Huge thanks to Neel Pandya, Sarah Yam and Christopher Szczyglowski for your expertise.

The post Deep Dive: Does Our Future Involve Us, or Are We Going to be Left Behind? appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Many years ago, as discussion boards fell out of fashion we closed the forum and shifted conversation to Facebook. On reflection it was a little lazy as that’s not the right platform and I feel that we lost the sense of community we once had outside of our annual events.

As we look to refocus in 2022, I’m pleased to say we’ve created a new community on Guild. A platform that was created by eConsultancy founder Ashley Friedlein to serve B2B communities and we think it does an exceptional job.

Collaborative problem solving and support

The knowledge we have within our industry and the willingness of the community to help their peers is something that should make us proud. Our new community already boasts 250+ pioneers of Affiliate & Performance Marketing from around the world.

The group has a no-nonsense approach to self-promotion and everyone is expected to post transparently.

Membership

Access to the community is free, and what’s more we pay for it so it’s also ad free. We also like it better than slack as it encourages more meaningful and in-depth conversation.

To join, you’ll need to be a member of PerformanceIN and you’ll be provided with a unique link to join the community via email or you can visit this page (once signed in)

I look forward to seeing you in the group!

The post Introducing the Partnerships Lounge appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Using a combination of behavioural and contextual data, RevLifter’s platform delivers hyper-personalised deals across the entire customer journey. RevLifter tailors 1-2-1 messages and offers to each of their customers by using a merchant’s goals and business rules as a foundation, which in turn drives both increased revenue and profitability.

Chris, who joins RevLifter in a non-executive role, has propelled businesses at the forefront of marketing industry disruption over the past two decades. He was formerly CEO of The Exchange Lab, a first-of-its-kind programmatic platform that delivered effective media execution by aggregating valuable audience data from leading DSPs, data providers, and booking systems. The Exchange Lab was sold to agency holding company WPP in 2015 to bolster the Group’s bespoke technology offering in the rapidly growing programmatic space.

Prior to The Exchange Lab, Dobson led efforts to transform BBC Worldwide into a premier global omnichannel media property by successfully combining TV and digital assets. Before the BBC, he drove global commercialisation for MSN with MSN Messenger, achieving 10X revenue-growth by pioneering the targeting value of audience data – a method that now powers all digital media.

We were able to catch up with Chris, who spoke to us about personalisation within performance marketing and his new role.

How will you use your past experience in your new role at RevLifter?

My past experience in technology, e-commerce, and advertising-based businesses will be applied to help with a number of elements essential to the next stage of RevLifter’s expected exponential growth. 

These include customer-driven roadmap development, the hiring of key staff, international expansion – with a big focus on the US – and several go-to-market considerations to fit client needs. I’ll also be working toward the completion of scalable business and tech infrastructure to power our growth while giving space to the leadership team to effectively apply their passion for RevLifter and its customers.

What influenced your decision to join the team?

When I look at a business, there are a number of things that need to be in place to capture my interest. With RevLifter, I was immediately impressed by the passion, vision, and drive of Simon [Bird] and Ryan [Kliszat], the Co-Founders, and the culture they have created across all teams. 

The next test is ‘how genuine is the technology?’ So many young businesses are optimistic about what they can do, but I was really impressed by the power, scalability, and market-leading features of RevLifter’s hyper-personalisation platform. This, coupled with the foresight to realise what a business will need to scale, and the diversity and skillset of the board members, made it an easy decision.

How do you plan to collaborate with RevLifter as it works towards international expansion?

My role is to advise on key hires and business and management models as the company becomes, by definition, more distributed across multiple territories.

International expansion is a crucial and essential step, but it heralds a lot of change for everyone in all disciplines. My whole career has been founded in building and fostering international, culturally diverse teams to capture the advantages of that diversity but still helping them work together to achieve their common goals. I would hope my experience across many businesses can be applied to ensure RevLifter fast-tracks to success across multiple markets.

Simon Bird, co-founder and CEO of RevLifter, said: “Chris Dobson has been at the vanguard of transformation for so many elements of marketing strategy and execution. E-commerce is on the cusp of the same fundamental reinvention through the power of hyper-personalised offers and experiences. As RevLifter continues to expand globally, Chris will play a critical role in helping us better serve brands and making our technology an essential part of the e-commerce stack.”

