and digital) across the U.S. and U.K., as well as a digital advertising division that includes services such as SEO, website development, marketing automation and lead management. You might already be a reader or advertiser within Gannett’s network and I bet you know one of Gannett’s largest properties – USA TODAY.
This move makes perfect sense for WordStream because of the alignment in our visions: Gannett is a next-generation media company that empowers communities to thrive, and WordStream’s software and services do the same for small businesses. Our offerings will strengthen Gannett’s portfolio and market presence in digital advertising, and together we will be the leader in this space.
How this benefits our customers
Everyone at WordStream knows I live by a two-word phrase: Customers First! Much of my focus in the past year has been making sure that we’re building a customer-first company. Back in November, we had our first Customer Insight Roundtable, where we invited a group of customers from a range of verticals (from health care to home furnishings) into our office for a day of knowledge sharing and workshops. It was an amazing view into what motivates them, and an excellent reminder of why we all come into work every day. It was such a success, we’re doing it again in a few weeks.
Our customers have many challenges and barriers to growth, and our job is to lessen those challenges so they can focus on what they love about their work (whether it’s a doggy day care or a travel agency). As part of Gannett, we’ll be able to offer our customers a greater range of solutions to help them succeed and grow. We’ll be able to leverage Gannett’s expansive media network as well as their strong presence in the UK, Australia, and New Zealand to better serve our growing international client base, and Gannett will invest in our products so we can more quickly expand our cross-platform capabilities, our offerings for agencies and more.
The same but better
I’ve barely scratched the surface of the positive change I believe this acquisition holds in store. At the same time, we will retain the elements that have made WordStream a market leader as we will continue to operate independently inside of Gannett. Our executive team remains in place and we continue to aggressively hire and grow our teams across the company. Our core values have not changed. Our brand, our reputation, and our thought leadership will all continue, and continue to thrive.
Our acquisition by Gannett creates incredible opportunities both for all our people here at WordStream and for our customers. We thank you for being part of the journey so far, and we can’t wait to show you what we’ve got planned!
Howard Kogan
Howard M. Kogan joined WordStream as president in June 2017 and became CEO in January 2018. He is responsible for overseeing the company’s day-to-day operations and internal strategy with a focus on rapid growth.
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