The acquisition comes on the heels of Incubeta’s recent big win at the Global Performance Marketing Awards, where the team took home the trophy for Best Performance Marketing Agency. Judges’ comments commended the “powerhouse” agency of over 800 employees for “supporting employees across all factors, driving business growth and maintaining client relationships.”   

The Carlyle Europe Technology Partners (“CETP”) platform will support Incubeta in accelerating its international growth plan through the development of its existing suite of services and acquisitions, as well as investing in the company’s commercial operations and proprietary technology. CETP has extensive experience in scaling technology and marketing services businesses through its partnerships with leaders in their respective markets, including companies such as DEPT, Work & Co, The Mill, and HSO.

Lars Lehne, CEO of Incubeta, said:

“We are very proud of the significant growth that Incubeta has achieved, having completed five acquisitions over the past two years and becoming a key partner in the Google ecosystem. We strongly believe Carlyle is the perfect partner as we take the next step in our growth journey, given its global presence, deep understanding of our sector, and extensive experience in scaling technology and marketing services businesses.”

Andrew Tan, Director in the CETP investment advisory team, said:

“Incubeta has all the hallmarks we look for in our investments – exposure to a market benefiting from strong tailwinds, partnership with an experienced and driven management team, and multiple levers for growth, including international expansion and service line extension. We look forward to partnering with Incubeta’s management team under the leadership of CEO Lars Lehne to help accelerate the next phase of the company’s growth as it seeks to become the leading global partner of choice in the fast-growing GMP ecosystem.”

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With a focus on Central and Eastern Europe, VIVnetworks helps e-commerce brands scale their performance marketing efforts and unlock growth in the regional market, as well as globally. The agency currently possesses a client portfolio of 900 merchants across 27 countries.

The integration of VIVnetworks with CJ will open up new opportunities for global brands and publishers to activate and grow within Central and Eastern European markets whilst also supporting those within the region to expand internationally.

VIVnetworks will be integrated into CJ’s continental European offering and operate under the leadership of Tobias Allgeyer, Senior Vice President EMEA, based in Munich. VIVnetworks’ founders, Vladan Hejnic, CEO, and Robert Studený, COO will join CJ’s executive management for Central and Eastern Europe.

Mayuresh Kshetramade, CEO at CJ, says of the acquisition:

“A decade ago, CJ started partnering with VIVnetworks to harness the agency’s vast expertise in affiliate marketing within Central and Eastern Europe. I’m pleased to say that continues to be a huge success. VIVnetworks have not only operated and developed expertise in the region, they’ve matured the affiliate industry. Now, under CJ’s unified umbrella, VIVnetworks and CJ will fully combine to help our clients—advertisers, publishers, and agencies—win in commerce with unparalleled regional and global performance marketing expertise supported by our internationally renowned capabilities in data, technology, and partnerships.”

Vladan Hejnic, Founder and CEO at VIVnetworks, comments:

“The integration of VIVnetworks within CJ marks a merging of expertise. CJ is a global performance network and technology platform with local expertise worldwide. By joining CJ, the VIVnetworks team will enhance that expertise, becoming a core strength in Central and Eastern Europe to benefit VIV, CJ, and Publicis Groupe’s global clients. In addition to CJ’s ability to offer our advertising brands action-based insight on trends, best practices, and local-level knowledge around the world, our brands will gain greater access to Publicis Groupe’s commerce transformation through CJ’s expert teams—data science, product, engineering, publisher development, and fraud prevention to name a few.”

We look forward to seeing how this acquisition will benefit clients of both companies.

The post Publicis Groupe Announces Acquisition of VIVnetworks – To Be Integrated with Performance Platform CJ appeared first on PerformanceIN.

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As we face a cost-of-living crisis, and general economic fragility, consumers are having to constantly evaluate the value of products and services they use. There has been a genuine fall in income for everyone, and this is having a knock-on effect for brands – some of which are benefitting, while many others are losing their customers.

What value means to brands

We’re seeing German discount grocery chains, Aldi and Lidl, growing their market share, while services like Netflix are losing subscribers. Brands are having to prove their products or services to provide consumers with the much sought-after value they seek, and marketers are having to re-evaluate what value now represents for them.

The current economic climate is proving to be a far bigger challenge for brands than what they faced during the pandemic. As a result, value has become one of – if not the – most important aspect of their campaigns. With marketers increasingly unsure of who their target customer is, many are struggling to find the value they are desperately looking for.

