This month’s movers and shakers in the digital industry: O2 and Facetime | Nissan and Spotify | Netglobers | Bunnyfoot | Webgains | bazaarvoice | BeAddictive | Criteo | Oddizzi | Fiat | LiveCinemaEvents | SMG | Motoring.co.uk | ecircle | Cubeworks | Greenlight | Strandloyalty | affilinet | Improve Digital | Expedia | ClickThrough Marketing | adfrap | Liverpool F.C. | Epsilon | Paypoint | Cognitive Match | fredhopper | ebookers | the rubicon project | Zeus | smartclip | Guava | Responsys | Hi-Media and Nugg.ad | Couponstar
O2 appoints Facetime for business social media drive
O2 is putting real-time social media monitoring and insights at the heart of its business, following the successful testing of a platform developed by Face, the co-creation agency. The platform enables O2 to monitor and analyse, in real-time, all social media activity around the brand in the UK, and provide ongoing insights. This supports O2’s successful activity in social media, as one of the top ten most followed UK brands in the social web, including a dedicated real time response team. The solution, based upon Face’s Pulsar platform, has been implemented across business areas, and is now being developed further to provide further functionality, aimed at ever more targeted insights. Face Social media research team uses the platform to monitor key topics 24 hours a day. Teams can access a real-time dashboard providing them with audits on the brand and specific topics, brand and campaign tracking. Face is also providing O2 with bespoke reports on a weekly, monthly and quarterly basis.
www.facegroup.co.uk
Nissan sponsors live gig broadcast on Spotify
Elly Jackson, from platinum-selling electro act, La Roux, will top the bill with a DJ set at the first UK gig to be streamed live on Spotify. The event is part of the Nissan Juke ‘Behind the Hit’ campaign to uncover new music talent. Taking place on Tuesday 5th April 2011 at London’s Koko, Nissan Juke has secured the recent Grammy award winners for Best Dance Album to perform alongside Delphic, The Naked And Famous and Pony Pony Run Run. Elly will play a DJ set including tracks a new recording Helly from Ben Daniels, who was specially selected as the winner of recent Nissan Juke ‘Behind The Hit’ competition. Both amateurs and pro music-makers alike were invited to mix their own tracks online, with Ben Daniels’ prize being the opportunity to record Helly with La Roux’s Ben Langmaid, in advance of the Koko event. Those keen to watch the gig in real-time can either check it out on Spotify or go to www.behindthehit.com.
http://ponyponyrunrun.net/
New App helps travellers avoid cross-cultural blunders
The days of cheap airfares are probably over so when you go away, you want to make the most of the time. For many of us, this means a last-minute Google cram-plan, or a swift visit to traveller community sites like Netglobers or Lonely Planet. But what about the all-important matter of etiquette overseas? Gestures, expressions or actions considered the cultural norm in many countries could offend in others. Did you know in Turkey it is rude to show someone the sole of your shoe? Or in Germany twisting a finger on the side of your head while driving is a powerful insult and an arrest-able offence? Those planning holidays this year can avoid cross-cultural blunders with the Europ Assistance Dos & Don’ts iPhone/iPad App, available free from iTunes.
www.netglobers.com
NHS Direct Appoint Bunnyfoot to Improve Digital Experience
Following a competitive tender and rigorous 6 month pitch process, Bunnyfoot are delighted to announce they have been selected as the preferred supplier of user experience services for NHS Direct. The 3 year contract, will work across NHS Direct’s digital services, led by Bunnyfoot MD Sarah Ronald, who previously worked on the re-design of NHS Direct’s online health and symptom checkers. NHS Direct will identify opportunities when user testing is appropriate, for example when a new service is introduced, and work with Bunnyfoot on the project brief to take it forward. NHS Direct provides remotely delivered health services to people in England and has user experience at the forefront of its strategic digital developments, utilising technological advances to continually improve users’ digitally delivered experiences. User experience is a term to describe the experience people have when they interact with a product or service. Often used in relation to web services, user experience increasingly includes, for example, knowledgeable and helpful customer service or a smooth and painless account opening process with a bank. User experience heavily influences the perception people have of a brand and specialists Bunnyfoot help companies such as NHS Direct understand how their patients and users think, behave and interact. Bunnyfoot’s partnership with NHS Direct will focus on improving access to its health and symptom checkers and Online Patient Decision Aids, which are designed for users with chronic or serious conditions searching for guidance on treatment and tests. NHS Direct users encompass the population of England and range from mums worried about their toddler’s temperature, through to young adults who want to quickly check symptoms and older sufferers of chronic conditions who need more in-depth advice and support.
