EADP Dispatch: SEARCHing for Value

This morning at EADP,  European Directories (EDSA) CEO Cornel Riklin outlined the company’s strategy to be the top provider of lead generation to SMBs in its markets. The path to get there includes offering leading local search platforms to consumers.

EDSA generated nearly 850 million euros in the last reported annual cycle and delivered 285 million euros in EBITDA. The Netherlands alone represents 37 percent of EDSA’s revenues and just over 45 percent of its EBITDA. Core to EDSA’s strategy is gaining a larger share of customer ad budgets. Today, that share stands around 15 percent, principally from print and IYP. Twenty-five percent of the SMB ad budget is meanwhile allocated to Web sites, e-mail, direct mail and search engine marketing.

In order to gain a larger share of that budget, EDSA’s team is rolling out new products by purchasing or partnering with early stage tech companies (ee yesterday’s post). EDSA also announced at the conference that it has selected IT2media to implement sales force automation across its operating units in the Netherlands, Finland, Denmark, Austria, Sweden, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland and Gibraltar.