As usual, the schmoozing at Minnedemo yielded a pleasant surprise. My discovery of a Minnesota company that is known better beyond it’s borders than within them and the CEO of said company. The CEO; Andy Johnson. The company; St. Cloud based W3i.
Many in the Minnesota interactive “space” (I love using that term. It’s so Gene Roddenberry) know Andy from his days at Fingerhut. He was instrumental in moving them into the e-commerce world where he grew their business to some $300 million* before Fingerhut sold in 1999, allowing him to take some time to recharge and be with family. He eventually joined CMS Direct where he was lured away by three brothers–Rob, Ryan, and Aaron Weber (the W3 of W3i. Yep the “i” is for interactive.)
What does W3i do? According to Johnson, whether you are a small developer with a great Windows based application or part of a monster company like Yahoo!, W3i can get your product on computers, build traffic, and make you money. How?
First a little history. As their own site states it, ‘W3i has its roots in “free stuff”—high demand, digital content distributed with ad-supported models.’ According to Johnson, the brothers Weber launched the company and subsequently received backing from Alta Communications out of Boston. W3i started as a lead generation play. Through sites like Wallpapers.com and Screensavers.com, they provided “free” content funded by ads and not to mention access to information about the folks that simply had to have a fish tank screen saver.
Another part of the business put them in the software and application download business. In conjunction with offering downloads like Yahoo! services and toolbars, W3i bundles smaller apps with the bigger ones allowing the end user to opt in and download more than one application.
Finally, when ring-tones downloads stormed the web, W3i planted themselves in the the thick of it.
Johnson explains that though all of the business units were making money, the application “bundling” business unit represents the largest growth potential. So in the last 18 months W3i has exited the lead generation business and sold off the ring-tone play. This is allowing them to focus and grow, “successfully” Johnson incidentally adds, the download business.
Okay, so that’s the Cliff’s notes history of W3i. Now, how can Minnesota developers work with this Minnesota company to deliver on, as advertised above, installing apps and software, building traffic ,and making them money. Johnson explains, “There are three ways a developer can take advantage of what W3i has to offer.”
The most obvious way is that you can flat out pay for a distribution deal getting you access to their 15 million unique users each month.
If you already have an application with high demand then W3i can help you monetize that demand by adding your Windows based app, and it’s associated traffic to another download offering on their W3i Download Network (WDN). This provides benefit and financial rewards shared between all the involved parties.
Finally, W3i can work with you in developing an executable file including quality control, etc and work with you on setting up a per install instance rate. Johnson also hits that, while it’s not something they do allot of, they are “open” to talking about working with start-ups on more complex development model.
Johnson reports that W3i continues to grow on the strength of new and ongoing (they just secured Yahoo! to another multi-year deal) business relationships. What would make Johnson like to see along with a strong growing business? “We want developers in Minnesota to know us as well as companies outside of our state do.” They continue to increase there profile through involvement in the local tech community and via the national stage with plenty of conference presentations by the Weber brothers.
“I sometimes think we’re one of those ‘best kept secrets” here.” says Johnson. “When really we want to provide ways to help Minnesota developers to get their applications and software on as many desktops as we can.”
(*The original post quoted this as $300 bilion rather than million. 5/23/09 )