This is the year that Yoast turns 5 years old. A natural time to reflect upon how the company is doing and what it should and should not be doing and what we want for the future. Today we’re proud to announce that we’ve been acquired by CrowdFavorite. Let me tell you the story of how this came to be and what this means.
WordCamp Europe
At last year’s WordCamp Europe in Sofia, I got the chance to spend some time with CrowdFavorite’s executive team. In particular I spent time with Chris Lema and Karim Marucchi. We connected in a good way, the “feels like we’ve been friends forever” kind of way.
Our discussions showed that we think alike. On the dance floor, we had tons of fun. In short, we proved to be a good match.
Ongoing discussions
Early this year, we began to talk more as CrowdFavorite reached out, needing help on the marketing side of things. As Karim Maruchi, CrowdFavorite’s CEO, said:
“Joost has a long history of consulting with enterprise organizations. His approach is in line with how we approach things, so it simply made sense to begin talking about how we could work together”
We discussed potential modes of working together and in the end came to the conclusion that we’re better off together. As CrowdFavorite is by far the bigger company in this “spiel”, they’re acquiring us in an asset acquisition.
So will Yoast disappear?
No. None of the Yoast products or services will change. The same plugins, the same review service. Your licenses will stay the same and you’ll be able to renew them as well. We will just be able to offer these as one integrated solution to all of CrowdFavorite’s clients. I myself will join CrowdFavorite’s executive team as Chief Marketing Officer.
We’ll be busy for the next 3 months integrating our companies. This shouldn’t slow down product development. It might mean I myself and the rest of the Yoast management team will be slightly less visible for a while. We do expect to party with all of you in Spain at this years WordCamp Europe though!
This post first appeared as Yoast joins CrowdFavorite! on Yoast. Whoopity Doo!