June 29, 2010 08:00 ET

HootSuite Selects Aria Systems to Monetize Twitter and Other Social Media

Premier Social Media Dashboard Automates Revenues for "Freemium" Model With Cloud Billing From Aria Systems

SAN MATEO, CA--(Marketwire - June 29, 2010) -  Aria Systems, Inc. (http://www.AriaSystems.com), the leading provider of cloud billing and subscription management solutions, today announced that HootSuite, the Social Media Dashboard, has selected Aria Platform Standard Edition. HootSuite will use Aria's SaaS platform to automate monetization of subscription features and services delivered in a "freemium" model that provides a free core offering with additional paid features.

Since its inception in 2008, HootSuite has rapidly emerged as one of the world's most popular social media clients, allowing users to monitor and post content to popular social networks including Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and Ping.fm. HootSuite's broad feature set and constant innovation have made it popular with leading organizations including Disney, Fox, National Geographic, Huffington Post, the U.S. Air Force, Dell, the National Basketball Association, TMZ.com and many others.

HootSuite recognized an opportunity to develop recurring revenue streams for premium features and services that provide additional value on top of HootSuite's core free client. HootSuite needed a revenue automation platform that supported a "freemium" business model, provided secure payment card handling and immediate service activation for paying customers, as well as automation for downstream billing and collections processes. Given HootSuite's historical agility and rapid evolution, the company also recognized that they needed a "future-proof" monetization platform that could enable their current model while providing complete flexibility for the future. Finally, the system had to integrate easily with HootSuite's backoffice accounting systems. HootSuite chose Aria after reviewing several SaaS billing alternatives.

"HootSuite is a fast-moving innovator, and we wanted a SaaS billing platform that could support the pace of our business," said Ryan Holmes, CEO at HootSuite. "Aria's platform offered the flexibility, ease of integration, and robust monetization capabilities that we needed for the next step in our evolution."

"Social media and cloud billing have created an enormous economic opportunity for companies of all sizes," said Mike Morini, CEO at Aria Systems. "HootSuite is another good example of a market leader who recognized the value that Aria's SaaS billing platform provides in automating revenue streams and enabling next-generation business models."

About Aria Systems
Aria Systems is the leader in cloud billing and subscription management solutions. Since its inception in 2003 as the pioneer in SaaS billing, Aria has grown rapidly to manage millions of accounts in every country in the world and spanning a wide range of industries. The Aria Billing and Subscription Management Platform is the industry's most reliable, flexible and scalable on-demand platform for organizations looking to accelerate recurring revenue capture while significantly reducing operating costs. Aria Systems also leads the market in security and compliance as the only vendor to have achieved both SAS 70 Type II certification as well as PCI DSS Level 1 compliance for the entire billing management process. Aria's team is comprised of industry veterans that have managed multi-billion dollar billing operations supporting millions of end user subscribers. For more information about Aria Systems, visit http://www.AriaSystems.com or call 1-877-755-2370.