www.bunnyfoot.com
easyJet Holidays Affiliate Programme Takes Off with Webgains
The easyJet Holidays affiliate programme is launching today with Webgains, the leading international affiliate network. The launch coincides with the launch of easyJet Holidays, expected to revolutionise the holiday market. The easyJet Holidays affiliate programme will enable online affiliates to generate significant revenue on beach holidays and city breaks booked through the easyJet Holidays website. easyJet Holidays is a new holiday offering, bringing together easyJet, the favourite UK airline and the leading arranger of accommodation in the UK Lowcostbeds.com Ltd. Results of the IMRG Hitwise Hot Shops List, February 2011 puts easyJet www.easyjet.com in the top ten most visited websites in the UK. The easyJet Holidays team aims to provide the most affiliate-friendly programme with a wealth of resources available to affiliates including search widgets, direct search API, an affiliate blog, twitter, SEO training and more. This is on top of some generous and unique affiliate incentives planned throughout the year.
www.webgains.com
ASICS integrates UGC across 30 European sites
ASICS, the sports shoes and clothing manufacturer, is working with Bazaarvoice to enable customers and fans to share valuable feedback with each other online and via Facebook. ASICS is using Bazaarvoice to power customer feedback on 30 brand sites across Europe and for Facebook applications, to harness customer-generated content and incorporate it across all aspects of the business, from product design to marketing. ASICS customers will be able to rate their purchases and provide opinion on fit, quality, reliability and performance directly on the Facebook fan page, as well as across the brand’s 30 websites in 15 different languages in the coming months with functionality already live in the UK. The Ratings & Reviews application for Facebook allows ASICS customers to discuss their latest purchases and share content with their peers on the familiar social networking site.
www.bazaarvoice.com
Boden builds online community integrated with social media
Fashion retailer, Boden is launching a new community site to enable its users to interact with each other and engage with the brand. Built and hosted by social loyalty platform, BeAddictive.com visitors to the community hub will be able to chat with like-minded people, enter competitions exclusive to the community, read or write their own blogs on cooking, clothes, gardening or style, share photos and videos and write reviews in ‘Critic’s Corner’ as well as shop. Boden has adopted the BeAddictive platform – which links with Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms – with additional bespoke specifications planned by Boden and developed by BeAddictive. The site rewards visitors with loyalty points for each action they take, which can be converted to ‘money can’t buy’ gifts, such as lunch with Johnnie Boden. In addition Boden can deliver relevant offers, reviews, and surveys to target groups within the site (provided they have opted in). The new community hub will allow the brand to better understand its customers, with research and polls which are also incentivised with loyalty points. Launched in 1991, Boden is one of the most successful and fastest growing online clothing companies in the UK offering distinctive ranges for adults, children and most recently teens with the ‘Johnnie b’ line.
www.BeAddictive.com
Microsoft picks Criteo for ‘Personalised Retargeting’ across Europe
Criteo, a provider of personalised retargeting, and Microsoft Advertising today announced their partnership across Europe, to allow Microsoft Advertising to implement Criteo’s retargeting solution on its European premium display advertising network Microsoft Media Network (MMN). This deal will add value to each of the over 1000 top retailers implementing Criteo’s retargeting solution today, as well as the more than 300 quality partner sites on MMN reaching up to 144 million European users a month [1]. As a result of the successful existing relationship in individual European markets over the last two years, with Criteo being one of Microsoft’s most important customers on the Microsoft Media Network, this partnership will now be rolled out across the region. As part of the agreement Microsoft will deepen Criteo’s technical integration so as to further increase the volume of business that both companies do together. Microsoft Advertising selected Criteo following an extensive industry evaluation based on key technology and industry criteria, including: value proposition to advertisers; quality and growth of clientele; creative capabilities; volume of impressions at competitive CPMs; and emphasis on consumer privacy and publisher data protection.
http://www.criteo.com
http://advertising.microsoft.com/europe
Teaching viral helps pupils learn geography though retro TV show
A former primary schoolteacher Jenny Cooke is behind the launch of Oddizzi www.oddizzi.com an online teaching resource for primary schools with geography at its core. As part of the launch, a new viral campaign has been unveiled which takes an amusing take on the popular 80’s game show Child’s Play hosted by Michael Aspel which challenged members of the public and a celebrity to work out what primary school children were describing. In the Oddizzi viral, geography knowledge is tested among primary students from Holy Trinity School Richmond, London with some amusing responses: “Falafel is some sort of Anteater”, “In Greenland they eat Green grass”, “Dead Sea is black and mouldy” and “a Yurt is an upper class person saying the word ‘yoghurt’”.