Nonetheless, it’s not the time for marketers to reduce their budgets – it’s time to continue investing and show them why your brand provides value to their lives. To do this, marketers must see value as being closely tied to brand and performance, with all three working together to get the most out of their campaigns.

The changing face of value

Marketers must look beyond the transactional media investment and consider the role that improving their brand and driving performance have to play in providing value.

When looking to protect or grow market share, insight and creativity must be at the heart of the campaign. Insights help understand audience behaviour to form the strong foundations for the campaign, while creativity ensures that audiences are engaged and interested in the advertising being served to them.

Performance should be driven by utilising KPIs that matter, with a particular focus on attention metrics and how these can help brands to produce the most effective and efficient advertising. Ultimately, every campaign is different and brands must focus on the performance indicators that are more relevant to their needs. Value can’t be found in viewability continuing to be the standard metric for measuring the quality of impressions.

Getting brand and performance right will automatically create value for brands, because they’ll be able confidently identify who their target customer is, and ensure these are the people that are being reached at the right time. This will help to encourage current customers to continue buying from the brand, while proving to new customers that the brand can add value to their lives.

Understanding the link between value, brand, and performance isn’t just about generating value for the brand, but also delivering value for the consumer, both in and out of difficult economic climates. Tying brand and performance to value will ensure that both consumers and advertisers benefit, even as the definition of value evolves. 

The post WTF is Value and Why Should Marketers Care? appeared first on PerformanceIN.

It was the perfect opportunity to acknowledge and applaud the industry’s key players, brightest minds, and strongest teams – those providing inspiration and innovation to the rapidly evolving performance sphere. And what a spectacular round of winners we saw this year!

Who took home the trophies?

Rakuten racked up the most trophies of the evening, earning a staggering seven awards. Their five-party super partnership – involving MyAmexShopping, Shinhan Bank, luxury retailer 24S, and K-pop band, BTS – won two trophies alone. Judges commended the “creative and out of the box thinking” of this multifaceted partnership.

Rakuten also wooed judges in their entry for Best Innovation, with one judge commenting, “This is one of the most innovative entries I’ve seen.” And they proved able to connect with the younger generation, winning Best Social Commerce Campaign and Best Loyalty Partnership for their authentic partnerships with K-pop stars and Student Beans that tapped into the Gen Z market.

impact.com were also prominent champions, taking home three awards across multiple categories. Judges praised their technological innovation, and they stood victorious for the Best Performance Marketing Technology award.

Who came out best in brand new categories?

This year’s ceremony presented nine new, exciting awards up for grabs. Etsy and TikTok seized the trophy for Most Creative Partnership and judges admired their effort to “keep human connection at the heart of commerce.”

TopCashback won the award for Performance Marketing Team of the Year for their fair, egalitarian and communicative approach to teamwork.

And UpSellit took home the trophy for Best Tech Publisher – their excellent service “impressed judges in a competitive category.”

The Book of the Night is available for you to download and peruse at your own leisure, featuring an extensive list of the night’s champions, their winning projects, and the judge’s comments. It’s an inspiring and necessary read as we head towards a new year of progression and innovation.

Save the date

We are thrilled to announce our 2023 US Partnership Awards, where we’ll be heading to Miami for April 3rd to recognise and reward the best work within the Partner, Affiliate and Influencer Marketing industry. Download the Entry Kit now to find out steps-to-enter, judge’s advice, mistakes to avoid, and entry criteria to score top marks and earn yourself a win like last night’s top dogs.

The post Bold, Brave, Innovative: The Winners of the 2022 Global Performance Marketing Awards appeared first on PerformanceIN.

A holistic approach to digital marketing

E-commerce marketing has changed. The last point of contact with a product no longer triggers the impulse to buy. Instead, the decisive factor is all the experiences that a customer has when he or she is interested in a product and researches it. Product reviews are at least as important as the brand promise and, of course, the price. For advertisers, this means that they need to know where and how customers find out about their products, and which arguments convince them before they buy. Only with this knowledge do advertisers get a holistic view of the customer journey. And only then can they pinpoint the purchase-relevant touchpoints and address them with advertising. 

What does the purchase-oriented customer journey look like these days? 

We are probably all familiar with this situation: Searching online without knowing exactly what product you want to buy. Let’s say you are looking for a new backpack, one that is waterproof but looks good downtown as well as on the trail. You often start your research on sites of publishers you already trust and then you go to special-interest media, communities, and social media. All of these sources offer information about differences, advantages, and disadvantages.At this point, many shoppers make a pre-selection and narrow down the search, looking for which brand offers the best price. Sources now include price comparison sites as well as discount and coupon providers. If then everything fits, if the model and price correspond to shopper’s wishes, the purchase of the new backpack takes place. To be successful, an advertiser must be present in all the places that are visited digitally during the shopper’s research, so that a competitor does not win out.

