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The Craft Community Takes Flight on Ektron CMS400.NET
Posted: 08.27.09
NASHUA, NH August 27, 2009 – Ektron Inc., a technology and market leader in Web content management, portals and social media, today announced that EKSuccess Brands launched its online community for crafters, www.spottedcanary.com on Ektron’s Web content management platform, Ektron CMS400.NET.
Spotted Canary is about everything crafting, whether it is scrapbooking, jewelry making, kids projects, paper crafting, needle work or crafts in general. EKSuccess Brands worked with Ektron Certified partner PINT to build the Spotted Canary community on CMS400.NET and leverage Ektron’s Web 2.0 and social media features to enable interaction and collaboration between members.
Spotted Canary members can create their own personalized profile pages and ‘craft spot’ where they can upload and share the projects they are working on. Members can add and invite friends, discuss craft projects through private messaging and comment on and rate other members’ projects that have been posted. Members also participate in the community forums and blogs as well as surveys, contests and polls that Spotted Canary hosts.
“We are excited about bringing our creative content to consumers in this new way,” stated Richard Ezra, Vice President of Marketing for EKSuccess Brands. “Spotted Canary was designed to inspire, educate and cultivate an entire community of craft enthusiasts. We think people will enjoy visiting the site as much as we do creating for and working on it every day.”
PINT developed custom functionality hooking in through Ektron’s API to display membership rankings and increased functionality based on member involvement. Active community members are awarded for their participation and can earn “feathers,” which act as a point system unlocking advanced functionality such as more background options for their profile page.
"We've used the Ektron platform for a variety of Web sites over the years and are pleased to see it continue to evolve to meet changing industry requirements. In this engagement the CMS400.NET platform provides us the flexibility and feature set we needed to implement a creative and social Web site like Spotted Canary," said Thomas Powell, PINT's CEO.
In addition to the community features, Spottedcanary.com contains thousands of informational articles and craft projects for members to read and try. There are also multiple newsletters that members can sign up for based on their craft interest, offering even more resources for project ideas and how-to advice.
“Spottedcanary.com is a perfect example of how dynamic a membership community can become if you give your members the tools that they need to participate and interact with each other,” stated Bill Rogers, chief executive officer at Ektron. “The site shows how Ektron’s out-of-the-box social media tools can be leveraged as well as how customizable CMS400.NET is. PINT has created an outstanding social community site and we are thrilled to see their creativity in extending the platform to deliver the community EKSuccess Brands was looking for.”
About EK Success Brands
EK Success Brands (http://www.eksuccess.com ) is a creative consumer products company with the leading market position in the $3.0 billion scrapbooking segment of the U.S. craft industry. EK Success Brands consist of nationally recognized and respected products in the industry, such as K&Company, Martha Stewart Crafts™, Inkadinkado®, Dimensions Crafts, Jolee’s®, Sticko®, and Perler. In 2006, EK Success was acquired by private equity firm GTCR Golder Rauner LLC. In 2007, GTCR also acquired Wilton Industries, Inc, Dimensions Holdings, LLC, and K&Company, bringing EK Success and these powerhouse brands together as Wilton Products Inc.
About Ektron
Founded in 1998, Ektron is committed to providing revolutionary, scalable Web content management and authoring solutions. Ektron CMS400.NET empowers developers and non-technical business users alike: developers can take advantage of built-in Server Controls to deploy a Web site out of the box or customize the deployment using CMS400.NET’s well-documented API, and business users benefit from an intuitive user interface for managing their Web site’s content and messaging. From enterprise level deployments to single sites, CMS400.NET ships with a wide array of functionality, including social networking, Web 2.0, SEO and synchronization tools. Headquartered in Nashua, N.H., Ektron has more than 20,000 customer implementations worldwide, including LG, Sony, and Johnson & Johnson. For more information, visit: http://www.ektron.com .
Spotted Canary is about everything crafting, whether it is scrapbooking, jewelry making, kids projects, paper crafting, needle work or crafts in general. EKSuccess Brands worked with Ektron Certified partner PINT to build the Spotted Canary community on CMS400.NET and leverage Ektron’s Web 2.0 and social media features to enable interaction and collaboration between members.
Spotted Canary members can create their own personalized profile pages and ‘craft spot’ where they can upload and share the projects they are working on. Members can add and invite friends, discuss craft projects through private messaging and comment on and rate other members’ projects that have been posted. Members also participate in the community forums and blogs as well as surveys, contests and polls that Spotted Canary hosts.
“We are excited about bringing our creative content to consumers in this new way,” stated Richard Ezra, Vice President of Marketing for EKSuccess Brands. “Spotted Canary was designed to inspire, educate and cultivate an entire community of craft enthusiasts. We think people will enjoy visiting the site as much as we do creating for and working on it every day.”
PINT developed custom functionality hooking in through Ektron’s API to display membership rankings and increased functionality based on member involvement. Active community members are awarded for their participation and can earn “feathers,” which act as a point system unlocking advanced functionality such as more background options for their profile page.
"We've used the Ektron platform for a variety of Web sites over the years and are pleased to see it continue to evolve to meet changing industry requirements. In this engagement the CMS400.NET platform provides us the flexibility and feature set we needed to implement a creative and social Web site like Spotted Canary," said Thomas Powell, PINT's CEO.
In addition to the community features, Spottedcanary.com contains thousands of informational articles and craft projects for members to read and try. There are also multiple newsletters that members can sign up for based on their craft interest, offering even more resources for project ideas and how-to advice.
“Spottedcanary.com is a perfect example of how dynamic a membership community can become if you give your members the tools that they need to participate and interact with each other,” stated Bill Rogers, chief executive officer at Ektron. “The site shows how Ektron’s out-of-the-box social media tools can be leveraged as well as how customizable CMS400.NET is. PINT has created an outstanding social community site and we are thrilled to see their creativity in extending the platform to deliver the community EKSuccess Brands was looking for.”
About EK Success Brands
EK Success Brands (http://www.eksuccess.com ) is a creative consumer products company with the leading market position in the $3.0 billion scrapbooking segment of the U.S. craft industry. EK Success Brands consist of nationally recognized and respected products in the industry, such as K&Company, Martha Stewart Crafts™, Inkadinkado®, Dimensions Crafts, Jolee’s®, Sticko®, and Perler. In 2006, EK Success was acquired by private equity firm GTCR Golder Rauner LLC. In 2007, GTCR also acquired Wilton Industries, Inc, Dimensions Holdings, LLC, and K&Company, bringing EK Success and these powerhouse brands together as Wilton Products Inc.
About Ektron
Founded in 1998, Ektron is committed to providing revolutionary, scalable Web content management and authoring solutions. Ektron CMS400.NET empowers developers and non-technical business users alike: developers can take advantage of built-in Server Controls to deploy a Web site out of the box or customize the deployment using CMS400.NET’s well-documented API, and business users benefit from an intuitive user interface for managing their Web site’s content and messaging. From enterprise level deployments to single sites, CMS400.NET ships with a wide array of functionality, including social networking, Web 2.0, SEO and synchronization tools. Headquartered in Nashua, N.H., Ektron has more than 20,000 customer implementations worldwide, including LG, Sony, and Johnson & Johnson. For more information, visit: http://www.ektron.com .