http://www.youtube.com/oddizzi#p/a/u/0/Q1b0E–RmCU
www.Oddizzi.com
Fiat 500 teams up with lastminute.com and the Metro for London deals
In conjunction with Fiat and media agency Maxus, Grape have launched a new campaign called Fiat 500 Loves… London to help people fall back in love with their city. Fiat have teamed up with lastminute.com to give you the best places and activities that London has to offer, all for £10 or less. The ‘Fiat 500 Loves’ Facebook application offers a prize draw where prizes include a spa day, concert experience or dinner in a Michelin Star restaurant.
www.facebook.com/Fiat500UK
Domino’s Pizza announces new partnership with eBay Advertising
eBay Advertising today announces a new partnership with Domino’s Pizza, the world’s leading pizza delivery company, which will see targeted advertising on the e-commerce site promoting the fact that pizza can now be ordered online through PayPal. Running until mid- April, adverts across eBay will drive traffic to Domino’s Pizza’s new payment site, meaning customers no longer need to input their personal details every time they visit and ensuring that longed-for pizza delivery is just two clicks away. The campaign will be Domino’s Pizza’s first with the online shopping giant and is designed to capitalise on eBay Advertising’s unrivalled insight into online shoppers’ behaviour. The campaign will minimise wasted ad spend by utilising eBay Advertising’s geo-targeting capabilities, which will enable them to serve adverts only to users registered in a postcode where Domino’s Pizza offer a delivery service, between the peak take-away hours of 5-8pm.
www.dominos.co.uk
Arqiva supports launch of LiveCinemaEvents.com
Arqiva has supported the launch of an independent website promoting live alternative content to cinemas. The new website, LiveCinemaEvents.com, allows rights holders to publish details of their available events and for cinemas to express an interest in screening them. LiveCinemaEvents.com will carry the details of a wide range of sports, arts and entertainment content from all around the world.
www.arqiva.com
Pets at Home launch nationwide customer insight programme with SMG UK
Pets at Home has announced a partnership with SMG, a customer insight agency, to deliver a nationwide customer feedback initiative called ‘Fish 4 Opinion’. The two year agreement will cover all of its stores in the UK. The programme will capture over 8,000 responses per month from genuine consumers, which will help improve the understanding of the customer experience, by capturing continuous feedback in real time. ‘Fish 4 Opinion’ is being launched at Pets at Home’s annual company conference in April, which is attended by all their store managers. The programme will be introduced alongside comprehensive internal store communications to ensure that all Pets at Home employees not only understand the initiative, but also know exactly why it is so important to the company. Starting in April, customers will be invited to complete an online survey accessed through details listed on their till receipt. Completing the survey brings the opportunity for customers to win a monthly prize draw of £200 worth of Pets at Home vouchers.
Motoring.co.uk revamps site
Motoring.co.uk, an automotive website for new car search, has introduced new features and functionality to boost direct response for advertisers and drive traffic and dwell time from new car buyers. Motoring.co.uk’s new website focuses on three core channels – the Buying Channel which shows the latest manufacturer and franchised dealer offers; the Research Channel which helps consumers choose their next new or used car through reviews, news, specifications, comparison tools; and the Valuation Data Channel, which captures the consumer and vehicle data and qualifies their needs, resulting in live leads for dealers and manufacturers. Motoring.co.uk now has an intuitive search facility, allowing visitors to search for new cars by body shape, engine size, MPG, fuel type, size, insurance group and lifestyle eg stylish, spacious, performance, luxury etc. The new website is heavily focused on new cars, but still has plenty of used cars for sale, supported by finance and insurance offers, news and reviews. The site is also offering all users a free valuation service, saving UK motorists over £1.2m annually*. (* Source: Average cost of vehicle valuation is £3.50. Figures are based on estimated 360,000 valuations per year). One of the site’s best features is its new comparison tool which allows potential car buyers to compare and contrast up to four cars side by side, comparing such things as MPG, Specification, Emissions, Size , Speed etc. Users can also save and send their shortlist to Facebook to share their choices and source views and opinions from family and friends.
