This week in martech
News from AudioMob, Urrgent, Impact, Crunchbase and Digital Remedy.
New audio ad format designed for today’s attention economy
The new at-home lifestyle has caused a surge in demand for all things audio, from podcasts to music streaming platforms, and AudioMob has introduced a new platform to take advantage of this trend. The AudioMob DSP, Rewarded Audio, aims at providing advertisers with the tools they need to take complete control of the management of their audio campaigns.
Built for the gaming industry, Rewarded Audio’s ad delivery mechanism plays the advertiser’s message while the gamer is playing, instead of stopping game play for a video advertisement.
“In today’s attention economy, marketers can no longer rely on just engagement as a measurement of their marketing efforts,” AudioMob CEO Christian Facey told MarTech Today. “While engagement can be a great measurement of reach, attention is where we can find the real impact we have on audiences.”
Why we care. With streaming audio playing a central part in many at-home lives, advertisers need to find ways to break through the clutter and get customers’ attention.
“Social media with a heart” platform launched
Urrgent Technology, an Atlanta based, black woman-founded, women-owned small business, has announced a step into the big-tech space with the introduction of the StoopUp digital platform, self-described as ‘social media with a heart.’
StoopUp is a free social-networking app allowing users to:
• Post content;
• Buy and sell items; and
• Exchange ideas and network.
StoopUp encourages users to engage in the “Neighborhood” and create content with “good vibes,” observing their profile’s “positive-energy” rating increase in real-time. Users earn rewards as their positive-energy rating increases.
“So many social media apps and freelancing platforms are just mining their users, treating them as nothing more than a monetized pool of advertising dollars,” said Urrgent Technology founder Shantell Graham. “That is not us. Our users are people, and we treat them as such.”
Why we care. Diversity, women empowerment and collaboration are key themes in society right now. StoopUp has all three.
Impact acquires influencer marketing platform
As a partnership automation platform, Impact seeks to combine resources to add value for clients. Yesterday, they announced the acquisition of Activate, an influencer marketing platform with an opt-in network of over 150,000-verified influencers that is designed for cross-platform collaborations.
The acquisition seems a natural fit for Impact, which automates the complete partnership lifecycle from discovery to engagement to optimization and payment processing. Impact’s Partnership Cloud manages over $50B in eCommerce sales and processes over $2B in partner payments on an annual basis.
In 2019 the Activate platform enabled over 50,000 partnerships with agencies, brands, companies and media. The technical partnership with Activate and Impact will utilize Impact’s platform to generate automated contracting and flexible payment processing for a consistent experience and reliable partner payouts.
Why we care. Partnership automation and influencer management are two parts of the eCommerce jigsaw puzzle, and jigsaw puzzles are made to fit together.
Crunchbase releases integration with Salesforce
Today Crunchbase announced an integration with Salesforce for all Crunchbase users, allowing faster activation for sales teams. The announcement speaks to the trend of more agile sales teams needing to ramp up at a faster pace with fewer resources.
Additional new features for the integration include:
• Expanded search filters and a redesigned company profile page allowing for quicker access to information and the ability to directly sell to prospects via Salesforce;
• Avoidance of record duplication through new prospect display in Salesforce;
• Prospects saved automatically in Salesforce via Crunchbase.
The redesigned company profile function acknowledges the enhanced research which sales teams need to do in the new competitive environment, from finances, personnel to acquisitions.
Why we care. Cold calling sales teams is a 20th century tactic that is now obsolete. Research is necessary for revenue.
Digital advertising platform launched for independent agencies
Media solutions company Digital Remedy has announced the launch of AdReady+, a self-service digital advertising platform targeted at independent agencies. The platform is meant to be a comprehensive resource for independent agencies, where campaign planning, RFPs, media execution and reporting can all be produced.
Digital Remedy is leveraging two decades of data and experience as the foundation to the platform. AdReady+ provides a step-by-step guide for client management and purposely provides a streamlined user experience so that both junior staffers and senior executives can navigate the platform.
Look for more from Digital Remedy about platform strategy and implementation later this month in MarTech Today.
Why we care. As independent marketing agencies get leaner on staff, end-to-end solutions like AdReady+ will become even more valuable, especially with agencies that work in multiple industries. ‘Bench strength’ in personnel has been supplemented with ‘platform strength’ in technology.
Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily MarTech Today. Staff authors are listed here.