SANTA CLARA, CA — (Marketwire) — 09/14/11 — Wantlet () — a pioneer in social commerce advertising that bridges traditional and online shopping through targeted retailer questions, social media integration, and location-based deals — today announced the company-s official launch at the DEMO Fall 2011 conference, which is taking place Sept. 12-14 at the Hyatt Regency in Santa Clara, Calif. Wantlet unveiled its new social retailing platform during a six-minute presentation on the DEMO main stage, followed by demonstrations of the platform at Booth D64 in the main conference pavilion.
“We are pleased and honored to launch Wantlet at the elite gathering that is the DEMO Fall 2011 conference,” said Erno Tauriainen, president and founder of Wantlet. “Wantlet helps offline retailers engage consumers and drive enhanced sell-through via targeted questions and social recommendation capabilities. In our early pilot programs, Wantlet produced conversion rates that were 50 to 100-fold better compared to traditional online advertising. Wantlet is in a unique position of knowing what products consumers want, what questions they-re asking, where consumers are located, and which nearby retailers have the products they seek. This is a powerful recipe for social commerce success, and our team is excited to reveal Wantlet to the DEMO community.”
Wantlet enables retailers to directly market to consumers who have socially expressed interest in one of their products. The company-s platform provides traditional retailers with a set of tools to leverage their offline strengths (in-store merchandise, in-store pickup, customer service, and product expertise) to interact with consumers through targeted online questions, social media integration, and location-based deals — effectively bridging offline-to-online shopping. Wantlet is currently integrated with 50,000 retailers in the U.S. that represent more than 7 million SKUs, with access to real-time, offline inventory updates via retailers- ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) systems.
According to Forrester Research, online retail sales will grow to $250 billion by 2014. While consumers bought $155 billion worth of goods online last year, a far larger portion of offline sales were influenced by prior online research. Forrester estimates that $917 billion in 2010 retail sales were “Web-influenced.” The company also estimates that online and Web-influenced offline sales combined accounted for 42 percent of total retail sales — and that the percentage will grow to 53 percent by 2014, when the Web will influence $1.4 trillion of in-store sales.
“We selected Wantlet to participate and launch at DEMO Fall 2011 because their platform offers a unique approach to the very hot social commerce/social retailing sector which is already having a significant impact on both traditional retailing and e-commerce,” said Matt Marshall, executive producer, DEMO. “Traditional brick-and-mortar retailers are working hard to leverage their assets and advantages to help them more effectively compete against online retailers, and Wantlet is certainly well-positioned at the crosshairs of that battle.”
Wantlet is available free of charge to consumers nationwide effective immediately, with easy signup via Facebook credentials or at . Brands and retailers interested in connecting to the Wantlet platform can contact Wantlet at or at (212) 203-3117. Follow Wantlet team updates during the DEMO conference via Twitter @wantlet.
Founded in Oulu, Finland, in 2007, Wantlet is a pioneer in social retailing and advertising that bridges traditional and online shopping through targeted retailer questions, social media integration, and location-based deals. Wantlet is currently integrated with 50,000 retailers in the U.S. representing over 7 million SKUs, with access to real-time, off-line inventory updates via their ERP systems. For more information, please visit .
Produced by the IDG Enterprise events group, the worldwide DEMO conferences focus on emerging technologies and new product innovations, which are hand-selected from across the spectrum of the technology marketplace. The DEMO conferences have earned their reputation for consistently identifying cutting-edge technologies and helping entrepreneurs secure venture funding and establish critical business. For more information on the DEMO conferences, visit .
Susan Donahue
Skyya Communications for Wantlet
Office: (646) 454-9378
Mobile: (651) 283-8700
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