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Buy-Sell: SparkPost CEO On The Firm's Pending Mergers https://ift.tt/3ysGcL3 SparkPost CEO Rich Harris has seen a few deals go down in his day. But even his mind must be reeling from the complicated proceedings at SparkPost. The news broke last month that the Netherlands-based software firm MessageBird would acquire SparkPost in a $600-million deal. And yesterday, SparkPost announced it has acquired Taxi for Email, an email design and productivity platform, with no public price tag on that one. Is MessageBird financing that purchase? No. “SparkPost is a profitable company, and had a healthy balance to execute the Taxi acquisition,” Harris says. But he admits that MessageBird was aware of the Taxi for Email buy, and saw that it reflects SparkPost’s commitment to the email channel. Harris will remain as CEO of SparkPost. And the soon-to-be acquired company is on a hiring spree, with its headcount expected to rise by 25%. All this reflects, if anything, that “email is getting more functionality, and a better user experience, and we’ve seen huge movement of budgets to email.” advertisement advertisement Take Google’s AMP (accelerated Mobile Pages) for Email. SparkPost was one of the launch partners. Harris concedes that widespread adoption “is going to take some time. It’s a little slower than everyone wants — there’s more to deploying than meets the eye. But the early results show higher customer engagement.” The goal of AMP to bring “more functionality into email, instead of having a static email,” Harris explains. “Are you interested in cooking recipes? You don’t have to go to a website or an app — you can bring all that functionality into the email itself. It makes it less likely that consumers would disengage.” Another strength of email is its place in the privacy landscape. “Email is a first-party ecosystem,” as opposed to third-party, Harris notes. The latter makes customer acquisition more expensive, so retaining existing customers by email is the optimal strategy for many firms. What about the threat to email from text? There’s no such threat. On MessageBird’s website, it says brands should make it "as easy to talk with a business as it is to talk with a friend.” “SMS is one-to-one — it’s what people use when they want to meet a friend for coffee,” Harris observes. For brands, it works for receipts and notifications. But when it comes to marketing communications, email is the channel to use. Harris has served as a group vice president at Oracle Data Cloud (ODC). And before that was CEO of AddThis, leading to its acquisition by Oracle. He has also invested in several technology business. What was it like dealing with MessageBird? For instance, did the firm, which is subject to GDPR, grill him about SparkPost’s privacy protections? “They ran a very rigorous due diligence,” Harris wryly notes. “Privacy compliance was part of that.” (Note: In the interest of full disclosure, SparkPost processes MediaPost’s email).
Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 21, 2021 at 03:24PM
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B2B Marketing News: Top B2B Paint Points, Influencer Types Survey, Zoom’s New Events Platform, & The KPIs That Matter https://ift.tt/3bLgaZN B2B Marketer Pain Points, Performance, and Priorities for the Year Ahead: B2B Marketing Monitor 54 percent of B2B brands face difficulty connecting with customers on the emotional level needed to increase brand engagement, while only 22 percent of B2B enterprises say they excel when it comes to customer experience (CX) — two of several findings of interest to digital marketers in recently-released survey data. MarketingProfs Micro Influencers Still À La Mode in 2021 From micro and macro to mega, non-paid, affiliate and celebrity, the influencer types that enterprise marketers prefer working with runs the gamut, however the overwhelming majority — some 90 percent — want to work with micro-influencers who have between five and 100,000 followers, up from 77 percent in 2020, according to newly-released study data. [Survey]MarketingCharts ANA Releases 'KPIs That Matter,' Finds The Most Important Ones Aren't Always The Most Used Cost per mille (CPM), cost per click (CPC) and unique reach are the top three key performance indicators (KPIs) marketers use, while those found to be the most important include return on investment (ROI), exposed return on advertising spend (ROAS) and brand safety metrics, according to recently-released survey data from the Association of National Advertisers (ANA). MediaPost Post-IDFA Alliance finds iOS 14.5 triggered up to 21% growth in Android ad spending Early figures have shown that between 63.5 and 83.2 percent of Apple mobile users have chosen not to be tracked for advertising, which has led to a 21 percent increase in ad spending for rival mobile operating system Android, according to recently-released mobile marketing report data. VentureBeat Social Users Demand Relevance In Advertising, Study Finds Some 59 percent of Twitter users say they remember those in-feed ads which are contextually relevant to the content surrounding them, with 46 percent preferring in-feed ads to open web alternatives — two of several findings of interest to online marketers in newly-released survey data. MediaPost How the pandemic changed worldwide ad spending Digital advertising will for the first time account for more than 60 percent of overall global ad spending, and is expected to court the 70 percent mark by 2025, according to recently-released forecast data, also showing 2021 ad spending that is predicted to be up 20.4 percent from 2020 levels. eMarketer LinkedIn Shares New Insights Into Evolving Market Shifts as a Result of COVID-19 Some 70 percent of buyers want to continue to work remotely at least half of the time, while 67 percent of sales managers have encountered unforeseen difficulties maximizing remote team efficiency — two of numerous findings of interest to digital marketers in recently released report data. Social Media Today Zoom announces all-in-one events platform Zoom has announced a summer release of its Zoom Events virtual experiences platform, which will offer an array of features for ticketed virtual events, as the firm looks to serve the ongoing virtual event market. 