Be Free, Inc. Adds Leading Internet Businesses to Growing & Diversifying Client Roster for Performance Marketing.Business/Technology Editors MARLBOROUGH, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 16, 2000 Bigstep.com, DealTime & Red Gorilla Launch Affiliate Programs Enabled by Be Free's Proven & Powerful Performance Marketing Infrastructure & Services Be Free, Inc. (Nasdaq:BFRE BFRE Besoin en Fonds de Roulement d'Exploitation (French: Working Capital Requirement for Exploitation) ), the leader of performance marketing, today announced that Bigstep.com, DealTime and Red Gorilla have launched affiliate marketing Affiliate marketing is a method of promoting web businesses (merchants/advertisers) in which an affiliate (publisher) is rewarded for every visitor, subscriber, customer, and/or sale provided through his/her efforts. programs powered by Be Free's proven, full-service performance marketing infrastructure and services. Bigstep.com and Red Gorilla are using Be Free's B2BFAST BFAST Be Free Affiliate Service Technology (Be Free Inc.) (sm) performance marketing services for affiliate programs focused on the business-to-business sector, while DealTime is leveraging the power of Be Free's LeadRunner(sm) program to drive qualified traffic to its site and compensate affiliates on a cost-per-click model. "Performance marketing is the next generation of online marketing - bringing down customer acquisition costs and expanding brand reach tremendously," said Gordon Hoffstein, chairman and CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. of Be Free, Inc. "This powerful mixture of benefits is precisely what leads category-leading businesses like Bigstep.com, DealTime and Red Gorilla to adopt this new paradigm New Paradigm In the investing world, a totally new way of doing things that has a huge effect on business. Notes: The word "paradigm" is defined as a pattern or model, and it has been used in science to refer to a theoretical framework. in marketing." "Be Free's proven leadership in providing top-quality services and scaleable and cutting-edge infrastructure have attracted the leaders of industry in e-business today," continued Hoffstein. "Be Free continues to partner with successful and strategic businesses to launch performance marketing programs, firing-up its business model and strengthening its leadership position." "Be Free has been instrumental in helping us to grow our affiliate program, which now has thousands of members and drives significant traffic to DealTime.com," said Deborah Sack, vice president of marketing communications Marketing communications (or marcom) are messages and related media used to communicate with a market. Those who practice advertising, branding, direct marketing, graphic design, marketing, packaging, promotion, publicity, sponsorship, public relations, sales, sales at DealTime. Three New Affiliate Programs Offer Affiliates Value & Opportunity Bigstep.com (www.Bigstep.com), based in San Francisco San Francisco (săn frănsĭs`kō), city (1990 pop. 723,959), coextensive with San Francisco co., W Calif., on the tip of a peninsula between the Pacific Ocean and San Francisco Bay, which are connected by the strait known as the Golden , Calif., is an e-business services company leading the movement of small businesses to the Web. Bigstep.com is a free, do-it-yourself, online service center where small businesses can build a business Web site, communicate with customers, market the site, accept credit cards, track visitors and more. Affiliates earn money each time a user clicks through and registers for Bigstep.com e-business services. DealTime (www.dealtime.com), the leading online comparison shopping service, is a gateway to a rich information exchange between consumers who are ready to buy and merchants who want to sell a wide variety of consumer goods consumer goods Any tangible commodity purchased by households to satisfy their wants and needs. Consumer goods may be durable or nondurable. Durable goods (e.g., autos, furniture, and appliances) have a significant life span, often defined as three years or more, and and services. DealTime empowers consumers with the ability to compare models, brands, merchant types and prices from merchants across the Web, as well as offline sellers. DealTime's robust, scalable technology further benefits consumers by providing highly relevant search results and the ability to deliver information through wireless devices, including web-enabled mobile phones and personal digital assistants. DealAgent, DealTime's dynamic pricing engine, empowers merchants, manufacturers and industry analysts by providing aggregated data about consumer buying activity through DealTime. Red Gorilla, The Application Syndication Company(TM) (www.redgorilla.com), based in San Francisco, Calif., provides wireless, end-user applications to the Media Metrix 500 and other high-traffic Web sites. Red Gorilla's first business-to-business product, Gorilla Time(TM)--the world's first time tracking and invoicing application is fully accessible via the Web, Palm(TM) and phone. Gorilla Time is designed for small professional service firms, independent consultants and freelancers who need a simple billing solution that doesn't require expensive software or constant upgrades. Red Gorilla affiliates earn money when users sign up for its free, Web-based service or low-cost, premium services. About Performance Marketing Performance marketing allows online marketers to increase sales, drive traffic, generate qualified leads and extend brand reach through relationships with affiliate web sites. These affiliate web sites provide meaningful context for a marketer's link and allow the marketer to target consumers with particular interests, knowledge and spending habits, while paying only for the performance of their promotions. By