Commerce Advertising sets a new standard

In order to generate these decisive buying impulses, advertisers need to combine different tools and technologies. Here, the key is to use those that most efficiently create a conversion between the ad format on the various pages and the advertiser’s online store or offering. For example:

• Technologies for pages with product reviews, product comparisons, tests, coupons, or cashback
• Widgets in Google Shopping 
• Affiliate marketing, which plays the crucial role in commerce content (publisher strategy)

We have coined a new term for the sum of all these opportunities that are clearly focused on a target transaction: Commerce Advertising. 

For advertisers, Commerce Advertising leads to additional revenues. Their advertising appears in an environment that interests their potential customers and that customers actively use. This makes it more likely that the customer will respond to the campaign. Conversion increases. 

D2C, Direct to Consumer, can also be implemented efficiently, as the click leads directly to the store or the offer that the advertiser is promoting. The offer can also be a sign-up or a download. 

Connecting Growth – by mrge

Traditional online advertising has reached its limits. Consumers have become banner-blind but still need reliable information to make better purchase decisions. Third-party cookies no longer play a long-term role in the advertising of the future. Advertisers must find new answers to the question of how to reach their audiences. Currently, publishers are looking for new digital ad instruments to monetise their services through their content. The answer is mrge, the new Commerce Advertising platform which incorporates best-in-class solutions in commerce content, performance marketing, and affiliate marketing.

Three market leaders in their fields have already joined forces at mrge. We are very familiar with the e-commerce and publishing markets; we know the potential but also the challenges in data-driven marketing. It is important to us that we set forward-looking impulses and combine both sides, commerce and content. And mrge isn’t done yet: We’re expanding the umbrella brand worldwide and working with companies that make further contributions to the conversion-oriented customer journey. If you are ready to grow, visit mrge.com.

Meet us at PI LIVE in London: October 18-19, 2022, on the mrge Terrace on the Grand Hall floor.

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To stay ahead of the curve and meet customers’ ever-growing expectations, many brands are beginning to re-think how they measure the success of their campaigns by looking inwards at their own internal measurement frameworks.

However, there may be a cause for concern. According to a new report from McKinsey ‘Prediction: The Future of CX’, only 6% of leaders revealed they are actually confident that their current measurement system ‘enables both strategic and tactical decision-making’. 

In principle, it’s very simple. Without clear measurement of the correct metrics, you’re unable to see how far (or not) you’ve come. This can then risk falling short of the brand’s vision, as well as ultimately threatening the overall success of the business. However, when done correctly, measurement can be a powerful driver of change across an entire organisation. 

As part of our 2022 Customer Experience Imperatives, we explored how brands can create a more effective measurement framework, from focusing on what you can measure, to what you should measure. And, how this in turn, can make the world of difference for those brands competing for the top spot. 

The importance of a measurement framework

An effective measurement framework is not about reporting or dashboards. Instead, it provides a solid foundation for understanding what activities are meaningful to the business, and how teams should prioritise them. This then allows brands to easily identify the core focus areas for the business and ensures everyone within the organisation is working towards clearly defined goals that are tied to a common purpose.

Unifying a brand’s vision is not only important for both customers and employees, but it also breaks down business silos, rather than reinforcing them. If for example, one team is working towards a set of goals that differs from another team’s, employees may feel a lack of direction from higher management. This can also cause disjointed brand interactions for consumers and could be just the thing to drive a once loyal customer into the arms of a competitor. 

A clear measurement framework, however, enables brands to deliver more seamless, cohesive, and relevant experiences to their customers, and ensure employees stay on track by translating the CEO’s vision into concrete actions. 

A four-pronged approach

Ensuring that the core business objectives tie into a brand’s business purpose, is an important first step. Once the above is in place, brands will need to develop a framework that will effectively track whether activities and inputs are driving positive movement towards these objectives. There are four phases to that process: align, access, analyse and evolve.

1. Align

Measurement, like many other elements of business, changes and matures as time goes on. Even if an organisation’s strategic objectives set the course and direction the business wants to take, often its KPIs and measurements do not align with those objectives. 

The first step for brands is to create a unified strategy that aligns strategic objectives to measurable outcomes, and to the actions and decisions needed to drive results. Brands should then benchmark how the business is performing and understand what capabilities it has to deliver those measurements. 