80 percent of U.S. users said that they expect to have virtual experiences available even when in-person options are offered, according to Zoom survey data. MarTech YouTube Previews Upcoming Improvements for YouTube Studio, Including Auto-Generated Title Suggestions Google's YouTube video platform has shared previews of forthcoming feature additions to its Creator Studio, including easier Google Drive integration, mobile publishing improvements, and multiple upload templates, the video firm recently announced. Social Media Today Google Announces New Features for App Advertisers Google has shared information about several new features aimed at mobile app advertisers, including in-app events from within Google Analytics, easier deep-linking, and new data-driven attribution (DDA) information, the search giant recently announced. Search Engine Journal ON THE LIGHTER SIDE: A lighthearted look at “the NFT bandwagon” by Marketoonist Tom Fishburne — Marketoonist Prabhakar Raghavan Isn’t CEO of Google—He Just Runs the Place — Wired TOPRANK MARKETING & CLIENTS IN THE NEWS:
The post B2B Marketing News: Top B2B Paint Points, Influencer Types Survey, Zoom’s New Events Platform, & The KPIs That Matter appeared first on B2B Marketing Blog - TopRank®. Mobile Marketing,SEO via Hubspot https://ift.tt/2wiHYzh May 21, 2021 at 05:36AM
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Drink Up: Personalized Ads Pull In Whiskey Brand Engagement Test https://ift.tt/3oA9uTo Email marketers who are using — or contemplating — personalization should look at these stats. Personalized creative is driving 84% higher engagement than non-personalized creative, according to The Impact of Personalization on Advertising Performance, a study by AKI Technologies. The company tested this proposition with two clients, only one of which is named: Westward Whiskey, a distiller based on Portland, Oregon. The hypothesis was simply that personalized advertising creative would outperform non-personalized. The challenges were the fact that it was a brand relaunch, and the brand had low market penetration and audiences with specific whiskey preference. The company targeted three different groups:
advertisement advertisement The company tried such non-personalized creative as “We are a Whiskey Of the Northwest,” versus “Award-winning Taste Of True Oregon.” What happened? Overall, personalized advertising drew 33% more engaged than non-personalized. And personalized videos drove a 22% boost across all segments. Among the personalized versions, the one for West Coast Whiskey Lovers did better than those in the Oregon Lovers and California Cool categories, The results were similar for interstitials — there was a 44% lift in engagement for the personalized versions. This included 59% for Oregon Lovers, 47% for California Cool drinkers and 26% for West Coast Whiskey Lovers. The firm also surveyed 3,000 consumers, presenting each with In general, seasoned email pros might be surprised by the finding that product contexts rates lower on the POP (Potential Of Personalization) scale than these other variables:
At the same time, in-store shoppers show greater receptivity to personalization than online. And mobile/tablet users are more receptive to personalization than desktop, connected TV or cable TV shoppers across all campaign objectives. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 05:01PM
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Why Google Made Changes To Its Design Language https://ift.tt/3bElNsz
Design and color act as a first impression, especially for an app or home page for a website. Google at this year’s I/O developer event introduced a “radical new way to think about design.” Think of a hyper-personalized approach that adapts to the user, similar to the way dynamic ads work in Google search. The future of Google’s design language, “Material You,” shifts away from the one-size-fits-all design on phones, tablets, and computers, putting the user of these devices in control of how the software looks and feels. Material You is the latest update to Material Design, the design language used by Google’s apps as well as third-party developers. advertisement advertisement Material Design -- which Google introduced in 2014 and which became the foundation for Google products -- evolved into Material You, which creates a color palette on Android devices automatically based on the home-screen photo. The photo becomes the color palette for the entire phone or device. If the user sets a background with a light blue, for example, apps like Calculator and Calendar will adjust the way they appear to use blue highlights. A color will translate into tonal ranges from light to dark, supporting a variety of colors in the palette. The relationship between colors is managed through luminosity. By calculating luminance rather than hue, Google can determine which tones can be combined successfully, considering elements such as contrast. This color system is used across the entire interface of the device. Think about the color highlights in a Porsche Cayenne or Ford Explorer. The dashboard enables the owner of the car to pick a color that illuminates various hues throughout the vehicles, from the color of the lights to the color in the dashboard and instrument panel. Comfort is realized through more than color. Text also plays a role, including size and font. But rather than allowing the user to make all the choices, Material You provides a few parameters. Phones are personalized devices that consumers carry around with them wherever they go. They hold details of our lives, from the meetings we attended a year ago to the phone calls we are expected to make tomorrow. And while marketers want to provide a personalized experience to each and every consumer who may become a customer, it is increasingly difficult because of the inability to collect and use data without the owner’s permission. Material You will debut with Android 12 on Pixel phones later this year.
Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 04:39PM
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Apple Touts App Privacy In New Ad Campaign https://ift.tt/3v6gom5 Apple is touting its new privacy controls in a new ad that takes direct aim at online tracking. The spot, posted Thursday to YouTube, features “Felix” as he goes about his daily life, only to be followed everywhere he goes by various trackers. The ad opens with Felix grabbing a coffee from a barista, who then leaps over the counter and jumps in the back seat of a waiting car. The car's driver asks Felix for his name and date of birth, only to be answered by the barista. Later, more and more people appear and begin following Felix everywhere he goes. At one point, he visits a drugstore where an employee intercepts him in the aisle, hands him a tube of cream and says, “This will help with the itching.” All the while, the song “Mind your own business” plays in the background. advertisement advertisement Near the end of the spot, Felix looks at his iPhone and sees Apple's new privacy interface, which asks him to decide whether or not to allow apps to track him. He clicks on the screen and the people tracking him disappear in puffs of smoke. The ad, created by TBWA\Media Arts Lab, will also run on broadcast tv and other digital properties (including on social media). Apple's new settings only allow developers to access the “Identifier for Advertisers” -- alphanumeric strings, comparable to serial numbers -- if users consent on an app-by-app basis. Facebook, which has vocally opposed those settings, launched its own campaign against Apple last year. The social networking platform warned in its ads that Apple will “change the internet as we know it -- for the worse.” The major ad industry organizations also oppose Apple's new settings. They have argued that requiring consumers to opt-in to tracking on an app-by-app basis will deprive companies of revenue. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 04:39PM
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5 Search Trends That Are Here To Stay https://ift.tt/3hHG8Bh Every aspect of how people work, live, shop and spend leisure time has changed due to COVID-19 -- and some of these trends are here to stay. According to the U.S. Department of Commerce, online retail sales increased 32% from fourth quarter of 2019 to the fourth quarter of 2020 due to COVID-19, representing an estimated $207 billion in sales. Fourteen percent of the total retail sales for the quarter was conducted online. Below are five ways that COVID-19 has permanently changed the search landscape, and some ways that smart businesses can learn from the corresponding trends that are here to stay. How We Understand Consumer Behavior and Intent Twenty-seven percent of respondents to the 2020 Microsoft consumer insights survey advised that they had increased their shopping at local independent retailers in 2020. Meanwhile, Google reported a 20,000% increase year-over-year in “support local business” searches, and queries for curbside pickup increased 3000%. advertisement advertisement Google reported a twofold increase in searches for “minimalism,” as people realized -- either by design or economic necessity -- that they could manage with less. Microsoft also found an increase in “do-it-yourself” searches, as consumers gained confidence (and time at home) to try new things. Throughout the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have learned just how risky it is to rely solely on historic performance as indicative of future performance. Through search, consumers share their specific needs and the intent driving them in real-time. Search is the voice of the consumer, and smart marketers will pay attention and pivot to meet the new focus. An Increasing Focus on User Experience Google is set to roll out its page experience update that will prioritize and reward the achievement of “user experience metrics including mobile-friendliness, safe browsing, SSL certification, and intrusive interstitials, as well as Core Web Vitals.” The Core Web Vitals are:
As mobile World Wide Web interactions grow, how a web page displays on a mobile device is vital. In 2019, Google added mobile-first indexing to its search algorithms. Digital commerce leapt from 37% to 80% of total retail spending during the pandemic, and businesses with mobile-friendly sites have an advantage. A mobile-first mentality means that visitors have access to the same information, whether on desktop or mobile, high quality content, images and video, easy navigation and simple ways to connect with support. This design will help businesses attract and keep customers — and Google will reward that improved experience with better rankings, as a result. The Growing Importance of Semantics & Context With Google’s shift to Natural Language Processing, semantics and context in search results deliver a more positive user experience. Meeting search intent is a lot more than which keywords you use; a cookie means very different things to a programmer and a baker, after all. Understanding the context of a searcher’s need requires that we use search insights to form a more holistic view of the person behind the query. What does the device they’re using, their on-site behavior, the time of day and day or week they’re searching, their location, etc. tell us about their specific need? Building personas based on what we know about existing customers and market research is a reactive approach. The trend going forward is to personalize content and experiences in real-time based on a deep understanding of the context driving the interaction. Expanding Roles of Search Data and Business Intelligence Even