www.Motoring.co.uk
eCircle secures top talent for UK management team
eCircle, Europe’s largest provider of email marketing services has bolstered its senior management team with three major new appointments to support the company’s continuing growth in the UK. Matt Clarke, former BP User Experience Communications Manager, is to take up the position of Director of Operations and Professional Services. The London office has also appointed Susanne Schmid, as the new Client Services Director. Susanne joins eCircle from Microsoft Advertising where she was responsible for the Atlas Advertiser Product. Both will be reporting to Simon Bowker, Managing Director, eCircle UK. As well as drafting in new talent, eCircle UK is appointing Barney Willis to the position of Director Media UK, where he will take full responsibility for the department, managing a team of 17 people and will be reporting directly to Christopher Kollat, Vice President Media Unit.
www.ecircle.com
Mediarun to enhance online visibility for IML voting tool
Response marketing company Mediarun has won a brief from IML Worldwide to raise awareness through search of IML Click. A new concept, IML Click works with IML Viewpoint Express software to create an intuitive PowerPoint voting system. IML recently provided the technology for the worm audience response system used during the TV leader debates in the May 2010 general election. Mediarun has been appointed to develop a multi-channel search strategy across four territories and four key languages (English, French, German and Dutch) As IML Click is a new concept, there are currently limited search volumes, providing a challenge for Mediarun in addressing an audience via search.
www.mediarunsearch.co.uk
New staff and HQ for Brighton digital and user experience specialists
Cubeworks announces its new brand and website, together with its relocation into city-centre premises and the recruitment of two senior managers. Having increased revenues by 50 per cent over the past year, this rapidly growing digital business is looking at achieving equally ambitious targets for the next 12 months. The Brighton-based agency specialises in helping organisations improve their performance by transforming systems and processes, such as developing efficient Content Management Systems, eCommerce platforms and digital sites focused on the users’ experience. Cubeworks clients include large corporations such as publishers EMAP and Reed Business Information, as well as GEM Motoring Assist, DIAGEO and SANYO. Public sector clients include Kent Police Authority and Land Registry. Expansion at Cubeworks has led to the recruitment of two new senior managers – Ed Chessman joins as the company’s business development director and Ifraz Mughal joins as user experience architect.
www.cubeworks.co.uk
Skiline appoints Greenlight in bid to be the UK’s top Ski Holiday Agent
London-based Skiline, the UK’s premier independent ski only travel agency and chalet specialist, has appointed the search engine optimisation (SEO) services of leading independent marketing specialist and technology firm, Greenlight. Skiline’s sights are set on becoming the UK’s top travel agent in the ski holiday industry. Generating more traffic to its website will form a vital part of its overall strategy towards realising this. Skiline’s booking engine goes live in six weeks and in line with its paid search strategy, natural search will form a vital part of its online traffic driving channel from which to generate bookings.
http://www.greenlightsearch.com
Visible Results UK becomes Strand Loyalty
Strand Marketing Group, the marketing services group owned and run by Johnny Morris, today announces the acquisition of the remaining shares (47.5 per cent) of Visible Results UK Limited, the retail loyalty and CRM specialists. The company will henceforth be known as Strand Loyalty. Visible Results UK was established in 2004 as a joint venture with Visible Results Limited. It is best known for its expertise designing, structuring, deploying and managing CRM and loyalty programmes for retailers. Clients include Game, RoadChef, Body Shop, TopShop and ChemMart.
www.strandmarketing.co.uk
http://www.visibleresults.com
Stuart Colman Promoted to Managing Director, Europe for AudienceScience
AudienceScience a global online advertising technology company delivering digital marketing success, today announced that Stuart Colman has been promoted to the position of Managing Director, Europe expanding his current role to managing offices throughout Europe including London, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Paris, and Milan. In addition, he will be helping expand the business’ reach in Scandinavia, Russia, Poland, Austria, Switzerland and Spain. In his new role, Colman will work closely with country management, overseeing account management, business development and agency outreach as well as providing strategic and managerial leadership across Europe. Colman will be responsible for driving the development and adoption of audience targeting technology amongst publishers, agencies and advertisers throughout Europe.
www.AudienceScience.co.uk
WWF-UK appoints affilinet for affiliate marketing campaign
affilinet, the specialist affiliate marketing company, has been appointed by WWF-UK to manage and run the charity’s UK affiliate marketing program. The campaign will engage affilinet’s network of publishers over the next twelve months to maximise digital fundraising opportunities. The deal will support wider online marketing initiatives to improve traffic to the WWF site and increase subsequent donations. This includes growing visits to specific landing pages supporting the charity’s ‘adopt an animal’ initiatives. The campaign will benefit from affilinet’s extensive and targeted network of affiliates across different media channels, such as email and high quality content publishers. Following a competitive pitch, WWF-UK appointed affilinet as a result of the company’s impressive selection of affiliates and because of the team’s previous experience at autonomously running successful campaigns in the charity sector. In particular, the campaign will use Search Engine Optimisation affiliates, which develop niche content sites such as adoptananimal.co.uk to drive additional traffic to the WWF site.
