Merkle, dentsu's leading technology-enabled, data-driven customer experience management (CXM) company, announced the launch of Intelligent Messaging, its end-to-end messaging solution, to create unified brand experiences across touchpoints and channels by blending AI assistance and human interaction. With Intelligent Messaging, Merkle can create turnkey chat experiences, including across social and messaging platforms, delivering always-on conversational interactions throughout the entire customer journey.

"Brands are seeking ways to make experiences more personal, make shopping more seamless, and shorten the path to purchase," said James Riess, SVP, General Manager, loyalty and messaging experience at Merkle. "Our new global solution, Intelligent Messaging, can be seamlessly integrated into existing plans, enabling brands to forge deeper connections with customers, enhance customer satisfaction, and generate lifetime value."

The Intelligent Messaging solution, part of Merkle's world-leading CRM & Messaging offering and incubated by the dentsu Integrated Solutions group, modularly connects across six key service areas:

• Intelligent Messaging Blueprint: Craft a tailored messaging strategy that shapes the customer experience for future-state marketing.
• Conversational Design & Experiences: Create messaging that matters with intuitive, human-like persona development, conversation flows, branching narrative and behavior-based experiences.
• AI + Human-Powered Assistance: Amplify assistance, improve performance and support with AI-powered chatbots, synthetic humans, and our human-powered team 24/7.
• Click to Message Ads and Marketing Messages: Enable customers to click directly from an ad to a 1:1 message via Messenger, Instagram, or WhatsApp for an always-on 1:1 connection and lead generation.
• Technology Integration: Seamlessly integrate with industry-leading ecommerce and CRM platforms including Salesforce, Adobe, Braze, and more.
• First-To-Market Advantage: Through partnership with Meta, gain early access to alpha and beta products along with technology updates and tailored solutions to drive innovation and growth.

"Intelligent Messaging seamlessly integrates media and CRM, providing a holistic approach to customer interaction. By leveraging advanced technology, businesses can meet consumers in their preferred communication channels and deliver connected and personalized experiences, ultimately leading to improved customer satisfaction and loyalty," said Val Vacante, VP Solutions Innovation, dentsu. "We were excited to see the solution deliver increased engagement, conversion, and zero-party data collection with our clients William Grant & Sons and WWF in collaboration with dentsu X, Carat, and iProspect."

Dentsu and Meta recently joined forces to form a global Meta Messaging Alliance to provide dentsu, Merkle, and Meta clients with access to alpha and beta products across Meta Business Messaging platforms. Dentsu is also the first global agency network solution provider for WhatsApp Business. The partnership with WhatsApp allows dentsu and Merkle clients to take advantage of the huge engagement and conversion potential of this channel by delivering seamless customer journeys across media, customer engagement, and service.

PearlMountain Limited's flagship video creation platform, FlexClip, is pleased to reveal the release of the its latest version, featuring the highly anticipated Chroma Key, Reverse Video, and Freeze Frame functionalities. These additions are specifically designed to elevate the creative video editing experience, providing users with enhanced tools for crafting compelling and dynamic content. 

In this latest update, FlexClip introduces the Chroma Key feature, enabling users to seamlessly edit out the backgrounds of green screens - or any other color in videos or photos and replace them with different images or video clips entirely. This enhancement simplifies video compositing and post-production editing, expanding the scope of video creation for virtual backgrounds, special effects sequences, news segments, and educational content.

Additionally, FlexClip also adds the Reverse Video tool, which expands creative options by effortlessly reversing video timelines for captivating effects, adding creativity and entertainment to video content. The extension helps create magical music videos, highlight action replays, craft thrilling movie scenes, design engaging ads, and explore unconventional techniques in artistic short films.

What's more, FlexClip incorporates the Freeze Frame functionality, enabling users to capture and freeze key moments in their videos, enhancing visual effects and injecting more fun into their content. This feature brings users a fresh video editing experience suitable for creating artistic effects, creative expressions, educational demonstrations, and producing film trailers, among various other scenarios.

"I am excited to introduce these new editing features to our users," says PearlMountain CEO and founder, Lin Xiao. "We believe the addition of these features will enrich users' creative experience, bringing them more inspiration and enjoyment. We eagerly look forward to seeing how users leverage these features to create impressive video works."

Marketers agree that CTV advertising is the most effective digital channel in their media mix and 23.6% plan to increase their spending on connected TV (CTV) campaigns, according to a new survey from tvScientific, the leading performance advertising platform that gives advertisers the ability to deliver targeted ads and measure impact through outcomes for CTV. The study, which collected responses from more than 600 marketing professionals in Q4 of 2023, found that 35% of respondents plan to increase their overall ad spend in 2024 and that 65% report an increase in sales when performance TV is added alongside other paid channels like search and social.

