artificial intelligence 15 Sep 2025
For years, apartment hunting has been plagued by hidden fees that sneak up on renters like a bad Wi-Fi connection during a Zoom call. Now, MavenAI and Engrain are joining forces to eliminate the guesswork. The two companies announced a partnership designed to bring real-time, transparent fee data directly into Google Business Profiles (GBP) for multifamily properties—something the rental market has long needed.
MavenAI, which already automates multifamily marketing for more than 2 million units, will tap into Engrain’s SightMap REST API to syndicate fee information alongside pricing, floor plans, and availability. The result: prospective renters won’t just see a glossy picture of the pool—they’ll know upfront whether they’re also paying a $250 “pet amenities fee” or a one-time “admin charge.”
This isn’t just a convenience upgrade—it’s about compliance. Multifamily operators are under mounting pressure to disclose all costs upfront, a shift modeled after industries like travel and retail where hidden charges sparked consumer backlash (think airline baggage fees). Several U.S. states and municipalities have already passed regulations requiring all-in pricing, and more are lining up.
For operators, the risk of staying vague isn’t just legal trouble—it’s reputation. “Managing a Google Business profile should be automatic,” said Alec Slocum, CEO of MavenAI. “With Engrain’s fee transparency built in, operators can finally publish all-in pricing without effort. The impact is obvious: better applicants, fewer distractions, and real alignment with what residents expect.”
Engrain CEO Brent Steiner adds: “The fees associated with renting an apartment can be numerous and confusing. We’re excited to partner with a cutting-edge, AI-driven company like MavenAI to support the shift to fee transparency.”
With the new integration, property listings on Google Business Profiles can now show:
Structured Fee Transparency: Every recurring or one-time fee listed clearly alongside the rental price.
Automatic PMS Sync: Real-time updates for unit availability, pricing, and concessions, eliminating stale or misleading information.
AI-Powered Google Posts: MavenAI dynamically generates daily Google posts based on amenities, availability, and promotions—making property listings more engaging and discoverable.
For SightMap customers, enabling fee syndication to MavenAI comes at no additional cost. Engrain clients can simply request access from their representative.
The partnership represents more than just another API handshake—it’s part of a broader trend pushing multifamily housing toward the same standards consumers already expect from hotels, airlines, and e-commerce. Renters increasingly want clarity on what they’re paying for, whether it’s an application fee, a monthly trash pickup charge, or premium parking.
By making this information visible on one of the web’s most critical discovery tools—Google Search—MavenAI and Engrain are setting a precedent that rivals may soon have to match. And with more than 2 million units already under MavenAI’s umbrella, the scale of this rollout could nudge fee transparency from “nice-to-have” to “industry standard.”
For renters tired of scrolling through online listings only to be blindsided later, this move could mark a turning point. For operators, it’s an early chance to stay ahead of regulations—and maybe even turn honesty into a competitive advantage.
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digital marketing 15 Sep 2025
If you’ve ever wrestled with three different apps just to get one decent Instagram post out the door, ClipGen thinks it has the cure. The company today announced the launch of its all-in-one AI Creative Suite, a platform designed to let creators, brands, and businesses generate professional video, image, and audio content in seconds—no technical expertise required.
At its core, ClipGen is a creative factory powered by more than ten AI tools under one roof. Instead of bouncing between Photoshop, Premiere, and a translation plugin, users can start with a simple idea—say, “make a video about my new sneaker drop”—and get a polished, share-ready result.
The platform targets a wide audience: social media influencers, YouTubers, educators, and marketers, but also SMBs who don’t want to pay a production team just to stay visible online.
ClipGen packs in an impressive list of creative functions, including:
AI Text-to-Video: Type a script, get a video with visuals, transitions, and voiceovers.
Image-to-Video: Animate static images for presentations or social posts.
Talking Photo: Make any picture “speak” with synced lip movement.
AI Image Generation & Enhancement: Create or upscale images up to 8x without losing quality.
Cartoon Generator: Turn concepts into stylized cartoon characters.
AI Video Translator: Translate clips into multiple languages while preserving tone and emotion.
AI Voice Changer & TTS: Over 100 natural voices in 40+ languages.
Throw in auto-formatting for TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram, subtitles in 100+ languages, and a recommendation system that scores your content’s engagement potential, and ClipGen starts to feel less like a tool and more like an assistant.
Unlike many creative suites that feel bolted together, ClipGen uses proprietary multimodal AI models that process text, image, and audio simultaneously. That means fewer jarring mismatches between narration, visuals, and soundtrack.
Its distributed, serverless inference engine spits out results in seconds, and everything comes wrapped with GDPR compliance, end-to-end encryption, and audit controls for corporate clients. In other words: it’s built for TikTok teens and Fortune 500s.