We’d like to thank Chris for taking the time to talk to us. It seems bright things are on the horizon, and it will be interesting to see how Chris uses his expertise to guide RevLifter in their global expansion.

The post E-commerce Platform RevLifter Names Chris Dobson as Chairman appeared first on PerformanceIN.

With a huge portion of commerce now in the process of, or having already moved online, new and exciting ways of engaging with customers virtually are important. Due to this, the demand for innovation in this department is huge. AR and VR can enable companies to adhere to this, so it is positive to hear that these technologies are predicted to take off over the next decade, with the APAC region a particular powerhouse, according to research from GlobalData.

Sunil Kumar Verma, lead ICT analyst at GlobalData, said: “VR adoption has so far been relatively low in APAC compared to developed markets like the US. However, the region is bound to witness a strong adoption trend in future, aided by high-speed 5G network deployment. The burgeoning ecosystem of connected devices, which is estimated to grow further, and ample government support, will drive VR adoption in the region.”

Buzz AR and Cloudbae

Buzz AR, the Singapore-based augmented reality solutions startup, has recently signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with Alibaba affiliates, Cloudbae, as a strategic partnership to accelerate smart city AR/VR applications in the APAC region. The company is seeking to close a funding round by the end of Q1.

Cloudbae is an affiliate of Alibaba, and it runs the China-ASEAN New Smart City Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition. 

A Smart City is a framework, with technology which allows for planning in order to improve quality of life in cities. Through smartphones, traffic lights and smart waste bins, solutions can be made to solve problems citizens experience on a daily basis.

Buzz AR believes that the current ways of engaging users are fragmented – either solely online or offline, and that AR will bridge that gap.

What does this mean for marketing?

Reaching customers wherever they are is easier than ever, and with more than 3 million mobile devices having AR capabilities globally, a great opportunity for engaging with customers in unique and creative ways has reared its head.

Think more creative content. For instance, consumers having the ability to try before they buy. AR and VR take away the requirement for physical products, allowing an easy buying experience. We have seen examples of this with IKEA’s ‘IKEA Place’ technology, which allows users to place furniture items in their homes through their smartphone camera, as well as ASOS’ virtual catwalk, with which users can view clothing items on a model who appears to walk within their own home. Hopefully we will see more of this technology within the APAC region.

A more connected world means more available data, and AR can revolutionise the way we collect it. Humans can collect data, but it takes a significant amount of time and expertise. Imagine if this could all be done by computers. It could mean streamlined processes, enabling brands to consider what works best for their audiences in a much more simple way.

As Buzz AR believe that AR should bridge the gaps when engaging users, similarly, AR should help to do so in terms of engaging customers. A rise in the use of AR within the APAC region could mean great things for marketing. More accessible technology means AR can be incorporated into marketing strategies and allow brands and publishers to reach new audiences with fresh techniques.

The post Augmented Reality in the APAC Region – A Positive Development for Marketing appeared first on PerformanceIN.

The aim is to optimise mobile traffic and help evolve performance marketing into a channel that contributes to mobile growth goals around app installation, as well as increased app usage and in-app transactions. This will hopefully lead to increased profitability for brands across the globe.

How does Reach work?

Button’s Reach product provides deep linking and app affiliation technology to marketers in the affiliate channel, in addition to transforming affiliate traffic into an app acquisition channel. It identifies where to route users based on the outcomes marketers are seeking – whether their focus is maximising GMS or conversion rates, acquiring new users, or boosting app installs.

As a result, brands earn more revenue per tap, increased sales per user, and higher-LTV users through app acquisition. 

Based on aggregate CJ Affiliate performance and Button data, Reach has proven to deliver the following performance for CJ Affiliate’s brands:

• 35% increase in brand revenue per tap
• 173% more opens of a brand’s app

Brands such as Albertsons Companies and Overstock use Button’s Reach product in conjunction with CJ’s tracking platform and strategic partnerships to unlock the full potential of their mobile affiliate technologies through increased app installs and revenue.

“Reach has been effective in helping marketers boost revenue with each tap that users make on their path to purchase,” said Michael Jaconi, co-founder and CEO of Button. “We are delighted to join hands with CJ Affiliate, the preeminent affiliate marketing network, to help more brands enjoy the full benefits of affiliate as an app acquisition channel and maximise profitability through Reach.”

