Latest Digital Advertising Report from Merkle Cites Steep Growth for Google Shopping Ads, Steady Growth for Amazon, and a Decline for Facebook Ads The rise of Instagram Stories was among the biggest advertising news in 2018. However, it could not topple Google Ads and Amazon from the pedestal. Merkle a leading technology-enabled, data-driven performance marketing agency, has released its Q4 2018 Digital Marketing Report (DMR). This comprehensive report analyzed the latest trends across paid search, organic search, social,…

Millennials Want to Bet More on the Big Game as Legal Gambling Blossoms Across US Millennials, famously, are more interested in enjoying experiences than making big purchases, thus it should be no surprise they want more from the Super Bowl besides the spectacle of the game, funny TV ads and an entertaining halftime show. From emerging gambling opportunities to an esports connection, Millennials want the Big Game to be even grander, according to a national survey measuring fan sentiment conducted by the Fan Experience…

Report Cites Steep Growth for Google Shopping Ads, Steady Growth for Amazon, and a Decline for Facebook Ads Merkle a leading technology-enabled, data-driven performance marketing agency, has released its Q4 2018 Digital Marketing Report (DMR). This comprehensive report analyzes trends across paid search, organic search, social, display, and Amazon Ads. It also provides insights into the performance of major industry players such as Google, Facebook, Amazon, Bing, Yahoo, and Instagram. To provide additional detail on…

Fake news, digital ad fraud and data privacy are pressing issues threatening the trust and confidence in an ad-supported internet. While advertisers continue to demand transparency of their partners downstream — even going so far as to hold budgets hostage, consumers – who have enjoyed positive, emotional connections with their brands online — are at risk of turning off due to privacy concerns. Stakeholders will expect even greater clarity and accountability in the quality of the online platforms and content that they invest…

Fuse, a marketing agency specializing in reaching teens and young adults, has released a new report on teens. At the start of a new year, it's valuable for marketers to consider what is most popular with teens. So, to kick the year off, Fuse asked 1,000 about their favorite things. 1. Technology: Teens and smartphones remain an unstoppable force When it comes to what tech teens love most, it's no surprise that nearly half of the teens we surveyed said they preferred their mobile phones above all other technology. …

40% of UK Consumers Now Identifying as Fans of the Six Nations Tournament A new study by GlobalWebIndex, conducted amongst 1,885 UK consumers aged 18-64 ahead of the Six Nations tournament in February, reveals burgeoning popularity for the sport in the UK with two in five respondents now identifying as fans of the tournament. With the Rugby World Cup taking place in September, 2019 promises to be a year of heightened interest in rugby. Testament to this, nearly half (46%) of the 651 Six Nations fans identified by the…

Sabre Corporation, the leading technology provider to the global travel industry, released a study in partnership with TrendWatching, global consumer trends and insights experts, which reveals the top consumer trends that will shape the hospitality industry in 2019 and beyond. “The hospitality industry is always reinventing itself, constantly adapting to the changing expectations of travelers,” said Clinton Anderson, president of Sabre Hospitality Solutions. “As a result, digital transformation has become a rising…

44% of Respondents Plan to Leverage AI in 2019 for Sales Productivity, Pipeline Building, and Revenue Growth; 90% Expect Significant Impact to Performance InsideSales.com, the AI sales platform powered by Collective Intelligence, released the results of research into the technology adoption plans of over 600 sales professionals across all industries in 2019. The data shows respondents across the board are bullish on advanced technologies to drive above-market growth. When asked about the most important trends in B2B…

Ada’s AI Reduced Customer Wait Time up to 98% in One Month Ada, a Toronto-based AI customer engagement platform, announced its partnership with AirAsia, Asia’s leading low-cost carrier. In only one month, AirAsia used Ada to build the AirAsia Virtual Allstar – 24/7 customer self-service that officially launches today in eight languages across the airline’s website and app. AirAsia Takes Off with Ada-powered Virtual Assistant Ada’s AI reduced customer wait time up to 98% in one month Also Read: Leading AI Company…

Empowered Brokers to Leverage Listings to Generate New Business for Agents In 2018, Imprev continued its quest to give real estate franchises and brokerages a new, powerful way to reach substantially more consumers. Brokerages are using Imprev's service to create effective marketing campaigns with company-defined best practices that harness the power of their agents' marketing networks. The results have been impressive. Through its marketing automation platform, Imprev generated marketing for over 1.5 million of their…