www.affili.net
Improve Digital expands UK team
Online advertising revenue specialist and sell-side platform, Improve Digital (www.improvedigital.com), has hired Alasdair Cross as VP of UK publisher development and Kevin Fox as strategic partnership manager. The move comes as the company prepares to further increase its foothold in the market following its 400 percent revenue increase in 2010. Alasdair joins Improve Digital from online advertising technology company Adprecision, which he co-founded in 2005 to help media owners maximise the potential of rapidly-evolving search marketing. Clients included the Daily Express, the Evening Standard, the Independent, IPC Media, National Magazines, News International and the Telegraph. Alasdair’s previous roles also include business development manager at Associated Northcliffe Digital and senior sales positions at United Business Media. Kevin will be based at Improve Digital’s headquarters in Amsterdam, where he will be responsible for liaising directly with ad networks to help maximise revenues for publishers. Prior to joining Improve Digital, he worked as a network and traffic manager for ad network and digital sales house, Digitize, in Dublin. In managing the company’s AdSure display network, his specific focus was buying and selling remnant inventory. He has worked with a variety of demand side platforms and ad exchanges, as well as premium publishers including Channel4, Glam Media, IGN and Miniclip.
www.improvedigital.com
Millennium & Copthorne Hotels engage Greenlight to manage integrated search across European portfolio
Millennium & Copthorne Hotels has appointed specialist search marketing and technology firm Greenlight, to manage its PPC (pay-per-click) and SEO (search engine optimization) strategy across its entire European portfolio of hotels. Millennium & Copthorne Hotels is an international hotel group with over 100 hotels in Asia, Australasia, Europe, the Middle East and the United States. The company owns as well as manages most of its hotel properties, making it one of the largest “own and managed” hotels groups in the world. Listed on the London Stock Exchange, Millennium & Copthorne Hotels’ annual revenues exceeded £700 million in 2010, with profits in excess of £128 million. Through an integrated search approach with a single agency – Greenlight, Millennium & Copthorne Hotels is looking to broaden its use of the online channel and in turn, increase brand visibility, drive relevant traffic to its sites and significantly grow the revenue derived through the online channel. The project will be implemented in stages throughout 2011. Part of Greenlight’s PPC strategy for Millennium & Copthorne Hotels will involve expanding the PPC strategy to include other dynamic aspects such as retargeting, social media advertising and performance display. SEO-related aspects will include on page optimization and link building to improve conversation rates.
Expedia Launches New TripCompanion Facebook App
Leading online travel booking site, Expedia.co.uk, today announces a major upgrade of its Expedia TripCompanion service, based on consumer feedback and interaction insights. Expedia’s first European Facebook application, the refreshed service builds on existing features, offering increased customisation and targeting, combined with a greater focus on the ‘during trip’ functionalities. Expedia TripCompanion provides relevant content for travellers throughout each stage of their trip. In the ‘pre-trip‘ travel phase the app provides a holiday countdown with weather updates and currency information. It also suggests potential activities using top-rated activity, restaurant and bar recommendations from Tripadvisor. The new app maintains core content from the original beta version and continues to offer currency conversion, weather information and suggested activities.
www.expedia.co.uk
ClickThrough assists in Red Nose Day’s Adwords campaign
Earlier this year ClickThrough Marketing were approached by Comic Relief who were looking for a suitable PPC agency to manage their paid search activity for Red Nose Day 2011, with the aim of delivering their Google Adwords campaign in order to get people across the country to do something funny for money and raise a huge amount of money for the charity. As well as working with some of the biggest UK brands including Nectar and Peugeot, ClickThrough are experts in all areas of online marketing.
www.clickthrough-marketing.com
3rd Space appoints Adfrap as mobile ad network partner for China
3rd Space has appointed Adfrap – one of the fastest growing mobile advertising networks in Europe – as its global mobile ad network partner, targeting mobile ads through to the Chinese Central Television (CCTV) mobile internet portal and its popular iPhone and Android apps. This follows the announcement that the mobile division of state broadcaster CCTV is working exclusively with 3rd Space to give global brands and digital content owners access to China’s 850 million plus mobile users through the CCTV mobile advertising platform. Adfrap will work with western and Chinese brands along with other mobile ad networks to drive rich media campaigns across CCTV’s full range of mobile inventory, including traditional display banner and pre-, mid- and post- roll video ads. Advertisers will also be able to create and manage their own dedicated digital eco-systems within the CCTV portal – in the same way as sites such as YouTube.
