Friends Reunited

They also encouraged celebrities and broadcasters to log onto the site and look at their old school friends. For instance, The Daily Mail featured a double page spread on celebrities and their old school friends and radio host Chris Moyles discussed the site at length on Radio 1. A weekly feature was negotiated with the Sunday Express, offering human interest stories and topical case studies, such as Valentine's Day.

As the Friends Reunited database expended into the millions they contacted TV researchers offering it as a resource in return for positive on-air recognition for the site.

Regional media were offered local angles where users had successfully been reunited. The Press Association was frequently updated with site statistics, which in turn generated further regional coverage. The site was pitched to online and trade journalists as the potential internet success story of the year. The campaign was not backed up by any advertising.

The result was that every national newspaper has featured the site on more than one occasion. The number of registered users was 30,000 in April 2001: by February 2002, the site had over 5 million registered users. The site was in the top 10 most visited websites in the UK in 2001, an achievement shared with the likes of MSN, Freeserve and the BBC.

Friends Reunited has become a household name aided by the great concept and viral nature of the product and superb PR - there can be few who have not read about, or been touched by, the site over the past couple of years.

The company successfully ditched the dot.com tag and demonstrated through clever media relations how the internet offers a unique way to reach people and, in many cases, instigate friendships and reunions. The response to this from the media was truly phenomenal and this translated directly into a massive increase in registered users. Its creators eventually sold the company to Granada for £170m.

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