dogado joins forces with HEROLD to become a leading website provider for SMBs in Austria

The dogado group, a co-owner-managed digital company with roots in Germany and Austria, will be taking hold over all shares in the traditional Austrian company HEROLD. The closing is expected for February.

The unification of Herold and dogado group creates a player with a uniquely strategic position in the digital market: both companies specialize in supporting small and mediumsized businesses achieve business success with website and online marketing products. HEROLD and dogado group thus complement each other perfectly in their approaches.

„HEROLD and dogado group – a perfect match,“ explains Daniel Hagemeier, CEO and coowner of dogado group, adding: „Together we will assume a unique position in Germany and Austria, allowing us to serve over 300.000 customers. We are one of the first companies to offer websites and online marketing services as well as self-service and managed services.“ dogado serves over 260.000 clients with services such as webhosting, domains and cloud solutions, many of which in Austria under the “easyname” brand.
Herold serves over 45.000 small and medium-sized companies in Austria with its websiteservices, which include fully managed websites as well as marketing services such as search engine optimization (SEO) and digital advertising campaigns (SEA). The long-established company has earned its reputation as a leading service provider for search engine marketing: as one in around ten Austrian companies, HEROLD holds the title „Google Leading Agency“, which is awarded by the search engine market leader itself.

HEROLD is widely known in Austria and enjoys the trust of numerous SMBs. „We want to build on this trust and expand the digital product portfolio to make our customers even more successful online,“ says Hagemeier.

„We are very much looking forward to being able to serve our customers even more comprehensively alongside dogado group,“ comments Alberto Sanz de Lama, CEO of HEROLD, on the merger. The management team, which is composed of Sanz de Lama and COO Alexander Soukup will be joined by John Goddard. Goddard held the position of Managing Director at HEROLD from September 2018 to April 2020 and in his time with the company started building the foundation for the company’s current success. „With John Goddard we have re-gained an additional specialist for digital products,“ Sanz de Lama is pleased to say.

Regarding current challenges Goddard explains: „Never before have the needs and requirements of our small and medium-sized customers changed so rapidly as during the Corona crisis. At HEROLD, we will therefore not only ensure the continuance of our productrange, but also expand our product and service portfolio to the benefit of our customers.“

About dogado group

dogado group is a cloud hosting provider for business customers with its main offices located in Dortmund, Hannover, Halle (Saale), Lübeck, Vienna and – in the future – Mödling (headquarters of Herold Business Data GmbH). After its establishment in 2001, the company initially specialized in professional hosting services and later became one of the first German specialists for cloud-based business solutions. With soon-to-be 580 employees as well as the brands checkdomain, BUSYMOUSE, dogado, alfahosting, easyname, Profihost and HEROLD under its roof, the group serves around 300,000 customers and is one of the leading providers of website and online marketing services in Germany and Austria.

dogado group is part of to the European Directories (EDSA) group of companies with more than 1,500 employees with locations in Austria, Finland and the Netherlands. Thanks to this support, dogado group has developed into a leading provider of website and online marketing services in the German-speaking market.

More information can be found under: www.dogado.group

About HEROLD

HEROLD is the specialist for online media and marketing services, connecting providers with potential customers as is represented in its slogan „HEROLD bringt’s zamm“.

Over 2 million consumers use the HEROLD online portals every month to find the right local service provider, allowing customers to access all the relevant information they need to make the best buying decision.

HEROLD marketing services are tailored to the individual needs of Austrian SMBs and offer cost-efficient solutions to attract new customers and increase sales. Around 45,000 customers trust in the long-standing expertise of the marketing specialist. With more than 20,000 websites created HEROLD is the largest website provider in Austria within the SMB segment today. As one of the very first Google Premium Partners, HEROLD was awarded the esteemed „Google Leading Agency“ award and has already implemented more than 55,000 SEA themed campaigns. In the area of search engine optimisation, 2,000 campaigns for around 12,000 thematic areas have already been successfully implemented.