5 Platforms That Connect Online Campaigns to Offline Results

If hyperlocal vendors expect marketers to spend big on digital campaigns, they need to be able to show that their platforms are delivering offline results. Until recently, attributing offline sales to online campaigns was a challenge for even the most tech-savvy of businesses. Now, a number of major digital and data players are beginning to realize the importance of making this attribution connection, and they’re snapping up platforms that connect the dots between offline data and online marketing.

Google purchased Adometry for an undisclosed sum in May, the same month Acxiom announced the acquisition of LiveRamp for $310 million. Meanwhile, Twitter and Facebook are partnering with Datalogix in an effort to show advertisers how online ads are influencing sales. Here are five examples of offline-to-online data platforms that tie the results of digital marketing campaigns to in-store transactions.

1. Datalogix: Measure offline sales lift from online campaigns.
Datalogix has partnered with industry heavyweights like Facebook and Twitter to provide a link between digital ads and in-store sales. A massive on-boarding firm that powers campaigns for more than 75% of online media companies, Datalogix gives its clients a way to measure sales lift from display, video, mobile and social campaigns. For example, when consumers make purchases through card-connected loyalty programs, Datalogix relays this transaction information to advertiser clients. These advertisers can then run more targeted online ads based on consumers’ purchasing histories. Cross-publisher measurement also allows clients to compare value across almost any digital media impression.

2. Placed: See if mobile ads are actually driving foot traffic.
Placed Attribution measures the impact that mobile advertising has on in-store visits and traffic patterns. Rather than relying on geo-fences, surveys, and clicks to evaluate the success of mobile campaigns, Placed tracks more than 200 million daily locations from what it calls the “world’s largest opt-in panel.” It then compares this location data against the local mobile ads that businesses are running, to determine how effective those ads actually are at bringing consumers into physical stores. Reports are then issued to merchants showing how many in-store visits were directly tied to their mobile ad impressions.

3. Adometry: Optimize advertising campaigns with accurate analytics.
A marketing analysis and optimization platform, Adometry was purchased by Google in May. During that process, Google announced that Adometry would continue to operate independently for the near future. Adometry specializes in being able to credit online ads with impacting consumers to take specific actions, such as purchasing products in-store. Adometry Attribute offers businesses insights to improve the performance of their digital campaigns, with ad verification to tell if ads were viewed and predictive models that provide recommendations on actions that businesses can take to see a lift in KPIs.

4. Specific Media: Bridge the offline-to-online gap.
Specific Media’s Retail Connect platform was launched in late 2013, providing brands with a way to bridge the gap between online advertising and offline sales. Retail Connect uses Nielsen Buyer Insights’ aggregate data to connect retailers with consumers in the digital space without relying on cookies or tracking browser histories. Instead, Retail Connect uses POS transaction data to identify customers online. Online campaign results are measured against offline sales reporting figures, and businesses are given access to details on actual consumer purchasing patterns.

5. LiveRamp: Connect data across marketing applications.
Acquired by Acxiom in May, LiveRamp is a data on-boarder that provides marketers with ways to unify their customer databases across disconnected digital marketing applications. What that really means is that LiveRamp gives marketers the tools to better take advantage of the CRM and transactional data they already have access to, for better measurement of digital campaigns. LiveRamp draws connections between user registrations on certain travel, news, gaming, and dating websites to inform its clients’ CRM databases. Identifying consumer information is erased, and the resulting data is sent to ad targeting platforms.

Know of other online-to-offline data platforms? Leave a description in the comments.

Stephanie Miles is a senior editor at Street Fight.