The Knot Marries Couples' Wedding Needs With Relevant Local Businesses

NEW YORK, March 4, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- The Knot, the #1 online wedding resource, today announced a mobile-first site relaunch for TheKnot.com that enhances the company's marketplace by seamlessly engaging, matching and connecting couples with the right local vendors, products and services they need to pull off their wedding. As the category leader, The Knot reimagined the site from the ground up, leveraging learnings built on the success of its industry-leading mobile apps—with mobile now accounting for more than 50 percent of the brand's traffic.

The new site offers a completely personalized experience that sees couples through their entire wedding planning journey—from tailored real wedding photos and inspiration to a customizable checklist and perfect matches with the right local vendors across 30 categories. Just as no two couples have the same wedding or planning journey, no two couples will have the same experience on the new site. Through a personalized dashboard called "My Knot," couples are served an automatic feed of relevant content, tools and solutions that are based on their stage in the wedding process and tied to their preferences, such as wedding location, style and color. As they move through the site, there are multiple touch points where the couple can be matched and connected to the right local wedding vendor, at just the right time in their planning process. 

"Our goal is to help inspire, plan and book every wedding in America," explained Rob Fassino, Cofounder and Chief Product Officer at XO Group Inc. "As the pioneer of the digital wedding planning industry, innovation is in our DNA. We are thrilled to apply our new technology platform and 18 years of industry experience to create perfect matches between our couples and our local business partners around the country."   

Over the past year, The Knot has increased both the number of local wedding vendors on its site and user-generated reviews from real couples. There are more than 250,000 wedding vendors across 30 wedding planning categories including wedding venues, hotels, DJs and bands, photographers and more.

"Our engineering team is incredibly agile and user-focused. We completely rebuilt The Knot from the ground up as a platform for personalization—one that delivers deeper engagement for our couples and our marketers," said Nic Di lorio Chief Technology Officer at XO Group Inc. "The site serves contextually relevant ads that target against very specific user criteria and leverage a variety of native ad formats that support video, lead generation and custom content."

Advertisers are signed on to celebrate the site relaunch with The Knot "7 Days of Giveaways," which begins March 20. This sweepstakes highlights products that couples need for their wedding. Prizes are from Cuisinart, Disney Honeymoons, Maggie Sottero, Sottero and Midgley, Mikasa, Watters, and Aspen & Co.   

About The Knot
The Knot is the nation's leading wedding resource, reaching nearly every couple in America through the #1 wedding website, TheKnot.com; mobile apps; The Knot national and local wedding magazines; The Knot book series; and syndicated columns in newspapers nationwide. The Knot is the flagship brand of XO Group Inc. (NYSE: XOXO), the premier consumer internet and media company devoted to weddings, pregnancy and everything in between, providing couples and new parents with the trusted information, products and advice they need to guide them through the most transformative events of their lives. Follow The Knot on Twitter and Instagram @TheKnot.

Forward Looking Statements 
This release may contain projections or other forward-looking statements regarding future events or our future financial performance. These statements are only predictions and reflect our current beliefs and expectations. Actual events or results may differ materially from those contained in the projections or forward-looking statements. It is routine for internal projections and expectations to change, and therefore it should be clearly understood that the internal projections and beliefs upon which we base our expectations may change. Although these expectations may change, we will not necessarily inform you if they do or update this release. Please refer to documents we file from time to time with the Securities and Exchange Commission for a discussion of the risks and other factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements contained herein. Forward-looking statements in this release are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions contained in the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995.

CONTACTS:
Caty Bennett, PR Manager, The Knot, (212) 515.3595, [email protected]

Melissa Bach, Senior PR Manager, XO Group Inc., (212) 515.3594, [email protected]

Jennifer Perciballi, VP, Corporate Communications, XO Group Inc., (212) 515.1595, [email protected] 

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SOURCE XO Group Inc.

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