Web hosting provider Verio (www.verio.com) said this week that it plans to give away a total of $13,000 in prizes through a contest it is running through its Websites.com (www.websites.com) small business resource.
The “Best New Small Business Site Award,” says Verio, will recognize small businesses in the US for “outstanding website design, performance and achievement.”
The contest, the details and rules of which are described at length in a devoted section of the site, will match website owners with partners from the site’s “Find an Expert Directory.” Site owners and experts will work together to build new websites for participation and eligibility in the contest.
The first place entry in the contest will receive $10,000, while second place will be given $3,000.
Verio says the contest is the first in a series of similar promotions the company intends to run in the coming months, which it intends to call the “Websites that Work for Small Business” series. The company says it may expand the series into markets outside the US.
“We are committed to helping small and medium businesses achieve online success and this contest is just the beginning,” says Kazutaka Kobayashi, director, global strategy and marketing for Verio, quoted in the company’s release. “It is our goal that this and any future contests will highlight businesses that are successful at using their expertise in hosting, online collaboration tools, email applications and other technology areas.”
Verio’s hosting services focus on the small and medium-sized business market, though the company announced a plan to shift its focus from a split between channel and direct sales to a 100-percent channel operation by the end of 2009.
Late in June, the company announced a new line of Linux VPS services for its viaVerio channel partners.