Content. It’s a blessing and a curse. Content is at the core of marketing technology and so many other areas of business. From product to business intelligence to sales to customer care and support, HR, legal (this list goes on) businesses are tasked with curating, aggregating, creating, publishing and making sense of growing volumes of content. A few years ago, I conducted research on content marketers’ greatest pain points. The clear winner? Creating content. The need for more content, for better content, for enough…

Moxian, Inc., an offline-to-online (O2O) social media services and internet media marketing services provider and an exclusive agent of Xinhua News App, announced the signing of a strategic partnership and cooperation agreement with Fujian Sihe Media Co., Ltd., a Fujian-based mobile marketing company. With clients including Tencent, Toutiao, Blizzard Entertainment, China Unicom, China Post, Agricultural Bank of China, China Telecom, Beibei Sale, Ctrip, Baidu Takeaway, Bilibili, Pupumall, etc., Sihe Media utilizes its…

The Upgraded Sales Automation Toolkit Is Tightly Integrated with CRMs, Voice Platforms, Social Media and Offers Excellent Support from Cadence, Print and Email Marketing Perspective Mindmatrix has enhanced its channel and sales enablement software’s sales automation toolkit to include tight integration with CRM, voice (Phone calls and diallers), social media platforms and print and email marketing modules. This enhancement makes Mindmatrix’s sales automation functionality more powerful. This is the first major enhancement…

Black Entrepreneur Launches Social Streaming Platform First teased last fall – X On Demand (xod.tv) has finally gone live. The Netflix-style site, with a social twist, boasts a growing library of works by Black filmmakers, with at least one person of Black American/African decent in a leading role both in front of and behind the lens – prerequistes for a project to be considered for the site. While billing itself as a platform "dedicated to showcasing works by Black filmmakers and content creators", XOD steps up the…

"Every action you take, every application you use, every decision you make, should be based on insights garnered from trustworthy data." Tell us about your role at AdSwerve and your journey into technology. I joined AdSwerve as the VP of Marketing in September. My vision is to build the brand awareness and recognition that AdSwerve truly deserves. AdSwerve is such an exciting, fast-growing company with a great reputation among both its customers and Google. But since it's never had a marketing department, it hasn't had…

USU‘s unymira business unit is one of the first worldwide to offer voice powered customer service via Amazon’s Alexa. A live demo will be presented at this year’s Call Center World (CCW) from February 19th to 21st in Berlin at unymira’s booth (Hall 3, F4/G3). Unymira offers the most comprehensive omnichannel customer support portfolio including intelligent chatbots, its active knowledge base Knowledge Center, its AI-powered service platform Knowledge Cloud as well as social media support and self-service solutions. A range…

Brief Insights for Marketers to Assess Pros and Cons of the Newly Launched Amazon Customer Acquisition Metrics Recently, Amazon launched extensive metrics for marketers to gauge the number of new customers that purchased products due to advertisement campaigns. Amazon has included video, display and sponsored brands ads in their ‘new-to-brand’ customer metrics. Here are few pointers for marketers jotting down the pros and cons. Pros Amazon is now ranked third, only behind Facebook and Google when it comes to its advertising…

Verizon’s Digital CX with Managed Service to Help Large Businesses Intelligently Improve Customer Interactions Verizon launched a world-class suite of solutions that blends human and artificial intelligence to enhance the customer engagement experience. Digital Customer Experience (CX) is an end-to-end managed service that deploys automation into enterprise and business owner’s customer experience tools. Through Digital CX, consumers who contact a business – whether on social media, chat, email, text, or over the phone –…

Time flies, technology moves even faster. Scott Brinker’s annual Marketing Technology Landscape super graphic now displays more than 6,800 marketing technology solutions — a 27% jump from 2017’s figure. That’s a lot for marketers to handle. Some simplification is in order. From analytics to Social Media Marketing, here are six digital marketing skills your team needs today: 1. A Focus on Digital Marketing Analytics While “web analytics” focus on website performance, digital marketing analytics reveal the performance and…

Their Latest App, Swish, Helps Business Owners Easily Create Custom Videos to Market Their Brands Just in time for the new year, Lightricks, innovators of digital editing applications for mobile platforms, launched their latest app, Swish. Targeted to small businesses and creators on-the-go, Swish capitalizes on the company's goal of empowering everyday individuals to unleash their creativity. Swish provides an easy-to-use resource for small businesses looking to make an impact online and more effectively market their…