paying only for results, marketers lower their customer acquisition costs and increase the power of their marketing budgets. Be Free offers a truly customer-focused approach to performance marketing, producing superior overall results and enabling cross-promotions and cooperative marketing. Be Free also offers an entire suite of performance marketing services, from scaleable infrastructure and tracking technology, to industry knowledge and value added Value Added The enhancement a company gives its product or service before offering the product to customers. Notes: This can either increase the products price or value. services. About Performance Marketing Using LeadRunner LeadRunner(sm) is a performance marketing solution that enables online marketers of all kinds--from content sites and portals to search engines and subscription services--to develop affiliate and e-mail marketing Email marketing is a form of direct marketing which uses electronic mail as a means of communicating commercial or fundraising messages to an audience. In its broadest sense, every email sent to a potential or current customer could be considered email marketing. programs using Be Free's BFAST(sm) and B-INTOUCH(sm) services. Using LeadRunner, companies can promote content, services, subscriptions or tools and pay affiliates a bounty (flat dollar amount) for every lead or click-through they generate. This program brings the power of performance-based affiliate marketing beyond e-commerce, including content and information sites. About B2BFAST B2BFAST(sm) is a performance-based online distribution and sales solution that enables online businesses to develop performance-based affiliate sales channels or to transform and optimize an existing offline distribution and sales channel for the Internet. In the exploding and fiercely competitive business-to-business e-commerce market, speed of growth and time to market are essential to a company's success. B2BFAST allows suppliers and business-to-business e-merchants the essential speed, easy implementation and results required to gain market share and achieve a competitive advantage. Be Free's already proven model allows e-businesses to create a channel of strategic selling partners that they own and control - making it perfect solution for business-to-business sales and distribution online. About Be Free, Inc. Be Free, Inc. (Nasdaq: BFRE) is a leader in performance marketing - the next generation of online marketing. Be Free helps its customers build and manage uniquely branded online sales channels, enabling these sites to capture revenue by driving site traffic, generating qualified leads and selling products in context on locations throughout the Web. Be Free's customers include some of the Internet's leading merchants, online services and portals such as IBM (International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY, www.ibm.com) The world's largest computer company. IBM's product lines include the S/390 mainframes (zSeries), AS/400 midrange business systems (iSeries), RS/6000 workstations and servers (pSeries), Intel-based servers (xSeries) (NYSE NYSE See: New York Stock Exchange : IBM), America Online See AOL. , Inc. (NYSE: AOL (A division of Time Warner, Inc., New York, NY, www.aol.com) The world's largest online information service with access to the Internet, e-mail, chat rooms and a variety of databases and services. ), barnesandnoble.com (Nasdaq: BNBN), GoTo.com (Nasdaq: GOTO), Mercata, Reel.com (Nasdaq: HLYW), C|Net (Nasdaq: CNET (body) CNET - Centre national d'Etudes des Telecommunications. The French national telecommunications research centre at Lannion. ), Garden.com (Nasdaq: GDEN), PC Connection (Nasdaq: PCCC PCCC Passaic County Community College (Paterson, NJ) PCCC Platform Communication on Climate Change (The Netherlands) PCCC Porsche Ceramic Composite Clutch ), Lycos (Nasdaq: LCOS (Liquid Crystal on Silicon) A technology used to make microdisplays for rear-projection TVs and head-mounted displays (HMDs). Each LCoS chip hosts a grayscale LCD shutter sandwiched between a cover glass and a mirror. ), About.com (Nasdaq: BOUT) and Yahoo!(R)GeoCities (Nasdaq: YHOO YHOO Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ symbol) ). Collectively, Be Free's customers have more than 3.5 million affiliates in their sales channels. Affiliates can enroll in performance marketing programs using Be Free's technology with a streamlined application form called FastApp, located at http://www.reporting.net/networks/affiliates/bf_fast_app. Founded in 1996, Be Free has offices in Marlborough, MA, Pittsburgh, PA, Atlanta, GA, Chicago, IL, Los Angeles, CA, Culver City, CA, Campbell, CA, Austin, TX, Silver Spring, MD, Seattle, WA, New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of , NY and Windsor, UK. For more information, visit http://www.befree.com. Statements in this news release about Be Free, Inc. may be considered forward-looking statements as defined by the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act The Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 (PSLRA) implemented several significant substantive changes affecting certain cases brought under the federal securities laws, including changes related to pleading, discovery, liability, class representation and awards fees and of 1995. These statements are based on the Company's current expectations, hopes, beliefs and estimates. These statements involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those anticipated or projected. Further information about the risk factors that could affect the Company's performance are contained in the Company's filings with the Securities Exchange Commission, including but not limited to its S-1 dated November 3, 1999 and its S-1 dated March 29, 2000. |
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