Park Resorts looks to ramp up online sales with Search appointment
Park Resorts, the UK’s leading operator of medium-sized family Caravan Holiday Parks, is looking beyond online advertising and taking the search engine optimisation (SEO) route to help it increase its online visibility and drive more search traffic for caravan sales and holiday sales. To achieve this, it has appointed leading search marketing and technology firm Greenlight. Park Resorts has provided quality leisure experience for 10 years. It boasts 39 coastal holiday parks in the UK. Guests can select from a range of accommodation including Chalets, Apartments, Bungalows, Hotel rooms and Lodges, through to fully furnished and equipped Caravan holiday Homes and Camping. A second part of the Park Resorts business operates around new and used caravans for sale. The ‘static’ Caravan holiday homes are available at all of the holiday park locations. Its ‘owner’s elite’ bespoke service offers facilities exclusive to those families who invest. Greenlight will conduct on-page and off-page SEO using various strategies and will develop a diverse link profile to increase the Park Resorts brand, improve the site’s accessibility and heighten its online visibility.
http://www.greenlightsearch.com
Liverpool FC launches ‘Shootout’ app for iPhone and iPads
Liverpool Football Club has launched The Official Liverpool Shootout Game; the first official football club game developed for iPad. The Official Liverpool Shootout game gives fans the chance to test their skills against Liverpool’s number one Pepe Reina, using the latest in 3D physics and advanced artificial intelligence to deliver the most authentic gaming experience possible.Genuine supporter chants and sound effects, plus detailed visual content from within the clubs historic Anfield stadium, have been used by Bright AI to create an application which is true to the heritage of Liverpool Football Club. The game features three modes: Classic – where players have three lives to score as many goals as possible, Time Attack – where the player is against the clock and Target Mode – where targets must be struck as the clock ticks down. Apple’s Game Center functionality enables players to connect with friends, compare scores and unlock up to 20 achievements in the game, whilst the application records player progress including the number of goals scored, goals saved, shots on target, average score, highest score and games played from each mode.
http://bit.ly/e6f8zN
Atrapalo enlists support of Epsilon
Atrapalo, Spain’s premier lifestyle and travel website, has awarded multichannel marketing specialist Epsilon International a multiyear international email marketing agreement after a competitive pitch process. Epsilon will provide a range of services, including the development of bespoke email-led integrated solutions, using a number of insight, delivery, measurement and analytical tools. Epsilon’s global footprint and 24 by 7 support are absolutely critical to Atrapalo who send approximately 15-20 million emails every month.
John Kirwan, Business development Manager, Epsilon International said: “Spain is a key region for Epsilon and we’re delighted to have Atrapalo as one of our major clients here. Our strategic and analytic consulting group has an international focus, so we’re in a great position to maximise the company’s email-led integrated digital marketing efforts.”
www.epsilon.com/international
WHSmith books more time with PayPoint.net
PayPoint.net today announces that WHSmith, one of the UK’s leading retailers, has extended its contract to provide online payment services to the retailer’s online store, www.whsmith.co.uk. The three-year renewal will see PayPoint.net continuing to process all online transactions WHSmith.co.uk handles for its customers every year. PayPoint.net was first appointed to process its payments shortly before Christmas 2007 when WHSmith.co.uk re-launched. PayPoint.net’s secure payment solution is specifically tailored to meet WHSmith’s business requirements and seamlessly integrates with its in-house systems. As a result WHSmith can incorporate PayPoint.net’s real-time reporting and reconciliation functionality into its existing technology, making its systems easier to manage while giving WHSmith a detailed view of its business performance.
www.PayPoint.net
Cognitive Match signs up key players ahead of US push
Cognitive Match, a provider of ads and onsite predictive targeting technology, today announced the addition of two senior online advertising veterans to its growing team. DeWayne Martin has been appointed Senior Vice President, Advertising Solutions and Jake Ajwani becomes Vice President, Client Services for North America. The appointments are yet more proof of Cognitive Match’s ambitious growth plans for 2011. Martin will now be responsible for the accelerated product and market development of Cognitive Match’s advertising and onsite content targeting technology. He is joined by Jake Ajwani, formerly at Adobe, who will oversee the client services organization in North America.
