Wishpond Helps SMBs With E-Marketing

Now even small retailers can have an e-storefront, thanks to a Vancouver, B.C.-based company called Wishpond. Last week, the company took the wraps off its Merchant Offering, which allows retail operations to manage all of their online marketing initiatives in one place.A search engine company, Wishpond first released a consumer-facing app that lets buyers find local stores selling the products they seek. Now retailers can get their names in front of those consumers, even if they don't have a lot of money to spend on e-marketing.

"A lot of consumers like to research products before they buy them, but they're usually seeing only the big national retail players online," says Ali Tajsekandar, founder and CEO of Wishpond. "Small retailers are missing out on that online presence because they don't have the resources to take advantage of online, mobile, and social marketing."

With Wishpond, retailers can upload information about their products quickly and easily. They can upload one product at a time or many at once, or they can import an entire catalog from their website, if they have one. Consumers can see at a glance where your store is located, how you can be reached, and what products you have to offer.

Wishpond also integrates with social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter, allowing retailers to create Facebook storefronts, for example. Promos are easy to manage as well; create a promo once and it gets pushed out to online ad platforms such as Google AdWords and to social networking sites all at once. Want all your FB fans to see your promos without having to visit your fan page and dig around? With Wishpond, you can have all your promos sent to all your fans' Walls.

Wishpond's Merchant Dashboard provides retailers with real-time analytics that help them manage their products and promotions. Retailers can track the effectiveness of their ad campaigns and get insight into all of their marketing initiatives in one place.

Believe it or not, all of these features are free. For a monthly fee, ranging from $150 to $450, Wishpond will promote you on Google's Ad Network too. Beats hiring a whole marketing team, right?