2. Access

Successful measurement requires mature capabilities, application, and adoption. Therefore, brands should benchmark how and what they are measuring, as well as the capabilities needed to successfully define, develop, and utilise measurements. 

However, benchmarking is an ongoing process. It’s important for brands to revisit benchmarking to ensure they are seeing continuous improvements as this allows businesses to track progress against valuable comparison points in the market (for example, the competition, customer spend, or an adjacent industry’s products/services).  Finally, brands should assess capabilities to measure, build the measurements aligned to the business’ outcomes, as well as define the primary measurement KPIs that support the actions needed to run the business. 

3. Analyse

Once a brand’s measurement maturity is understood, it’s important to define KPIs and map them against the measurements that are already currently in place. At this stage, it’s valuable to note all potential data limitations that could hinder achieving your objectives, including details around people, processes, and technology. 

Here, it is important to identify where and how a brand needs to expand measurement to track its performance. As you define KPIs, they should be strategically linked, actionable, and goal orientated, otherwise it cannot be considered a metric for measurement. This can put the business at risk of investing time and resources into measuring data that does not hold value. 

4. Evolve

For long-term measurement success, this requires charting a course for change that evolves over time. Therefore, brands must continuously evaluate their business objectives to ensure everything still aligns and gauge the effectiveness of KPIs, to link actions to outcomes. Once outputs are determined, brands can then begin to prioritise recommendations to improve long-term measurement, with near-term wins.

Finally, it’s time to define the measurement roadmap with key workstreams, dependencies, milestones, and timelines. As well as defining the steps needed to address data, reporting, and underlying technology initiatives to bring the KPI framework to life. 

No two businesses are ever the same, so there’s no such thing as a one-size fits all measurement framework. Instead, the key is to identify short, medium, and long-term plans to develop a bespoke structure that fits around a brand’s individual and unique needs. 

We’re now living in a highly competitive and fast-changing world and keeping up and keeping ahead can be a constant challenge. By building an effective framework, measurement can be used as a very powerful catalyst for change and can improve the effectiveness of customer experiences in new and innovative ways today, and as a business evolves in the future.

The post Using Measurement as a Catalyst for Change appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Now it’s official. Those who missed out in July will have a second shot at savings, with the retailer adding two additional Prime Days on the 11th and 12th October. Amazon has said that the additional days are a chance for consumers to get ahead of their Christmas shopping. And it’s a smart move. One that is very reactive to changes in the market and consumer behaviour.

Early holiday shopping or “holiday creep” is a growing trend. Gartner found that nearly half (48%) of consumers will start to shop in October or November this year, with 16% now shopping year-round for holiday gifts. But it’s fair to argue there is more to shifts in shopping habits than early festive cheer.

Surging energy prices and food costs weigh heavily on the economy. The cost of living crisis is affecting everyone, and as Amazon’s President told Reuters, this “macroeconomic environment” consumers are facing is further rationale behind the second Amazon Prime Day.

From the brand perspective, serving up big discounts for Prime Day isn’t as easy as it sounds for several reasons, including declining profit margins and supply chain issues. A survey of brands for the July event found that 22% planned to discount less than last year. There is no doubt that the extent to which inflation pressures shoppers will be weighing on the minds of brands this October as well.

It’s a lot to contend with, retail brands and marketers will need to think outside the box to balance the bottom line. Especially considering the intense competition for the shrinking disposable income of the average consumer. There is no single prescription for planning how to approach the event. Still, depending on where their challenges fall, there is much to consider around margins and inventory when capitalising on Amazon Prime Day 2.

It’s all about the margins

The problem in 2021 was getting inventory into warehouses, but understandably, it’s all about the margins this year. While all brands should conduct an extensive study on product margins and pricing, those with tighter margins – due to either higher cost of raw materials or inflation – must know their pricing structure like the back of their hand.

Prime Day can feel like an opportunity to go in all guns blazing. However, a conservative approach to bargains offered is a much smarter option for brands with tighter margins. Discounting just one or a couple of products could be a way of minimising the margin squeeze.

Consumer choice is not a bad thing, but in the busiest sales periods, retailers mustn’t overwhelm their customers to the point of checkout paralysis. There’s no need to. Instead, focus on getting the right products in front of the right people. With this in mind, choosing which products to discount should be based on a data-driven approach. Analyse your historical sales – which products are the best sellers? Where do you have an inventory surplus?

