commonground - The Global Community for Environmental Professionals

By Environmental Data Resources, Inc. (EDR)

commonground is the award winning, global social network for professionals involved in all aspects of environmental and commercial real estate property due diligence. Members include environmental lawyers, health & safety, lenders, appraisers, insurers, builders, and consultants.

The commercial real estate market is off more than 70% in 2009 vs. 2008. As a result, environmental professionals are turning to EDR's commonground social network for help with difficult questions, jobs searches, education, advice, and business opportunities. For many members, commonground has become an important part of each and every day.

In just over a year, commonground has grown to 3,900 members from more than 1,600 companies, all 50 states, and 67 countries. There are over 600 blog posts and 3,000 discussions ranging from US & International environmental due diligence, green building, and climate change, to business issues, risk management, and even travel tips for those in the field.

In February 2009, commonground was recognized by the Environmental Business Journal (EBJ) for a 2008 EBJ Business Award for its innovation, contributions, and value for all environmental professionals. It is also frequently recognized and referenced in many leading environmental industry publications.

The business goals of commonground are to reinforce EDR's brand position as an industry leader, solidify customer loyalty, maximize web marketing effectiveness, gather business intelligence, promote the industry and generate new sources of revenue.

As a result of the initial success of commonground, The Daily Mail and General Trust, EDR's parent company, recognized commonground as a strategic initiative and EDR as one of the true innovators in their portfolio of 150 companies. commonground, and other strategic initiatives, are helping them evolve from being a traditional media outlet to leveraging social networks and other new tools as a publisher of business information.

commonground has also contributed to EDR's customer loyalty. According to a recent customer satisfaction survey, nearly 90% of clients indicated they feel EDR strives to provide great customer service, 88% indicated feel strongly that EDR is a thought leader, and 93% rated EDR's customer service as excellent or good.

Since September of 2008, EDR's Alexa ranking has improved by 446,000 positions and traffic is now in the top 1.29% of web-sites in the world. Since commonground version 2.0 was launched on June 1, 2009, Google indexed pages have increased by over 3000%.

commonground's first effort to offer premium content far exceeded expectations, achieving 170% of the revenue target. And, members are getting referrals and business, which ultimately helps drive sales for EDR. With the feedback received, we will be introducing a standardized nationwide training curriculum and an environmental service provider directory.

It is important to note that while commonground has achieved a number of objectives, it has also been able to reduce its annual expenses by 50% enabling EDR to invest in other strategic growth areas.

April 2008 - present , Version 2.0 launched June 2009

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