Mayuresh Kshetramade, CEO of CJ Affiliate, said: “This exciting partnership with Button further compliments CJ’s suite of solutions which are designed to allow both brands and publishers transparency into channel performance and preserve transaction-based analytics across devices and in-app. This is essential for sustained growth and success.”

Albertsons Companies Director of Performance Marketing, Manjari Mehrotra said: “By harnessing the power of the affiliate channel to drive app installs, we look forward to helping more people get the essential food and supplies they need.”

It’s positive to see an increase in technology aiming to ensure the success of performance marketing. PerformanceIN recently reported that the channel could be the future for brick-and-mortar retailers, so it seems it is being continually recognised as a useful and profitable channel for many.

We hope to see lots of news surrounding development in the channel in the coming year.

The post Button and CJ Affiliate Partner to Transform Affiliate Into an App Acquisition Channel appeared first on PerformanceIN.

It is one thing to satisfy your customers, but to ensure your customers are receiving the highest quality experience when interacting with your brand is paramount when it comes to loyalty and retention.

Why is sentiment analysis important?

To ensure customers are happy, sentiment analysis is essential. It enables you to understand what consumers are saying when they talk about your brand and services. It allows you to understand what makes them happy, and in doing this, improve your strategy.

The digital world is booming, and it is now deemed unusual when a brand doesn’t have a heavy online presence. We can only assume that the future will bring with it an increasingly digitised market. This means that the conversations customers have are going to take place in the same way.

Twitter and LinkedIn are great places for customers to share their experiences, and with social listening becoming a technique which is growing in popularity for brands to understand their customers, the two naturally go hand-in-hand. Twitter is, in fact, a common platform for sentiment analysis to take place. Customers flock to tweet about their experiences, and brands can educate themselves and upgrade their services to suit this.

What exactly does sentiment analysis measure?

Sentiment analysis is simply the measure of whether a piece of text – a comment or tweet, for example – is positive or negative. Data analysts can use AI, as well as their knowledge, to identify the tone of a customer’s feedback. This can then be used to influence the techniques which are then implemented in business and marketing strategies.

There are three main categories of sentiment analysis:

1. Knowledge/rule-based techniques: Assessing text according to unambiguous adjectives such as sad, happy, bored, pleased et cetera.

2. Statistical methods: Using machine learning (ML) techniques for deep learning. This enables much more accurate information.

3. Hybrid approaches: Using elements from ML and knowledge representation to detect semantics that have been expressed in a more subtle way.

The different algorithms used in sentiment analysis work to show data analysts exactly what and how their customers are discussing a brand. These techniques are only going to become increasingly important as more and more brands move online.

Using this technique will allow you to truly understand your customers, in turn resulting in a much more positive brand-customer relationship. It should enable you to identify the causes of the problems you may not have been able to solve, meaning you can work on improvement, ultimately boosting your brand reputation.

The post Sentiment Analysis: the Key to Effectively Engaging Customers appeared first on PerformanceIN.

The technology was also helped by e-commerce leaders being willing to bake personalisation and artificial intelligence (AI) into their incentivisation strategies for a competitive edge.

Indeed, Revlifter offers a break from the traditional methods of serving e-commerce offers by using a mix of first and third-party data to target customers on a 1-2-1 level. This allows brands to pick and choose who receives an offer through a bespoke algorithm. The whole purpose is to reduce wastage, improve customer satisfaction and ensure that only the right results are achieved. 

PerformanceIN caught up with Simon Bird, RevLifter’s Co-Founder and CEO, to hear more about the company’s plans for 2021.

RevLifter ended 2020 on a high after raising £3.3 million in Series A funding. What’s changed since then?

Well, it certainly hasn’t been dull. We claimed three International Performance Marketing Awards on the eve of our funding announcement – the same week as the most digital Black Friday on record. Our volumes exceeded all expectations and we carried that momentum into the US holiday season and Christmas in the UK. That was the first 40 days, but consumer spend has barely dropped since, with more retailers having to fine-tune their incentivisation strategies as a result. 

Away from the day-to-day operation, we’ve made significant progress on our goal of building RevLifter’s team for the future. We’ve been staffing up since the tail-end of 2020 and with several major hires scheduled for H1, it’s an exciting time to be a ‘RevLifter’!

One of your goals for 2021 was to expand further into EMEA and APAC while stabilising your position in the UK and US. How are things going? 