Bring to life dead inventory

For some brands, lack of inventory is still very much not the problem due to a slowdown in E-commerce sales last year and the ongoing supply chain issues. While historically, sellers have viewed Prime Days as a sale to jump-start new products, for many, this will be a “clear the excess” type of sale. As such, this is a huge opportunity to take advantage of the ability to apply deeper discounts for the readily-engaged consumer. But, before deciding on a promotional strategy, brands must understand their stock levels across their portfolio. This is crucial because promoting such products might not stand out if other best-selling products are discounted.

The percentage discount is obviously pivotal in every Prime Day sale – consumers will not be incentivised to buy if the deal isn’t appealing enough. Amazon instructs a minimum discount of 20% off. This is why with those struggling with profit margins, pouring promotional efforts into one or two products, as mentioned, will be more effective than a full portfolio approach. Whereas in the case of inventory, brands will need to either be selective and only discount products with high inventory levels or have a more aggressive discount on those products.

How to tackle advertising spend to maximise Amazon’s potential

It might sound like a lot of homework. But a study on Return On Ad Spend (ROAS) for advertising campaigns and a set target to work towards on Amazon Marketing Services (AMS) will benefit all brands. For those with excess inventory, it would be wise to delve even deeper, expanding on analysis and having a target ROAS by-product depending on stock levels. This will enable advertisers to understand how aggressive they can be with their strategy, identifying different paths to maximise sales while still making sense compared to the cost of the product and/ or holding inventory.

Mastering margins and inventory, as well as your advertising investment in relation to each respective challenge, is absolutely worth it. Only those who understand how their business is affected by internal and external barriers will be able to remain efficient. But, the benefits for successful brands are vast – this October and further afield.

Prime Days, or indeed any event that offers a good bargain – are the perfect time to attract and engage new customers. But Amazon specifically provides a really good shot at future customer acquisition. For example, three out of four customers use Amazon to discover new products.

But for that to matter, planning must consider how to successfully entice those customers outside of these branded discount days and understand that while conversions happen on Amazon, they are driven by many media channels. An omnichannel approach that includes video and image content will maximise outcomes for Prime Day and beyond.

The post Amazon Prime Day 2: This Time, It’s Personal appeared first on PerformanceIN.

The initiative, which allows publishers to organise their audience composition in a standardised manner, does seem to bring back a level of control over the publisher’s business…

But how exactly do SDAs work, and are they going to emerge as one of the answers to how advertisers and publishers can evolve from the cookie-based system that currently underpins online advertising?

The post WTF Will Seller-Defined Audiences Do For Digital Advertising? appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Both traditional affiliate programmes and influencer marketing campaigns strive to build brand authority and drive conversions based on your goals, whether that be clicks, downloads, sales, or something else that can be achieved by engaging consumers. The two industries, affiliate and influencer marketing – which arguably both sit under the industry umbrella of partnership marketing – are converging now more than ever. This is because as the influencer space matures, affiliate marketers are realising how it can be viewed and utilised through a performance-based lens. 

When worlds collide

Global affiliate marketing agency, Acceleration Partners, has been putting a heavy focus on developing an influencer programme management service. AP believes that investment in the maturing channel is essential for top-of-funnel brand exposure across paid and owned channels, which is discussed in detail in its latest report. 

impact.com, is also among the big industry names that are dedicating teams and resources to elevate their influencer marketing offerings. For the second year in a row, impact.com is a partner of the Influencer Marketing Show London, as well as PI LIVE London. The team will be raising conversations about how their multifaceted approach to elevated partnership programmes benefits from the implementation of influencers. San Sareen, impact.com’s Director of Influencers and Creators, will be taking to the IMS stage specifically to hone into how to correctly compensate your influencers to beat the competition.

What about trackable metrics? 

SaaS and tech are also becoming increasingly more prominent in the influencer marketing space, with similar tools becoming available to those that have been harnessed and solidified in the affiliate space for many years. Platforms such as LTK and Metapic allow brands and influencer affiliates to earn an income from sharing fashion recommendations, and the likes of Captiv8 and Influencity allow brands and affiliates to identify content partners and seamlessly run end to end campaigns. 

The growth of SaaS and tech platforms in the influencer space that provide services similar to their traditional affiliate counterparts such as Afise and Partnerize shows that influencer marketing isn’t just posing with a product on Instagram, but is a channel that can be tracked and measured efficiently. 

Ultimately, putting a focus on influencer marketing as a part of your affiliate programme is a great way to expand the type of audiences you can reach, therefore escalating your potential for excellent outcomes. Affiliate marketers, it’s time to invest time and energy into understanding the true value of a creator’s influence.

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