“Finally, we have validation from a large group of marketers of what we have always known – TV is a superior and highly effective medium that can now be connected to business outcomes,” said Jason Fairchild, Co-Founder and CEO of tvScientific. “Marketers are putting their money where their results are, with CTV leading all mediums in terms of planned investment increase for ‘24.”

The data was collected amidst the ongoing transition of the $72 billion TV advertising market to programmatic execution, as technologies emerge that enable the buying and measurement of TV advertising in a manner similar to the $200 billion search and social media market. CTV advertising is expected to grow by 22.4% globally in 2024 to $25.9 billion, according to GroupM’s mid-year forecast. Additional findings from the tvScientific survey include:

• 65% of advertisers report an increase in sales when performance TV is added alongside other paid channels like search and social.
  
  
• With a diverse marketing mix, 68% of respondents say their company’s brand awareness has increased since using performance TV.
  
  
• 62% of respondents said it’s easy for them and their team to prove TV’s impact.

“We expect advertisers will continue making intelligent, bold investments in performance TV as it helps brands drive more engagement, ROAS, and sales in 2024,” Fairchild said. “With structural changes underway in other digital advertising channels, CTV’s addressability, accessibility, and efficiency are poised to change the game for advertisers of every description.”

Pacvue, the industry’s first commerce acceleration platform, today welcomed industry veteran Abi Harmon to its leadership team. Harmon will hold dual titles as Executive Vice President of Pacvue and General Manager of Pacvue’s small-to-midsize business (SMB) segment, Helium 10, where she will be responsible for supporting its continued growth.

A seasoned tech entrepreneur and veteran in the retail industry with roots in both Amazon and Target, Harmon is the latest in a series of strategic appointments to the Pacvue leadership team. Harmon’s hire is another signal that Pacvue is full steam ahead on its mission to drive the transformation of omnichannel technologies and empower enterprises and SMBs to win in commerce.

“Pacvue, together with Helium 10, is uniquely positioned as one of the only solution providers that can cover both the enterprise and SMB segments,” said Harmon. “It’s a huge honor to join this team to continue to grow the Helium 10 brand, which has become a staple for millions of sellers.”

With more than 18 years of experience, Abi is a seasoned tech entrepreneur and retail industry expert. Previously, she served as CEO of Perpetua, held various roles at Flywheel Digital from early-stage leader to Managing Director and spent a decade in retail roles at Amazon and Target.

“Abi is one of a few leaders in the space with a keen perspective across enterprise, SMB and retailers,” said Rahul Choraria, Chief Operating Officer of Pacvue. “We know her insights and expertise in the industry will translate to immense value for our customers and long-term vision for both Pacvue and Helium 10.”

Marketplace sellers and brands face more challenges than ever before – intense competition, increasing fees and the need to constantly optimize current channel strategies, while simultaneously launching opportunistically on new channels. Pacvue’s unique cross-segment positioning in the marketplace, innovative roadmap, cutting-edge data science and generative AI technologies, and deep bench of domain experts demonstrate its commitment to helping brands and sellers win.

Optimove represents a new category for the MACH Alliance, expanding its scope to ensure it serves the evolving needs of technology buyers

Optimove, the first Customer-Led Marketing Platform, today announced it has joined the MACH Alliance, the group of independent tech companies dedicated to advocating for open, best-of-breed technology ecosystems, as an ISV member. Optimove, the First Customer-Led Marketing platform, represents a new category for the MACH Alliance as it continues to grow and expand to best serve composable technology buyers' needs. Optimove is a recognized leader in retention marketing. Its solutions are proven to increase customer lifetime value, and it is ranked #1 by Gartner for Journey Orchestration among Multichannel Marketing Hubs.  

 MACH Alliance Managing Director Holly Hall said, "Optimove represents a new category for the MACH Alliance as we expand our scope to ensure we're serving the evolving needs of composable technology buyers," said Holly Hall, MD, MACH Alliance. "Their commitment to innovation and excellence aligns perfectly with our mission to advance modern, composable technology solutions. We are thrilled to formally welcome them as a certified member, bringing our membership to a balanced 50/50 North America/Europe representation. And at a time when our research shows US MACH adoption is overtaking Europe for the first time." 

Shai Frank, SVP of Optimove, added, "The MACH Alliance is a boon to tech buyers and, in Optimove's case, B2C marketing technology leaders, who are increasingly looking at composable solutions. We are honored to be chosen as a member and open a new category for this prestigious alliance."