It’s strange to think the world is largely static due to COVID-19 but here we are – hitting a sweet spot with our international expansion. 

Pre-2020, our team was racking up thousands of air miles through kick-off meetings and planning sessions. You’d have expected the pandemic to impact things like productivity or resources but it truly is business as usual because we can do everything remotely. 

In terms of individual regions, what we’re seeing is a clear pattern in brands coming to RevLifter with goals in mind, trialing our solutions in the UK and US, seeing the incremental uplift and then exploring ways of rolling us out worldwide. 

We’re hiring new staff to manage the rising demand for hyper-personalisation within several EU countries, and it’s compelling to see the interest in non-traditional partners like ourselves. 

How has Revlifter’s approach to implementation aided the same ambitions?

I think we’re still transitioning from an era where e-commerce technologies required lines and lines of code, which translated to stacks of tickets for the tech department. Then you get the time delays, followed by the vast changes to your website. It was almost like a certain level of advancement came at a cost in the onboarding phase. 

When we started in 2017, our intention was always to build something that was so simple for brands to implement, they could just focus on the good stuff. We like driving instant results, so why make it harder to do? 

RevLifter embodies the plug-and-play ethos. We require no tech assistance and if you’re on an affiliate network, it couldn’t be easier to launch your first campaign and start measuring the incremental effect.

As for your recent successes at the International Performance Marketing Awards and Global Marketing Awards, how have these helped with your international goals?

It’s always useful to bring an award-winning case study to a new brand. That’s been apparent since 2018 when we picked up the Best Performance Marketing Campaign in APAC for Vision Direct AU. Suddenly, you’re getting calls from retailers in the same region but in other sectors, like fashion, telecoms, and grocery, all striving for the common goal of optimising performance. 

Interestingly, we’ve seen a big uptake from the travel sector, which seems to be bubbling under the surface due to the expected boom in a post-COVID world. Hyper-personalised deals have so much potential here as they align with common challenges like cart abandonment, upselling and cross-selling. 

Plus, when considering the sheer competitiveness around products like flights and accommodation, it makes sense for providers to explore ways of launching offers that also protect their margin. Goal-oriented personalisation, where customers are incentivised on the basis of their value to the brand, creates a balanced, sustainable formula for driving sales. 

Do you think markets like the UK and US have been quicker to “get” deals personalisation than others and if so, why? 

Both are mature markets and you’d expect them to be ahead of the curve with any emerging trends. We’ve seen plenty of publisher demographics and strategies making waves in a cluster of markets before gaining momentum in other parts of the world. From our view of the situation, that looks to be the case with deals personalisation too.

Performance marketing also has a network effect that has become more noticeable with the breaking of geographical silos. Global brands, networks, agencies and publishers have reaped the benefits of sharing knowledge, where one team’s success gets passed on to the next market and around the world it goes. RevLifter typically boosts AOV by 10-30% and conversions by 30%. Once we have that result from a mature market, it’s much easier to get switched on somewhere else.

We’re only a few weeks into 2021 but what are the main trends you’re seeing from your data?

Last year, we saw more retailers using e-commerce to capitalise on the land grab for new customers. It’s created more competition for sales but at no cost to actual spend, which continues to rise. Consumers are now savouring the convenience of heading online for products and services they’d traditionally purchase in-store, and so it’s easier to focus on the opportunity at hand.

Looking at 2021 on the whole, I think we’re going to see a few potentially game-changing ideas entering the performance marketing space. RevLifter started as an idea on a napkin. While that initial lightbulb moment is crucial, you need the time and space to consider how you can put plans into action. Last year gave all of us the chance to stop and reflect, and I’m sure ‘founded in 2020’ will become quite the phrase in the tech world.

Visit RevLifter to see how hyper-personalised offers are helping retailers find, retain and convert their way to e-commerce success.

The post Q&A: RevLifter on Plug and Play, Hyper-Personalisation and Cracking the Global Market appeared first on PerformanceIN.

The COVID-19 pandemic has also introduced a whole new threat to physical retailers, with empty store lots now a common sight. Performance marketing could be the key to tackling this.

What is Zellebrate and how can applications like this help?

The creation of the likes of Zellebrate could be the answer to these retailers problems.

Zellebrate allows consumers to view and compare items being retailed by physical stores, from a mobile application. The idea originally came from the founders Chris Russell and Karl Bennett’s aim to ensure brick-and-mortar retailers would not lose their place on the market.