www.CognitiveMatch.com
ASOS picks Fredhopper for behavioural targetting
ASOS.com has added personalised recommendation technology to its website to enrich the shopping experience of customers and increase sales. The pure-play fashion e-tailer, which receives 11 million monthly visitors and recently expanded into the US, Germany and France, appointed e-commerce technology company Fredhopper to implement its behavioural targeting software. Customers benefit from personalised recommendations based on previous buying history and similar purchases of others, allowing ASOS.com to increase cross and up-sells.
www.fredhopper.com
ebookers to offer bobile travel bookings
Online agent, ebookers.com, is enabling its customers to book package deals through its mobile website. The new functionality enables customers to book a variety of travel options including flight and hotel, flight and car hire or hotel and car hire whilst on the move. In January this year, ebookers.com became the first online travel agent in Europe to launch a fully bookable mobile service across Europe available on all smart phones. Since then, 70% of all hotel bookings made through the site has been for same day check-in[1], highlighting the demand for such a speedy and flexible booking channel for customers on the go. The mobile website now also includes package booking functionality, highlighting ebookers.com’s commitment to providing a full range of booking options. Customers have been extremely receptive to the convenience, functionality and diversity of travel products offered on the new mobile website, with repeat visit rates exceeding that of the desktop site. The most popular mobile operating system used by customers visiting the site is Apple’s iOS (80%).
http://m.ebookers.com.
the Rubicon Project Grows appoints digital advertising veteran
the Rubicon Project, the advertising technology company, is expanding its operations in Europe with the appointment of Julien Gardès from 24/7 Real Media. Based in the company’s Paris office, Julien will work with premium online publishers in French-speaking markets to leverage REVV, the world’s leading yield optimisation platform, in order to safely, effectively and efficiently monetise their digital advertising inventory. This will include advising them on the use of new monetisation technologies including Protected Real-Time bidding (RTB) alongside existing sources of demand for their inventory, ensuring each ad impression is sold through the best channel for the highest price possible, whilst protecting their brand. Julien brings many years of online media experience to the Rubicon Project’s team in France. He joins from WPP-owned 24/7 Real Media where he spent two years working with publishers and ad sales houses. He managed the French ad serving business unit and served as Co-President of TASC, The Ad Serving Club, in France. Prior to that Julien worked at ValueClick Media as Head of Operations and Publishers where he defined the company’s strategy for online display advertising formats including CPM, CPC, retargeting and behavioural targeting. He spent five years before that at online performance advertising network, MIVA, joining as Head of Business Development and working his way up to Joint Managing Director with clients including Voyages SNCF, Le Monde, Libération, Caradisiac, Doctissimo, Eurosport.
www.RubiconProject.com
Zeus delivers millions of online transactions for BT customers
Zeus Technology, a software-based application traffic management (Application Delivery Controller) company, is helping BT, one of the world’s leading providers of communications solutions and services, deliver seamless online services across its premier websites serving more than 15 million registered users, processing in excess of 100 million hits per day, presenting over 10 million dynamic pages per day, handling in excess of 100,000 business transactions and responding to over 1 million searches per day via its BT Yahoo Portal. Zeus now plays a key part in BT’s online self-service strategy – acting as a traffic management layer, routing and managing customer’s access to rich self-services, such as its personalised customer account pages to view call and bandwidth usage, but also personalising their end services through its automated online sales channel. The Zeus software solution enables BT to deliver a consistent user experience between geographically separated datacentres. It is also pivotal to managing peak demands in traffic during marketing campaigns; flexibly routing customers based on availability of services. Zeus Traffic Manager is part of BT’s portfolio and has become the standard choice of application traffic management across BT’s market facing websites – BT.com being one of the largest.
www.zeus.com
smartclip appoints Yahoo’s Shirlene Chandrapal as Vice President Connected TV
smartclip, a digital video ad network, has appointed Yahoo’s Shirlene Chandrapal as VP Connected TV with immediate effect. Shirlene Chandrapal joins smartclip from Yahoo! Europe where she was Director of Yahoo! Connected TV, a platform that delivers Internet content to TV sets. In her role Shirlene covered all major European markets and was responsible for strategy implementation, partnership development across Europe and product marketing. In her new role at smartclip, Shirlene Chandrapal will be responsible for driving and implementing smartclip’s strategy as a unified pan-European solution within the emerging, high-potential market of Connected TV. The proliferation of the smartclip proprietary technology UTAI (Universal Television Adserver Interface), the first advertising technology to standardise and simplify video advertising on hybrid TVs, constitutes a major pillar of this strategy. UTAI is the only technology to enable media agencies and brand advertisers to work with just one format across the Internet and Connected TVs. Shirlene is based in smartclip’s UK office in central London.
