Here’s a snippet from Canpages’ news release:
"Online recommendations, especially those from a user’s social networks, are increasingly important when choosing which local businesses to buy from," said Olivier Vincent, President and CEO of Canpages. "With the acquisition of the GigPark, we are thrilled to be the first local search and directories publisher in North America to embrace social recommendations in a relevant way."
(I thought I was the only person to refer to the company as “The GigPark” – although ironically, as in “The Facebook” or “The Twitter”.)
GigPark are based here in Toronto, and founders Pema Hegan and Noah Godfrey are pillars of the Toronto tech community as well as all-round great guys, as are their team: Gianni Chiappetta, Paul Dowman and Tony Targonski. To echo the words of Jevon MacDonald at StartupNorth, it’s hard not to like them.
GigPark answers a few questions about their acquisition in their most recent blog entry:
Who is Canpages?
Canpages is the fastest growing local search and directories publisher in Canada. On its way to becoming the market leader in local online search, Canpages’ website gets more than 3.5 million unique visitors per month and is a pretty awesome place to find a local business. Its iPhone and Blackberry apps are pretty sweet too. They also publish 84 print directories that reach 8 million households and business across the country.
And the icing on the cake is that Canpages is run by a bunch of really smart and nice people (shout out to our new colleagues!)
What’s going to happen to GigPark?
GigPark is not going anywhere. We will continue to be the easiest place to find the local services your friends use. And with Canpages’ support and resources, GigPark will become even more useful.
How will GigPark play with Canpages?
The acquisition enables Canpages to integrate GigPark’s recommendations into its online and mobile search platforms. Like we said, Canpages is already a pretty awesome place to find local businesses and the addition of GigPark will make this local search experience even better.
Beyond that, Canpages is also excited about the prospect of adding some of GigPark’s social functionality to better connect users with advertisers through recommendations from friends.
I’m a business owner on GigPark. What does this mean for me?
It means A LOT more people are going to see the testimonials for your business and you’ll likely get even more business. You’re welcome! :)
The acquisition was also covered by The Globe and Mail.
Congrats to the folks at GigPark!