Yoder in Hot Seat at WebTrends

Just months after Dan Stickel took up the post of CEO at web analytics firm WebTrends, the firm has announced his resignation. Replacing him, the firm's fourth CEO in a year will be former VP of Sales Alex Yoder, who left the firm 18 months ago citing differences with management - and rejoined in January.

Stickel replaced Board member Bruce Coleman, who had taken temporary control of the firm following the departure of Greg Drew in a shakeup designed to accelerate the company's growth.

Yoder takes up his new role - and a seat on the Board - as the company announces its 'biggest ever' quarter for sales. His 20 year background includes nearly seven spent heading sales initiatives with WebTrends. However, he left in January 2007 to become VP of Sales at behavioral targeting firm Touch Clarity, explaining that he didn't feel he could provide a 'positive contribution' under the WebTrends management team at the time. Yoder returned to WebTrends a year later.

Commenting on the management change, Board member Neil Garfinkel of Francisco Partners stated: 'Alex has a proven track record and has demonstrated clear leadership at the company over the years, helping to form our strategic vision and drive customer success. He's the right person to lead WebTrends business forward.'

Yoder's new focus on sales, marketing and customer service means he is currently hiring a VP of Sales for his previous role, and a Chief Marketing Officer to replace Tim Kopp who left in January to take up the same post at e-mail marketing firm ExactTarget. He has already appointed former Oracle exec Dave Canelis for the new role of VP of Client Services, as well as former Corillian CFO Paul Wilde to head finance. In addition, Bruce Kenny has returned to WebTrends to lead engineering and hosted operations.

As WebTrends is owned by private equity firm Francisco Partners, it does not provide details on its actual revenues and profits. The firm, which develops software analytics tools for analyzing web site visitors and online marketing campaigns, is on the net at www.webtrends.com .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.

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