CONSTANT CONTACT/COREL SURVEY REVEALS U.S. SMALL BUSINESSES HAVE STRONG OUTLOOK FOR 2006

Fifty-five percent of small business owners expect growth in the coming year

Ottawa and Waltham, MA. - December 20, 2005

U.S. small businesses forecast a successful year ahead with strong growth and increased technology and marketing budgets, according to the Corel®/Constant Contact® 2006 Small Business Outlook*, a recent online survey of nearly 600 small business owners with employees of 50 or fewer. Reporting an upswing in business in 2005, more than 50 percent of small business owners expect even stronger growth in 2006. The majority of small businesses surveyed maintain this positive outlook, despite their concerns about the overall economy and the effects of rising energy costs on their businesses.

Small business owners rated acquiring more customers (44 percent) and increasing sales to existing customers (20 percent) as their top business objectives for driving growth in 2006.

"This survey indicates that small businesses are confident in their prospects for growth and plan to increase expenditures in key growth areas of their business, said Gail Goodman, CEO of Constant Contact. "U.S. small businesses play a significant role in the health of the U.S. economy, and this survey is a positive indicator of continued economic growth in 2006."

Technology and Marketing Spending to Increase and Push Small Business Growth

Small businesses owners also expect to increase spending on both technology and marketing activities in 2006 as compared to 2005. In fact, 61 percent of survey respondents said that they plan to spend more money on marketing, while 51 percent expect increased technology expenditures in 2006. Among technology categories, small business owners view communications tools (40 percent) as having the greatest impact on growing their businesses, followed by marketing software and services, computer hardware and business productivity software. Public relations, email marketing and web marketing were reported as the most widely used marketing practices for increasing business.

Additionally, respondents rated value and ease-of-use as the two most important attributes when making a software or services purchase for marketing materials creation, ahead of product features and brand name. Nearly half said that more professional looking marketing collateral would help increase revenue.

"Small business owners recognize the importance of technology for their long-term economic growth and are becoming savvier about how they evaluate technology expenditures and the marketing techniques they employ," said Richard Carriere, General Manager for Office Productivity at Corel. "By using technology from companies like Corel and Constant Contact, small businesses are creating more professional-looking collateral to compete effectively against larger competitors."

Sample questions and results from the Corel/Constant Contact 2006 Small Business Outlook survey include the following:

"How do you rate your overall business performance in 2005 compared to 2004?"

"How do you rate your current confidence level in the overall economy?"

"How do you foresee your business outlook for 2006 compared to 2005?"

"What are your top business objectives for 2006?"

The survey was conducted jointly by Corel Corporation (www.corel.com) and Constant Contact (www.constantcontact.com). Corel provides easy-to-use personal productivity software that helps millions of users worldwide run their businesses and extend their creativity at work and at home. Constant Contact is the leading email marketing service for small businesses, associations, and nonprofits.

*The 2005 Holiday Business Outlook survey was conducted through targeted online distribution to U.S. small businesses and associations, including Constant Contact customers, recording results from more than 1,200 respondents. The survey was conducted October 21st - November 7th, 2005.

About Constant Contact
With over 40,000 customers and a recent winner of SmallBusinessComputing.com's "Excellence in Technology Award," Constant Contact® is the leading permission Do-It-Yourself Email Marketing® service for small and medium businesses (SMBs) and associations. Constant Contact is a Web-based email marketing solution that enables small organizations to easily create and send professional HTML email newsletters, promotions, announcements and more with no technical expertise required. Designed and priced for SMBs, Constant Contact is affordable, easy-to-use and includes a free 60-day trial at: www.constantcontact.com. The service is marketed through over 1,500 Business Partners and more than 100 marquee channel partners including American Express OPEN, AOL, Corel, FTD, IBM, Interland, Network Solutions, Register.com, Website Pros and Yahoo Search Marketing. Constant Contact is a founding member of the Email Service Provider Coalition (ESPC), a group formed to fight spam while protecting the delivery of legitimate email. Constant Contact is funded by Morgan Stanley Venture Partners, Commonwealth Capital Ventures, Longworth Venture Partners and Hudson Ventures. For more information, please call 781-472-8100.

About Corel
Corel Corporation provides innovative software solutions that help millions of value-conscious businesses and consumers in over 75 countries improve their productivity. The Company is renowned for its powerful software portfolio that combines innovative photo editing and graphics creation, vector illustration and technical-graphics applications along with office and personal productivity solutions. Corel's flagship products include the CorelDRAW® Graphics Suite, the WordPerfect® Office Suite, the Corel® Painter(TM) Natural-Media® painting and illustration software and the Paint Shop(TM) Family of digital photography and image editing software. Founded in 1985, Corel is headquartered in Ottawa, Canada. For more information, please visit www.corel.com.

Please direct all press inquiries to:

Rosalind Morville
Constant Contact
339-222-5772
rmorville@constantcontact.com

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