News and Analysis

Snack Brands Lean Into Nostalgia this Back-to-School Season

Snack Brands Lean Into Nostalgia this Back-to-School Season

The dog days of summer have arrived, and all around the country, parents are preparing kids for back-to-school  in just a few short weeks. For snack and specialty food brands like General Mills, Conagra, and Nestlé, it’s go time. Despite often being overlooked during the back-to-school rush, when attention is generally focused on backpacks and […]

Snoop Dogg’s Munchie Meal and Celebrity-Inspired MULO Brands

We live in a world of stars — big, small, and on the rise. From singers and actors we watch on stage and screen to reality TV celebrity to previously-unknown consumers who make a name for themselves on TikTok, we exist in a world where everyone can be perceived as “talent.” Celebrity endorsements are certainly […]

6 Influencer Relationship Management Platforms for Brands

6 Influencer Relationship Management Platforms for Brands

Just about anyone can call themselves a creator these days, and that makes it harder than ever for brand marketers to cut through the noise when putting together their influencer campaigns. With the creator economy on track to become a $100 billion industry, more brands and agencies are searching for tools to source potential brand […]

Commentary

The Deprecation of Cookies Leads to a New Probabilistic Playbook

The upshot is that deterministic approaches via walled gardens will still have importance, but they will simply become a strategy play as opposed to a catch-all approach for digital marketing. It’s apparent that any brands buying or relying on deterministic audiences need to augment their solutions to ensure they meet their ongoing campaign goals.

How Deep Learning Can Boost Small Businesses

With e-commerce and the reach afforded by the internet, local businesses now have the opportunity to look beyond their community to find customers and generate enough revenue to keep afloat.

Contact Center Should Be the Marketing Engine

Contact Centers Should Be Marketing Engines

With so much now happening in the contact center, it seems it is indeed an often untapped source of marketing gold — if marketers can glean meaningful insights out of it. that is. So, how can marketing executives accomplish that?

Latest Posts

As Political Messaging Shifts to CTV, Email Backs Up Campaigns

In a loud election where social media is overrun with fake news and unsolicited user-created opinions, campaigns must communicate in a consistent and streamlined way with voters, serving only ads that they want to see in their preferred channels. Campaigns might not win a voter on one issue but could sway or motivate them on another if they know what resonates with them. 

This election year, the power of email should not be underestimated.

Google My Business Posts: Your Unexpected Holiday Hero

We’re in an era that allows enterprise businesses to tap into the API and upload Google Posts at scale (with help from a local platform management partner). Year-round, businesses can feature new product launches, new store openings, in-store events, and more, but perhaps one of the best times of year to leverage this space is during the months of November and December, when shoppers are gearing up for the holiday season. 

Let’s walk through the top five best uses for Google Posts over the holiday season.

Foursquare’s New Audio Assistant is a Peek into the Future of Local Tech

Dubbed Marsbot for Airpods, Foursquare’s virtual assistant will whisper insights to users about their surroundings, unprompted, as they move throughout the world. This may be a recommendation for a local coffee shop or a fun fact about a landmark.

For brick-and-mortar businesses and the technology providers that help them connect with customers, the marketing possibilities are tantalizing.

Brands Struggle to Strike the Right Tone This Holiday Season

It’s not even November, but the holiday shopping season has already begun. With nearly two-thirds of consumers saying the Covid-19 pandemic has negatively impacted their attitude toward the shopping season, retail marketers are rethinking their approach this year and focusing more heavily on empathy and values when they target younger shoppers.

Location Weekly: Location Data Gets Political, Taco Bell Personalizes Menus

In this episode of Location Weekly, the Location-Based Marketing Association covers using location data to influence US elections, Brandify and Rakuten Ready partnering, ZoneTail teaming with Radical Road Brewing, and Taco Bell using Certona AI to personalize menus for app members.

Google’s Latest Privacy Play Has Big Implications for the Open Web

Connecting the Dots on Google’s Visual Road Map

Google continues to double down on visual search and navigation. Its latest move came last week with updates to its Live View visual navigation to help users identify and qualify local businesses. This follows soon after its Earth Cloud Anchors that will let users create digital content on physical places.

Both developments tell us something about what may well be the future of local search: augmented reality-enhanced visuals.

How Brands Can Rise, Retain, and Return Stronger Than Ever this Holiday Season

Prior to Covid-19, traditional demographics still directed many brands’ targeting strategies. However, the pandemic has laid bare just how flawed this method can be. We believe that the best measure of what someone will purchase in the future is looking at what they’ve purchased in the past. This holds true even in an uncertain market and is invaluable for retailers as the holidays approach. 

Crucial Attribution and Targeting Tools

The lines in the traditional funnel have blurred. Consumers may enter and pursue a non-linear route before making a purchase or moving on. The path from awareness to decision is no longer predictable in an omni-channel environment. A progression that works for one type of consumer may have no relevance for another. These changes necessite another look at attribution models.

Identifying Content Opportunities from SEO Keyword Trends During Covid-19

Keywords that were optimized to improve inbound sales aren’t doing their job because people are no longer inputting those search terms. Does that mean that your product or service isn’t needed? No, absolutely not. Your brand’s content is needed. But the keyword trends that you had been relying on have changed.

To be able to once again reach your audience, you need to study search trends as they stand now and determine how you can create content around those terms.

7 Shoppable Video Platforms

How do you engage customers when in-store shopping is in many places all but obsolete? One solution that brand retailers around the country have been digging into this year is shoppable video. Using recorded and live video streams, brands have been able to capitalize on the shift toward mobile video and give customers direct links to buy their products online.

Here are seven examples of shoppable video platforms brands are using right now.