Last July, international ISP United Internet took a 30% stake in Jimdo, which markets a simple tool that allows users to build their own websites with little time and effort, and now the first results of the tie-in are becoming visible.
Today United Internet’s hosting provider subsidiary, 1&1, is debuting a new business service to its customers dubbed ‘1&1 MyBusiness Site’, which boasts Jimdo as its underlying engine.
1&1 later today will start offering this new package to its corporate customers, enabling small and medium-sized businesses to create their own website in just a few minutes without the need for extensive website design experience, starting at $9,99 per month. Specific designs are available for more than 100 different business types (restaurants, real estate, etc.), and users get a 5-day free trial to test the service before they sign up for a paid subscription. Users can check the success of their website via the inclusive 1&1 WebStatistics tool, and the 1&1 MyBusiness Site package also includes modules for SEO, implementation of RSS feeds, photo albums, YouTube videos and Flash animations.
This is a big deal for Jimdo, a small German startup that so far raised only a ‘fairly small amount in angel funding‘ from the infamous Samwer brothers. Looking at their traffic estimates on Google Trends, it was already doing nicely in terms of usage compared to competitors like Weebly and the well-funded Synthasite (now rebranded to Yola). The latest user numbers it released were back in February 2009, when the company said it had over 500,000 registered users building websites with its web-based application.
However, I think licensing deals with Internet Service Providers and server hosting companies are a much better way to make money from something like basic website editing tools than going after one user at a time. Jimdo clearly understands this and is making it happen, too.
Earlier this year, Jimdo also announced it had reached an exclusive agreement with KDDI Web Communications, a subsidiary of Japan’s second largest telecommunication corporation KDDI, to launch the Japanese version of the application.
If the Samwer brothers invest, it has got to be good!
Nice investment.Perhaps they see what;s good to be part of it..
The whole “create your own website” thing is pretty played. Any real business will hire a professional.
Like your local barbershop that only wants to let (local) people to know that they exist and give exact address and opening times to their customers?
I agree. There’s still a huge number of businesses that don’t even have a web presence. This is a good way to get something up on the cheep that’s decent looking.
Exactly, there’s a lot of people out there who want/need a website for their business, clubs, for their “online” résumé that can’t afford to hire a designer – and maybe the site is basic enough that most designers wouldn’t want to do it anyway.
People like this have many alternate outlets where they can accomplish the same goal for free. Wordpress, Facebook, Ning, etc.
I love it!
me too!
1and1 is just a bunch of crooks.
+1 (totaly totally)
good deal for jimdo anyway
I personally wouldn’t use 1&1 for anything but this is good for Jimdo.
congratulations, guys!
Congrats to Jimdo! Smart move by United Internet, as individuals and businesses continue to build their web presence with WYSIWYG software. Pretty sweet margins for them at $10/month hosting.
I like it…
1+1 sitting on 300.000 resellers currently
nice