AI-driven creative tools aren’t new—Adobe, Canva, and startups like Runway are all racing to put generative models into creators’ hands. What ClipGen hopes will set it apart is the combination of breadth (10+ tools in one suite), ease of use (no installation or editing experience needed), and speed.
It already has traction: over 100,000 active users and a 97% satisfaction rate, with creators praising its ability to churn out brand videos “in minutes” while keeping transitions and captions context-aware.
ClipGen’s roadmap includes real-time collaborative editing, branded team workspaces, and more nuanced style transfer models. In other words, it’s gearing up to compete not only with indie AI tools but also with established creative platforms.
For creators, the implications are big. If ClipGen’s “AI creative companion” vision sticks, it could shift expectations around content workflows—why juggle four apps when one will do? For competitors, the question is whether breadth and speed can outweigh their depth and polish.
You can test the platform yourself at www.clipgen.net. Just don’t be surprised if your next viral video takes less time to make than brewing your morning coffee.
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sales 15 Sep 2025
Inbound sales has always had one golden rule: the first vendor to respond usually wins. Yet, in 2025, most businesses still lose revenue to slow responses, bottlenecked reps, and clunky workflows. Enter Spara, a new enterprise platform betting that AI can solve what sales teams have failed to crack—instant speed-to-lead.
Launched today with $15 million in seed funding, Spara provides voice, email, and chat AI agents designed to engage, qualify, and convert leads within seconds. The round was led by Radical Ventures and Inspired Capital, with backing from XYZ Ventures, FJ Labs, Remarkable Ventures, and angels from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Databricks, and G2. The funding will fuel product development, team growth, and deeper multimodal AI integrations.
Buyers of high-consideration products—whether B2B software or luxury consumer goods—rarely wait around. Studies show conversion rates jump 10x when vendors respond within a minute, but crash after five. Traditional inbound systems, reliant on human scheduling and generic chatbots, simply can’t keep pace.
That’s the gap Spara wants to close. “Outbound is oversaturated to the point of irrelevance, while inbound systems haven’t evolved to meet modern buyer expectations,” said David Walker, co-founder and CEO of Spara. “Companies spend millions driving traffic to their websites, but most leads leave without ever getting their questions answered. Spara closes that gap by capturing revenue the moment it shows up.”
Unlike static chatbots or old-school telephony, Spara builds a custom AI model for each company’s sales funnel. That means responses aren’t just generic—they’re trained on the customer’s sales motion, brand voice, and qualification criteria. The platform can:
Engage leads instantly across chat, voice, or email.
Qualify prospects automatically based on company-specific rules.
Book meetings in real time, syncing directly into sales calendars.
Adapt tone and timing to fit buyer context, not just canned scripts.
Under the hood, Spara runs on enterprise-grade AI models fine-tuned for safety, precision, and scale.
Early adopters include Rho, MarketMan, Jericho Security, and TinyMCE. At Rho, Spara booked over 90 meetings in 30 days, converting 50% of qualified traffic with an average chat-to-meeting time under three minutes.
“With Spara, we’re engaging buyers the moment they show interest—often within seconds,” said Tommy McNulty, CRO at Rho. “That kind of speed has dramatically improved conversion rates and freed up our reps to focus on closing.”
The inbound sales stack hasn’t evolved much in a decade. While outbound prospecting has been flooded with automation tools, inbound engagement remains manual and inconsistent. Spara is betting that its “buyer-first immediacy” model will become the new standard.
Investors seem to agree. “The future of sales isn’t more automation for sellers—it’s more immediacy and clarity for buyers,” said Molly Welch, Partner at Radical Ventures.
If Spara delivers on its promise, it won’t just modernize inbound—it could redefine the first five minutes of every sales cycle, the window where deals are won or lost.
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marketing 15 Sep 2025
IFA 2025 wasn’t just a showcase of shiny gadgets—it was a stage for how deeply robotics, AI, and smart systems are weaving into daily life. Among the futurism, one name with roots stretching back nearly a century stole the spotlight: Morphy Richards.
The 89-year-old British appliance maker proved it’s far from old-fashioned, unveiling a new lineup that blends classic craftsmanship with forward-looking design and intelligent functionality. The theme: everyday living, reimagined through smart, sustainable comfort.
Morphy Richards’ booth delivered more than nostalgia; it delivered headlines. The Fusion Kettle and Toaster Set bagged the coveted Best of IFA award from Gadget Flow, signaling that the brand’s modern aesthetic isn’t just marketing spin.
But the real crowd magnet was the Chill Zone, where the InfuseChill Flavoured Ice Maker wowed visitors with customizable flavored cubes—think lime-infused cubes for your water or strawberry for your mocktail. Its sibling, the MixChill 3-in-1 Ice Maker, turned heads for its triple talent: rapid ice production, crushing, and even juicing.
