This week in Martech: TikTok copy, Reels is released, IBM launches AI-powered platform with Influential, Yotpo raises $75m, Flash Memory Summit (FMS) announce partnership with TechTarget and Terminus integrates with Salesforce Pardot.
TikTok copy, Instagram Reels launches in over 50 countries
Facebook owned Instagram, rolled out their own version of social media rival, TikTok in over 50 countries including the US.
Reels is designed for mobile phone users to record short videos, with the ability to add special effects and soundtracks imported from a music library to be shared on the existing platform. The astonishing similarities led TikTok Chief Executive Kevin Mayer, to call Reels a "copycat product" that could coast on Instagram's existing user base after "their other copycat Lasso failed quickly."
The release of Reels could not have come at a better time for Facebook as their competitors, TikTok continue to face the scrutiny of the US government in light of the Chinese app’s data sharing regulations. TikTok have recently faced threats from President Trump to ban the app in the US (their largest market) or sell to an American tech company.
We were surprised to hear that Microsoft were the first ones rumoured to be on the scene of the potential TikTok acquire, and Facebook appeared to be keeping their distance. Although, Facebook had just received a pretty brutal grilling at the Big Tech Antitrust hearing just days before, where Facebook CEO, Mark Zuckerberg was accused to “copy, acquire and kill competitors” - so we assumed Zuckerberg’s telling off had wisely made him think twice and back off.
As it turns out, this doesn’t appear to be the case. Facebook was merely in stage one of their social media monopoly master plan - “copy”.
IBM launches AI-powered platform with Influential
IBM has expanded their partnership with Influential to launch an AI-enabled social targeting solution to help brands identify influences that align with their values and voice.
By harnessing the power of IBM’s cloud native product, Watson uses deep learning to extract metadata from text to help clients make data driven decisions that create connections with consumers and enable social targeting with Influential.
Features of the new partnership include:
- The use of IBM Watson Natural Language Understanding on the IBM public cloud to process and analyse social media data to identify influencers.
- Identifies brand-safe influencers by examining profanity ratings to recommend potential partners with shared values
- Connects online behavior with offline purchase to help drive ROI based on real-time campaign measured across brand perception, consumer engagement, online conversion, offline sales and foot traffic
- Delivers tone appropriate ads to real people at the right time to help drive engagement
"Together with Influential, we're building trust into the ecosystem by applying IBM Watson to help clients select an influencer that aligns to their brand values, exemplifying our belief that AI can and should be the backbone of the new digital economy." - Bob Lord, SVP of Cognitive Applications, Blockchain and Ecosystems, IBM.
Yotpo raises $75m for its e-commerce marketing cloud
Yotpo, a marketing platform which provides a suite of solutions to help direct-to-consumer and e-commerce companies accelerate online revenue growth has raised $75 million in in Series E funding.
Yotpo’s insights into how customers are engaging across different marketing touchpoints has resulted in the company seeing a 300% increase in customers in 2019 and a 250% increase in annual recurring revenue since its $51 million raise in November 2017.
The platform is said to use its $75 million to continue growing its suite of products, gain new customers and establish more partnerships in addition to Salesforce, Adobe and BigCommerce.
“Yotpo is singularly focused on helping direct-to-consumer eCommerce brands solve the dual challenge of engaging consumers and increasing revenue, and with their multi-product strategy and innovative edge, they are uniquely positioned to dominate the eCommerce industry for years to come.” - Adam Fisher, a partner at BVP.
Flash Memory Summit (FMS) announce a strategic partnership with TechTarget
Flash Memory Summit (FMS), the world’s premiere flash memory conference, announces a strategic partnership with TechTarget (Nasdaq: TTGT), the global leader in B2B technology media, to provide a digital extension of FMS content on TechTarget’s sites.
TechTarget creates high-quality, editorial content across over 140 targeted technology-specific websites. The company attracts and enables technology buyers to research their companies’ information technology needs. By analysing buyers’ content consumption behaviours, TechTarget creates the purchase intent insights that drive efficient and effective marketing and sales activities for global clients.
The partnership will significantly expand FMS’ digital reach to its customers as global leader in intent-driven marketing sales and services, TechTarget’s B2B technology network includes its flagship SearchStorage.com - generating 650,000 monthly page views across IT, storage, and infrastructure buyers.
Terminus integrates with Salesforce Pardot
Terminus, a leading ABM (account-based marketing) platform, announced its product integration with Pardot, a leading B2B marketing automation platform (CRM) by Salesforce.
The integration will enable Pardot users to access Terminus account data and information in the Pardot platform, resulting in streamlined marketing automation, improved analytics and in-depth reporting.
This will enable users to identify high-value accounts in real-time, while accessing Terminus’ engagement data to build sophisticated campaigns at an account level.
Additional integration features include:
- Bi-directional datasynchronisation- allowing for more targeted advertising campaigns or active drip marketing campaigns
- Sales and customer information to assist in prioritising outreach to the most engaged customer accounts with notifications about expiring or at-risk customers
- Matching leads to accounts while building customised marketing campaigns
“There are more than 8,000 martech solutions on the market today. The landscape is highly fragmented, making it difficult for marketers to connect all of their data effectively across the entire customer lifecycle... This integration can make it easier for marketers to combine existing marketing automation data with our high-performing account intelligence data.” - Bryan Wade, Terminus Chief Product Officer.