News and Analysis
Toys ‘R’ Us is Not Playing Around With its Retail Re-launch
Setting what might be an example of a future retail model, mega toy brand Toys ‘R’ Us is emerging from bankruptcy with a new retail strategy involving airports and cruise ships. Called the “air, land, and sea” initiative, the big box MULO (multi-location) brand is opening up to 24 flagship stores and locations in airports […]
Informing the Agency 2024 Marketing Plan
Ever wanted an inside peek at what your agency competitors are doing? Curious if you’re spending too much time managing accounts compared to other agencies? Wondering if your pricing structure compares to the competition? We’ve got those answers for you (and more!). WordStream by LocaliQ released its popular State of the Digital Marketing Agency report […]
Commentary
The Data Balance: How to Deliver Privacy and Personalization
It’s possible for merchants to provide personalization alongside customer data privacy—in fact, it’s a must for businesses that want to retain customer trust and remain viable. In order to balance using data for personalization with respecting customers’ privacy, it’s important to first understand the current consumer data and privacy landscape.
What’s Driving Retailers to Implement Autonomous Checkout
Convenience stores have been the first frontier for autonomous checkout, with grocery to follow. While today, it’s still rare to find autonomous checkout in stores, I think that within two years, people will have at least one store in their neighborhood that offers the technology. And within five years, autonomous checkout will be common and preferred by the majority of shoppers. While Covid may have accelerated the shift, this technology is here to stay.
Is Amazon Primed for the Data Privacy Era?
In a world that favors first-party networks — especially those with ample web traffic outside of iOS apps — it doesn’t get much bigger than Amazon. The question is if the e-commerce giant can attract advertisers en masse with the reach of its ad network plus the unfettered targeting and first-party contextual relevance of the world’s largest online store.
Latest Posts
What Is Person-Based Advertising?
Account-based marketing promised to take marketing to a new level of granularity. Instead of targeting entire companies, marketers would be able to connect with the specific accounts within enterprises that could lead to conversions.
But Influ2 reckons that ABM doesn’t offer B2B marketers enough granularity. As a result, it is pioneering person-based advertising in the B2B space, bringing the personalization of consumer marketing to the B2B setting.
Leveraging Household Targeting and CTV to Influence the Customer Journey
As technology has vastly increased the degree of targeting granularity marketers can achieve, there’s been a tendency to think of the customer journey as a solo endeavor. But in verticals like travel, QSR, and automotive, purchase decisions are more often a group activity involving all members of the family. Household targeting is the key to maximizing marketing performance in these segments.
Amazon’s Retail-as-a-Service Expands into Payments, AR, and Salons
As Amazon continues to mature, it needs to find revenue growth in new, creative places. The company’s booming advertising business is one such conquest. Iterating on the AWS playbook by bringing tech-fueled logistical innovations to physical stores could be another.
LBMA: Target and Safeway Use Google Pay for Location-Based Promotions
In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers TikTok partnering with Nielsen for geo-targeted campaigns with the aim of helping SMBs, Target and Safeway using Google Pay for location-based promotions, Petco using facial recognition tech to reunite lost pets with owners, and a KLM billboard that listens for flu symptoms.
Delivering an Online Retail Experience with In-Store Shopping’s Perks
As the future of retail customer experience takes shape, it will become more important for brands to re-create the in-store experience online. But how?
Commerce Content: A New Way to Connect with Customers Online
Most millennial consumers, the generation with the most spending power, grew up shopping by researching a product before purchasing. Nine out of 10 consumers consult reviews before making a purchase, and 56% say they consult at least four reviews before making a purchase. This portends a different way to reach consumers and convert.
Airkit Raises $40 Million to Fuel the Future of CX
Just this morning, the low-code digital customer experience platform Airkit announced a $40 million round of Series B funding, led by EQT Ventures. The Series B will be used to accelerate the company’s investments in go-to-market and product development. The announcement comes just seven months after Airkit came out of stealth with a $28 million Series A.
2021: All Upside for Digital
As retailers try to determine how to welcome customers back in person while expanding digital efforts that accelerated last year, NetElixir CEO and founder Udayan Bose weighed in on what to expect from commerce and why retailers should invest aggressively in online channels.
6 Touchless Payments Apps for Small Businesses
The latest wave of touchless payment solutions are designed for small merchants dealing with the fallout from the pandemic. Contactless payments went from being “nice to have” to a being an essential service for retailers in 2020, as consumers around the world discovered that they really didn’t want to touch cash or POS hardware while they were making purchases at local stores.
Digital Advertising’s 2-Sided Transparency Problem
There’s another side to digital advertising’s transparency problem: Companies don’t even know what they know about consumers. Just as consumers use dozens of apps, businesses use hundreds of applications. Most, if not all, of them collect data on employees and customers. But sifting through that data, figuring out what is necessary, and determining whether it is privacy-compliant is a Sisyphean task.



















































Meta Is Automating Ads, But Brands Still Face a Bigger Problem