Favemail Engine Change Expands Services
Favemail, a viral e-mail marketer, has expanded its business model to include a broader range of e-mail marketing services and has renamed itself Expression Engines Inc.The remodeled company seeks to combine direct marketing and e-mail campaigns with business consultation and analysis. Expression Engines has hired Al DiGuido, a former Ziff-Davis senior executive, as its CEO.
In its first life, Favemail, New York, operated almost exclusively as a viral marketing service, offering clients a tool to allow customers to use and promote company logos in their own e-mails. For example, NHL.com used Favemail during the 2000 playoffs to enable hockey fans to go to the league's Web site, download team logos and graphics, and insert them as footers in their personal outgoing e-mails.
Besides branding benefits of viral marketing, Favemail also claimed to drive site traffic for clients by inserting links within the logos to various destinations in the clients' Web sites. The NHL.com links, for instance, took fans to the NHL.com home page or to the teams' individual home pages.
The Favemail services will become one offering in a larger portfolio of Expression Engines products and services. While the company has not released additional specifics about the new services it wants to provide, it did say the focus would remain on using e-mail to drive site traffic and promote brand awareness. Expression Engines seeks to offer research and strategic planning services, content creation, message management and delivery, and reporting and analysis.
DiGuido joins Expression Engines after 13 years at Ziff-Davis. He held several sales and marketing positions, including publisher of Computer Shopper and ComputerShopper.com.
The privately held Expression Engines was founded in 1999 under the Favemail name. Its chief investors include Flatiron Partners, Chase Capital Partners and Grey Ventures.