Coffee loyalists weren’t ignored. The Fully Automatic Coffee Machine drew strong retailer interest with its pro-level brewing packaged for home use. And on the climate side, the S1 Pro and Ultra air treatment units impressed with distinctive design, smart sensors, and eco-friendly efficiency—timely products as Europe continues to face extreme heatwaves.
Morphy Richards didn’t miss the opportunity to tie its products to broader market trends. In a Bloomberg segment on Europe’s heatwave, the company positioned its climate-control appliances as not just nice-to-have luxuries, but long-term necessities—reinforcing predictions of growth in the European air conditioning and air treatment market.
That framing matters. In a space crowded with startups promising futuristic “air wellness,” Morphy Richards brings two advantages: brand trust built over decades and a sustainability-first pitch tuned to European regulation and consumer sentiment.
IFA wasn’t just about wowing consumers—it was about deal-making. Key accounts showed strong interest in the new product lines, while prospective partners circled, drawn by the brand’s global strength. The event gave Morphy Richards a platform to reinforce confidence in its growth strategy and lay groundwork for new distribution channels.
The media impact was broad, too. Coverage spanned outlets like TrendHunter, The Globe and Mail, and La Vanguardia, while influencers from Europe and Asia amplified the brand’s reach. Notably, creators like Blin Othman and Jan Březina highlighted the mix of design and practicality, underscoring how the brand resonates beyond trade shows.
Morphy Richards may be pushing 90, but its latest IFA showing proves it’s not just keeping up—it’s positioning itself as a global innovator in smart living. By aligning design heritage with modern sustainability and intelligent features, the company is making a play not just for nostalgia, but for relevance in a market that increasingly expects its appliances to be as connected and adaptive as its phones.
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marketing 15 Sep 2025
Adverity, the marketing data platform best known for helping brands unify and manage data pipelines, has unveiled Adverity Intelligence, its first dedicated AI-powered analytics layer. The move expands the company’s role from data management into actionable intelligence—promising marketers faster, more collaborative insights at scale.
The new suite leans on AI and model context protocols (MCP) to close a persistent industry gap: marketing teams drowning in static dashboards but lacking real-time guidance. Adverity Intelligence introduces three core capabilities:
Data Conversations – conversational and agentic AI that lets teams query data dynamically and surface insights in seconds.
Notebooks – a collaborative workspace that turns insights into structured narratives teams can refine and share.
Intelligent Agents – automated assistants that schedule insights or trigger workflows. The first, an MMM Agent for Google Meridian, automates the complex process of preparing data for marketing mix modeling.
“Adverity Intelligence isn’t just about AI—we’re scaling how different tools, agents, and teams work together to accelerate impact,” said Lee McCance, CPO at Adverity.
CEO Alexander Igelsböck framed the launch as an answer to long-standing CMO headaches: slow reporting cycles, reliance on technical specialists, and missed opportunities from delayed decisions. “This is about moving beyond static reporting to dynamic, collaborative intelligence,” he said.
The release underscores a broader industry shift: embedding AI directly into marketing workflows to make insights not only faster, but integral to daily decision-making.
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advertising 15 Sep 2025
Oshkosh-based 4imprint has once again proven that consistency pays off—not just in promotional products but in workplace culture. The retailer landed on the 2025 Fortune Best Workplaces in Advertising and Marketing list, marking its 18th consecutive year of recognition. That’s nearly two decades of staying power in an industry where talent churn is more common than client loyalty.
The annual list, compiled by Great Place To Work and Fortune, is built on a rigorous analysis of employee survey data. This year, responses from more than 8,500 employees across certified organizations were evaluated, with 4imprint earning especially high marks—90% of its team members said it’s a great place to work.
Unlike flashy perks or short-lived employer branding campaigns, 4imprint’s formula for recognition seems grounded in everyday values. CEO Kevin Lyons-Tarr credited the company’s people for shaping the culture: “Their positivity, curiosity, and collaboration are just some of the reasons we have so much to celebrate.”
For context, Great Place To Work taps into more than 1.3 million survey responses annually, making this one of the largest ongoing workforce studies in the U.S. To even be considered, companies must already be Great Place To Work-certified, setting a high bar for entry.
Recognition on Fortune’s list doesn’t just burnish a company’s employer brand—it also signals operational stability in a competitive sector. In advertising and marketing, where the fight for skilled talent is fierce, 4imprint’s 18-year streak is an outlier. Most organizations can’t sustain cultural momentum through market swings, let alone across nearly two decades of technological disruption.
Michael C. Bush, CEO of Great Place To Work, summed it up: “In every industry, our research shows that investing in people drives productivity and higher revenues.” For 4imprint, that investment is clearly compounding.
