Pressemitteilungen

21.07.2009

Product- and Price-Comparison Specialist SmartShopping launched in UK

London, 21 July 2009. SmartShopping, the comparison-shopping specialist in the portfolio of United Internet Media, has formally launched its own online offer for the English market (www.smartshopping.co.uk). Nick Casey has been appointed as the Country Manager of SmartShopping UK.

SmartShopping.co.uk is the first website in the English online market that makes it possible to compare not only prices but also shops and their services. The extensive comparison-shopping offer can also be accessed via mobile phone (http://mobile.smartshopping.co.uk) or in a variation that has been optimised for the look and feel of the iPhone (http://iphone.smartshopping.co.uk). Since the start of this year, an application that has been specially developed for the iPhone is available at the Apple iTunes Store as a free download.

With the expansion of the successful e-commerce model to Great Britain, United Internet Media – one of the leading marketing companies for digital offers in the European media market – emphasises the consistent internationalisation of its e-commerce offers and its sustained market commitment to one of Europe’s most important and strongest growth online markets. Following the DACH region (Germany, Austria and Switzerland), the UK is already the fourth market in which SmartShopping is represented with an offer.  

“Apart from advertising, e-commerce is and will remain the driver of growth par excellence for the entire digital sector. Great Britain also represents one of the most important growth markets in Europe in this respect. In the European comparison, the UK is already in 4th place with 86% online shoppers* and 42% of the European online advertising volumes. We also intend to expand our leading market position outside of Germany with a differentiated shopping network and excellent know-how, in addition to establishing ourselves in this strategic growth market,” is how Matthias Ehrlich, CEO of United Internet Media AG, explains the bridging to Great Britain.

United Internet Media has entrusted Nick Casey with the rollout of the SmartShopping offer in the UK. In his new function as the Country Manager of SmartShopping UK, the 31-year-old ecommerce specialist is responsible for establishing the brand in the British online market, as well as for the conceptual design of new shopping products and solutions specific to that market.
Casey can draw upon his longstanding and extensive knowledge of the English e-commerce scene and its special demands for his new assignment at SmartShopping UK. Casey comes from the well-known English price-comparison provider of PriceRunner UK, where he was responsible for the strategic planning of the pan- European and global brand expansion, as well as mobile services, as the Head of Products and Mobile Services. Before his time at PriceRunner, he was in charge of the successful market launch and positioning of the comparison-shopping platform Kelkoo in Australia as the Acting Head of Products at Yahoo! Australia. At the beginning of his professional career, Casey worked at Vectorcraft.com, a start-up for e-commerce and web-based software solutions that he co-founded.  

“Our goal is to establish SmartShopping UK with its portfolio of offers that is equally attractive for users and shop operators among the leading comparison-shopping platforms in the English market. I am very pleased to have Nick Casey on board as a proven expert and authority on the English e-commerce scene for this challenging assignment”, is Ehrlich’s welcome for the new arrival on the international team of SmartShopping and United Internet Media.

* Source: EIAA Mediascope 2008