www.smartclip.com
talkSPORT gets 600% traffic boost after Guava SEO and social drive
Guava, the integrated digital marketing agency, has helped talkSPORT, UK’s largest commercial sports radio station, increase traffic to its new website by over 600 percent in just six months. In collaboration with talkSPORT’s internal team, Guava also helped increase the broadcaster’s social media channels by thousands of new fans and followers. Last summer, talkSPORT underwent a major overhaul of its website, online identity and content strategy, in an effort to increase listener engagement and create new opportunities for third-party advertising. During the campaign the results generated by Guava far exceeded initial targets laid down by talkSPORT. The results included traffic for the whole campaign increased by over 600%, on average by 10% month on month. Using SEO tools developed internally, Guava was able to precisely indentify any issues around the broadcaster’s current keyword activity, which combined with consultancy on the sites structural architecture ensured maximum search engine visibility and strong results across the board. Monthly linking reports highlighted offsite link building opportunities and recommendations, whilst indentifying the areas of the talkSPORT site which were performing best and therefore more valuable to potential advertisers.
http://www.guava.co.uk/
Responsys enhances existing integration with Adobe Online Marketing Suite
Responsys, a provider of on-demand email and cross-channel marketing solutions, today announced at Adobe Omniture Summit 2011, where Responsys is a platinum sponsor, enhancements to its existing integration with the Adobe Online Marketing Suite, powered by Omniture, aimed at accelerating time-to-market and reducing complexity of cross-channel marketing campaigns. The update to the Responsys integration, which leverages Adobe Genesis, Adobe’s technology for automating integrations between partner technologies and the Adobe Online Marketing Suite, gives marketers a new level of power and ease of use by automatically summarising web analytics data that is captured by Adobe SiteCatalyst, powered by Omniture, into pre-defined audience segments within the Responsys Interact user interface. Without any manual work or technical resources required, Responsys Interact users can instantly target campaigns based on who has recently browsed, purchased, or abandoned a shopping cart on their website. Responsys has integrated these pre-built audience segments into Responsys Interact’s Filter Designer so that users can now easily build cross-channel targeting rules that combine behavioural attributes from the website with other channels; for example, people who have neither purchased on the website recently, nor engaged with campaigns on other channels. This allows marketers to quickly create and launch marketing campaigns aimed at reaching these crucial audiences.
http://www.responsys.com/suite/index.php
Hi-media partners to nugg.ad
Hi-media Deutschland AG has partnered with Europe’s leading provider of targeted advertising solutions, nugg.ad. Using nugg.ad’s predictive behavioural targeting solution, the leading independent online premium content publisher will now be able to offer its customers the most efficient and intelligent target group management solutions on the market. As the entire Hi-media portfolio becomes available for bookings, customers will be able to order and directly address target groups defined in-line with socio-demographic criteria and product interests. All nugg.ad campaigns include a wide range of diverse optimising tools designed to improve everything from branding to performance. With over 775 million page impressions per month, Hi-media also offers enormous market reach – a great basis for any campaign. This new partnership with Hi-media will allow advertisers and media agents access to both pre-defined “best performer” target group categories and individual target group segments which are tailored to their campaigns. By accurately addressing the right kind of users, wasted advertising is reduced, increasing the campaign’s efficiency.
www.nugg.ad.com
www.Hi-media.com
Co-op picks CouponStar for online shop discounts
The Co-operative Food, the fifth largest food retailer in the UK, has partnered with beforeIshop, the digital pre-shopping network from Couponstar, to launch a ‘Save More’ website, which will allow its shoppers to save money across Co-operative Food stores nationwide. The launch of the ‘Save More’ site will feature the supermarket section of beforeIshop™ meaning manufacturer-led coupons will be displayed for consumers to select, print and redeem when shopping in Co-operative Food stores. For the initial launch, customers will also be able to grab an exclusive “£5 off £30” spend coupon upon registration. The Co-operative Food is a significant addition to the beforeIshop™ network which reaches consumers through both its own destination website as well as a network of publisher branded microsites including ITV Daybreak, UKTV Good Food, Now Magazine and Delia Online. beforeIshop™ is the only UK grocery coupon network which targets mums and provides a one-stop shop to help effectively plan a supermarket or high street shop.
www.couponstar.com
www.goodwithfood.co.uk/savemore