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advertising 15 Sep 2025
Marketing teams love a good brainstorm, but keeping everyone on the same page—especially with AI in the mix—can feel like herding cats. Oshkosh-based agency Good At Marketing wants to change that. The certified Google Partner has struck a beta partnership with SharedChat.ai, the first platform designed for multi-user AI collaboration in shared conversation threads.
The deal makes Good At Marketing the first marketing agency to bring SharedChat’s collaborative AI into its workflows, spanning client service delivery, strategy development, and internal team sessions.
While most AI tools are built for one user, SharedChat.ai flips the script. The platform allows multiple users to participate in the same conversation thread while toggling AI assistance on or off as needed. Teams can choose:
Collaboration mode: multiple AI models work together.
Competition mode: AI engines battle it out to deliver the best solutions.
Human-only mode: sensitive discussions stay AI-free but retain full context.
It also includes a prompt builder designed for team-based marketing tasks, helping groups refine their AI queries collaboratively instead of working in silos.
“This revolutionary approach changes everything about how we work,” said Roni Strompf, Chief Content Officer at Good At Marketing. “When our entire team can collaborate with Claude, GPT, and other AI models in unified threads, then toggle between modes as needed, we’re fundamentally transforming how marketing teams operate.”
For Good At Marketing, the partnership builds on its existing AI Form Reply service, which auto-responds to website inquiries, qualifies leads, and books meetings. The addition of SharedChat pushes the agency deeper into end-to-end AI-powered marketing, from first contact through collaborative campaign planning.
Donnie Strompf, founder of SharedChat.ai, called Good At Marketing “the perfect beta partner,” noting the agency’s expertise in digital marketing and early adoption of AI for client engagement.
The beta tests are surfacing clear use cases for marketers:
Shared Strategy Sessions: multiple staff brainstorming in one thread, switching AI input on/off as needed.
Client Workshop Integration: letting clients join shared chats while tightly controlling AI participation.
Creative Development: pitting AI models against each other to generate campaign concepts.
Context Preservation: keeping conversation history intact even when AI is temporarily disabled.
It’s a sharp contrast with most AI tools, which require starting fresh whenever context shifts.
As AI collaboration matures, SharedChat’s toggle-based approach could reshape how agencies and enterprises alike manage brainstorming, workshops, and client-facing interactions. For Good At Marketing, it’s a chance to get ahead of rivals experimenting with AI-enhanced workflows.
“This isn’t just early access to innovative tech,” said Roni Strompf. “It’s the future of how marketing teams collaborate.”
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technology 15 Sep 2025
Slow Wi-Fi is the fastest way to ruin a hotel stay, derail a business meeting, or frustrate fans at a stadium. Ookla, the Ziff Davis subsidiary behind the ubiquitous Speedtest app, wants to end that gamble with the launch of Speedtest Certified™, a new program that verifies a property’s network performance against rigorous standards.
For years, consumers have turned to Speedtest to check their own connections. Now Ookla is extending that trust to physical spaces—think hotels, airports, office buildings, and sports arenas—where reliable connectivity is often more important than the minibar.
Speedtest Certified isn’t just a marketing badge. Properties must undergo a comprehensive, data-driven assessment of their enterprise network deployments. The process evaluates:
Wi-Fi radio frequency (RF) quality
Network configuration and security
Performance metrics across multiple devices
ISP backhaul quality
Those that meet the standards earn a certification backed by one of the most recognizable names in connectivity testing. Certified properties also gain access to a digital platform for benchmarking, insights, and recommendations to keep their networks competitive.
“Today, Ookla is introducing a solution,” said Stephen Bye, CEO of Ookla. “For years, you’ve trusted Speedtest for your own connectivity. Now, with Speedtest Certified, we’re extending that trust to the places you visit.”
Connectivity is now a core amenity for tenants, guests, and employees. Poor internet isn’t just an inconvenience—it can sink customer satisfaction scores and revenue. By offering a trusted verification system, Ookla is effectively creating a “Good Housekeeping Seal” for Wi-Fi and broadband.
That could prove especially valuable for property owners competing in crowded sectors like hospitality and commercial real estate, where customer expectations around seamless digital experiences are higher than ever.
Hamdy Farid, SVP of Product at Ookla, framed it this way: “Speedtest Certified is the gold standard in network verification. It provides objective metrics to validate investments and stand out in a crowded market. For the rest of us, it simply eliminates the guesswork.”
The launch comes as connectivity becomes a make-or-break factor in real estate and events. Marriott and Hilton, for example, already advertise upgraded Wi-Fi as a differentiator. Tech-forward venues like Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas are investing heavily in network infrastructure to support streaming-hungry fans. Ookla’s program could push the industry toward greater transparency and accountability in connectivity standards.
For property owners, the certification offers both a competitive edge and a defensive play: in a world where bad reviews often start with “the Wi-Fi was terrible,” Speedtest Certified could be the digital badge that saves them from public shaming.
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