the most forward-thinking companies missed “global pandemic” in their 5-year projections, and millions were left scrambling to meet a consumer demand no one could have predicted. Data-driven business decisions can help businesses navigate the uncharted waters, and research finds that data-driven companies will beat their retail goals by 58%. With greater emphasis on context and user-experience, both macro and micro analysis of the data will be essential for continued business success. However, not all data is good data, and it’s easy to get lost in a sea of numbers. Advancements in AI and machine-learning means technology can process large volumes of data quickly, identify and flag trends and issues, and provide real-time data analysis of trends and patterns. In addition, intelligent automation enhances this analysis with machine learning. This is key in taking all of that data, adding it to information already stored about your customers, and using it to deliver a more personalized (and therefore positive) user experience. SEO as the Key Driver of Digital Marketing Strategy Search is the real-time voice of the customer. That became more evident during COVID-19 and smart marketers will continue making good use of search insights in the future. Left with no option but online, customers began and ended their searches online, and agile businesses were able to capitalize and convert the search results into sales by pivoting to meet changing customer demand and priorities. Now more than ever, marketing channels must work together — PPC, content, email and more. Increasingly, SEO holds the key to unlocking holistic, cross-channel digital marketing success, especially when paired with data-driven personalized visitor experiences. Just as COVID-19 drove even the most reluctant user online, it also forced businesses to pivot to meet rapidly changing customer demands and priorities. Many of the trends are here to stay, and savvy companies will be watching search trends and utilizing business intelligence to understand business impact, anticipate changes and catch the next wave of online opportunity. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 04:25PM
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Brands, Agencies Look To Programmatic, Billboards, 'Advertising Solutions' https://ift.tt/3v5r58n This week’s intent data points to a rise in searches around “programmatic” and “LED billboards” among both brands and agencies, as measured by Bombora Company Surge. Despite budget cuts last year, advertisers reported better than expected results for U.S. programmatic ad spending last summer. eMarketer predicts programmatic digital display ad spending will rebound in 2021 to 24.1% (versus just 10% last year) and CTV - which is almost exclusively video – will remain one of digital advertising’s fastest-growing channels as available inventory increases. The pandemic hit the out-of-home advertising market hard. However, we are beginning to see OOH channels advertise programmatically through digital screens on bus stations, shopping malls, and billboards as COVID restrictions ease nationwide. Still, regardless of whether you’re advertising on mobile, CTV or OOH billboards, video will continue to drive faster growth when compared to non-video display formats across all devices. advertisement advertisement For the first time in a long time, brands are looking for “advertising solutions” – a category that rose sharply after experiencing little to no interest from marketers for five months. Bombora defines it as “solutions to a means of communication with the users of a product or service.” So why are advertisers looking for solutions? And why are they going about it in this way? With the push and pull of various internal and external factors at play, we believe 2021 will be a banner year. The unexpected resiliency of the digital ad market, coupled with the pent-up demand for traditional advertising, will force marketers the world over to adapt and transform quickly. To succeed, today’s organizations need a trusted partner to help them become adaptive digital enterprises to meet the post-pandemic wave of digital business transformation. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 11:20AM
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Spectrum News Networks Reports Record Audience Gains In April https://ift.tt/3yoB2Qd Charter Communications’ Spectrum Networks averaged more than 3 million daily viewing households in April — more than any other broadcast and cable news network across Spectrum’s nine-state footprint, according to the networks’ set-top box data. “We had record-setting audience gains in April, seeing increases in viewership and engagement on both our linear and digital news platforms for the month,” reports Spectrum Networks Executive Vice President Mike Bair. Viewership for the 24/7 networks was driven by major news events during the month, including the Derek Chauvin verdict and President Joe Biden’s address to a joint session of Congress. On April 20, the day of the Chauvin verdict, the mobile-first Spectrum News app had more than 47,000 visits — the most of any day since launching last July, according to Charter. advertisement advertisement Visitors spent nearly 350,000 minutes in the app collectively, the fourth-highest total time spent since launch. Livestream viewership accounted for 34% of time spent in the app. The app added more than 140,000 new downloads during April — up 5% versus March — bringing its total devices to 1.1 million. On April 28, the networks’ coverage of the President’s address generated their highest-to-date set-top-box viewership for a national special, exceeding all broadcast and cable news networks’ averages in Spectrum News markets. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 08:36AM More Media Merger Chatter After Discovery-WarnerMedia News https://ift.tt/3bHWfuH Rampant media merger speculation is coming hot and fast, due to the Discovery-WarnerMedia combination. Two mini-major TV-film production studios -- MGM and Lionsgate -- are obvious targets. Plus, AMC Networks, the midsize cable TV network group has been floated as acquisition material. AMC Networks had been through this acquisition talk for years -- back before Discovery bought Scripps Networks Interactive for $15 billion in 2018. Before that deal, the thinking was that both the midsize cable TV network groups, Scripps and AMC, would need to merge sometime to compete with bigger TV networks. This occurred about the same time cord-cutting began to rear its head, leaving cable TV networks with an increasing erosion of legacy pay TV subscribers. Modern media mergers are about “horizontal” combinations. In short, TV networks and/or studios are combining with other similar companies, hopefully to compliment each other. That’s the thinking behind Discovery and WarnerMedia. advertisement advertisement In part, one can see the interest Amazon may have when it comes to buying the mini-major studio MGM for a reported $10 billion. With Netflix ramping up production -- $17 billion this year -- and Discovery-WarnerMedia recent floating a $20 billion proposed spend for all its TV and movie production spend yearly -- the bottom line is easy to figure out. It’s all about content. You want to say content is king? You’re thinking too narrow. Content isn’t just one person. It is the kingdom -- all of the people. Everyone can do it. But if you want to get there faster, buy something. One thing is certain: There is no need to merge with a communications/cable/mobile phone company. That vertical integration stuff is no longer needed. Verizon and T-Mobile never really considered owning big, legacy media content. And Verizon just sold off its Verizon Media, which includes Yahoo and AOL. For its part, cable-centric/ broadband operator Charter Communications also never really took aim in this area. And now AT&T leaves the scene. That leaves Comcast Corp, the lone major vertical media operator. And while the company has done a good job after a decade of owning NBCUniversal, now with rising value, there may come a moment when it departs. Previously analysts believed it could be NBCU merging with WarnerMedia to compete with Netflix and Walt Disney. Wells Fargo analyst Steven Cahall wrote that now Comcast and ViacomCBS may be “suddenly feeling lonely.” Both had been called big media. Maybe they need to shop for a media brand modifier. Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 08:22AM
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Google Launches Tools To Grow App Business, Connect Brands With Consumers https://ift.tt/3u6d6xA As the demand for apps grow, it has become increasingly challenging for developers to get their apps discovered and convert new users into loyal customers. On Thursday, Google released app advertising solutions during the week of I/O to help developers reach more people, improve marketing performance and provide better user experiences. Even as mobile use continues to climb, 46% of the total time on websites is spent on desktop. Supporting this trend, app campaigns on desktop -- Google’s flagship app advertising product that relies on machine learning to find the right users across Search, YouTube, Play, and Discover -- will now for the first time reach onto the desktop versions of Google.com and Google Display Network for campaigns running on Android. The feature rolls out in June. Those who click on an app advertisement in their desktop browser will be directed to the Google Play Store desktop website. From there, the user can choose to install the app directly onto any Android device linked to their Play account. advertisement advertisement Growing a business based on apps means connecting with new users, but it’s also important to understand what happens after the app is installed. It’s important to measure the correct in-app events. That’s why Google Analytics for Firebase event creation and modification will allow marketers and developers to create and edit custom in-app events -- like logging a “purchase” at a confirmation screen -- without any code. In addition, there is help to validate deep links that bring people directly to a specific destination or landing page within an app. To make it easier for marketers to work with developers, this week Google announced a deep link validator and impact calculator. The tools allow developers to fix deep links that do not work, and understand the return on investment for implementing deep links from their Google Ads. Shopee, an ecommerce company in Singapore, boosted its checkouts by about 126% by using deep links to send traffic to the app if customers already had it installed, for example. App deep-linking directs customers to the content in an app -- and often leads to more conversions, according to Google. But the path is not always linear. People search across various sites and apps before taking action, which makes it more difficult to pinpoint the ad that drove the purchase or event. Marketers can now identify the specific mobile web ad clicks that led customers to the app to complete the purchase. This helps marketers make bidding for web campaigns more effective by providing a complete understanding of performance that includes in-app conversions.
Mobile Marketing via MediaPost.com: mobile https://ift.tt/2oB2PsH May 20, 2021 at 08:22AM |
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