Karl Bennett, CDO and Co-Founder said: “Zellebrate’s goals are simple: be the equivalent of a virtual countrywide superstore of all brick-and-mortar based products, making it freely available to search, find, compare, and acquire. Our solution is designed to help consumers quickly and easily find matching products from retailers that are ideally locally available.”

Performance-Related Retail

The creators of Zellebrate follow what they call: ‘Performance Related Retail.’

CEO of Zellebrate UK, Indrajeet (Indy) Mukherjee, said: “We understand that some local brick-and-mortar retailers have been working in the physical world for so long that it can be hard to enhance their presence. We have built a boutique website creation tool that will create local retailers an e-commerce website completely for free.”

Chris Russell, CEO and Co-Founder of Zellebrate said: “It’s one thing for local retailers to have their products digitised and saleable online but it’s quite another to get consumer traffic to those websites and generate sales.

“That’s where Zellebrate’s performance marketing business model kicks in. Every single retailer has their own story to tell and that personality and the product content that goes with it must get exposure if they’re to compete with the online giants monopolising their space.”

The key to brick-and-mortar retailers success

It is important that no retailer, whether large or small, is marginalised. Zellebrate will assist in driving traffic and sales, and only when sales occur will traders incur a fee (when Zellebrate have marketed for them).

Smartphones have made the blend between physical and online retail possible, and it is a positive sign for brick-and-mortar retailers to have products such as Zellebrate being created in their favour.

Innovative thinking and the redesign of business models are steps that will allow physical retailers to involve themselves in the picture. This is the key to remaining relevant and successful.

The post Is Performance Marketing the Future for Brick-and-Mortar Retailers? appeared first on PerformanceIN.

Why are intent-driven conversions so important?

Offering customers exactly what they want, when they want it, is a much simpler way of driving conversions than trying to increase the traffic to your site.

More and more marketing strategies are using conversion technology, and tools like this are incredibly helpful in optimising the positive effects of the technology.

Smarter Click is harnessing this trend with intent.ly, and is rolling out a new brand name, logo and overall image for its US and APAC operations, as it is set to continue diversifying further into offering additional conversion tools across a host of new brand and publisher partnerships.

Ennis Al-Saiegh, CEO, said: “Intent is at the heart of everything we do. Using intent-based data to drive incremental conversions and customer experiences is the axiom of our operations. Doubling your conversion rate is far more cost-effective and efficient than doubling your traffic levels, and intent.ly has a string of products that can do just that.” 

Some other platforms offering services allowing you to keep track of your consumers habits in a wider context are Funnel, HubSpot and BuzzSumo, to name a few.

These platforms all work towards ensuring their partners are reaching the right people at the right time, and it seems tools such as intent.ly will make it much easier for this to take place.

The post Smarter Click launches new brand ‘intent.ly’ across US and APAC markets. appeared first on PerformanceIN.

This new geographical targeting makes it easier for marketers to pinpoint specific paid search threats and take immediate action. This precision targeting is critical for marketers seeking solutions for global businesses models such as franchises, insurance companies, mortgage companies, and other businesses with high priority geo-specific markets (for example shared ride services). 

This added targeting capability provides important functionality for users focused on addressing three common paid search monitoring needs:

1. Affiliate Compliance 

Enforce geo specific program rules and enable specific affiliates to participate in paid search advertising in some markets, but not other markets.

2. Brand Protection

Prioritize high value cities, regions or other areas to ensure a consistent brand experience and to protect geo-targeted marketing spend.

3. Competitive Intelligence

Gain competitive insights and focus on strategic goals for top geographies, ensuring optimal and localized ad placement.

“Our customers value the ability to further customize their compliance monitoring,” said Maura Newell, product lead for BrandVerity. “The addition of location targeting to the BrandVerity platform will give marketers the option for additional precision in their paid search monitoring and compliance programs.” 

BrandVerity’s paid search and web compliance monitoring solution helps brands detect and manage infringements for performance marketers within the partnership channel. With BrandVerity’s paid search monitoring, marketers can effortlessly detect infringements and manage violations in order to maintain their brand integrity and protect marketing spend. For more information, please visit www.brandverity.com or email sales@brandverity.com.

The post BrandVerity’s Precision Location Targeting Enables Customized Compliance Coverage appeared first on PerformanceIN.