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Each week, the PMW editorial team selects five top picks of the latest product releases from the adtech and martech worlds, with our verdict on why they made the cut – and why you should pay attention.
This week:
Charlie Oscar: attribution tool offers deeper incremental insights
Lotame ‘Spherical’: linking up CDPs to shed light on ‘unknown’ first party sources
Amplified Intelligence: attention-based media planning tool
Bidstack: dedicated sports division for in-game ads
Shutterstock: generative AI with an ethical edge
Charlie Oscar attribution tech helps marketers scale their bottom line
Founded by James Connelly (previously Fetch), Charlie Oscar is a growth transformation group that scales the bottom line for digital businesses and has recently launched a next-gen attribution tool.
How it works
Utilising data science modelling, the solution gives marketers access to sub-channel level ROI and incrementality data – which the company claims is the kind of data science and growth capabilities typically reserved for big enterprises with deep pockets. Clients can understand which marketing channels (broken down by sub-channel) are having the biggest impact on the bottom line (prospecting vs. retargeting or micro vs. nano influencers), and how you can optimise to increase revenue growth. Charlie Oscar also combines their digital marketing knowledge with their hands—on management of client advertising channels, to interpret the data for clients.
What the provider says
Dan Wilson, our Chief Data Officer at Charlie Oscar, said: "Unlike standard measurement methods that measure navigational behaviours and rely on user data, clicks and device IDs, COmpass measures both the considerations and triggers that lead to a purchase, attributing value to the incremental activity throughout the entire marketing funnel. COmpass creates the link between marketing reporting and underlying business performance. Having access to this level of insight allows brands to allocate budgets to the areas that actually drive bottom-line growth and optimise their marketing activity to significantly accelerate growth long term.”
What the clients say
Charlie Oscar said that in the first 7 weeks of deploying actions guided by COmpass’ insight, clients achieved record numbers of 92% higher new user acquisition and 49% lower CAC/CPA.
The PMW View
Thanks to digital tracking complications (GDPR, IOS.14), increased adoption of omnichannel retail, and ongoing wars with in-platform metrics, measuring true attribution is becoming a hugely different challenge to what it was a few years ago. Charlie Oscar is aiming to stand out from the adtech crowd by making advanced level data such as incrementality and human-backed insights more accessible to brands of all sizes.
Lotame Spherical extracts insights across ‘unknown’ first party sources
Spherical is a next-generation data platform for marketers and media owners that can drive more value from both known and unknown first-party data for customer engagement and acquisition in a privacy-first world.
How it works
Spherical will enable interoperability and data portability across brand and media owner tech stacks and will extend first-party data living in data warehouses or customer data platforms (CDPs) into the madtech ecosystem. CDPs integrated with Lotame at the launch of Spherical include BlueConic, Meiro, mParticle, Rudderstack, Salesforce, Simon Data, Tealium and Treasure Data. Lotame plans to expand support to additional CDPs on an ongoing basis.
What the provider says
Andy Monfried, Lotame CEO and Founder, said: “There’s no shortage of pain in our industry. Everyone wants first-party data but not everyone has it. Many that have it don’t know how to make the most of it. Preserving addressability and data connectivity are gridlocked by a host of macro and micro issues. Spherical was designed to address these sources of pain instead of myopically focusing on symptoms.”
What the client says
"Spherical empowers digitally native brands to onboard customer emails as they authenticate onsite in real time,” said Carlos Payares, CSO LATAM, Omnicom Media Group. “That eliminates the lag time between first-party data ingestion and activation, and is a tremendous competitive advantage, especially in markets with limited onboarding functionality. We're excited to test with our clients straightaway."
The PMW View
Digital consumption continues to increase across a variety of channels, creating more data than ever. However, that data lives across multiple platforms, making it expensive and difficult for companies to unify and activate. Here, Lotame is aiming to cut down on the time and money spent extracting first party data from the hard to reach corners of the web and beyond.
Amplified Intelligence launches attention-based media planning tool
Amplified Intelligence has launched the next iteration of its attentionPLAN solution which covers linear TV, CTV, Socials, YouTube and other major digital platforms.
How it works
Combining human attention data and predictive analysis, the tool provides brands and agencies with a view of the human attention they will receive in return for ad investment, based on their own uploaded media plans. It also equips them with the ability to optimise short- or long-term commercial outcomes that match their business objectives. Businesses and media planners can get started for $1,000 to build out a full campaign and it spans all major platforms and media channels.
What the provider says
Karen Nelson-Field, CEO and Founder at Amplified Intelligence, said: “The product has been extensively tested by over 100 organisations across the global media industry and is perfect for in-agency and in-house media teams looking to consolidate their tools, recession-proof their advertising spend, and optimise strategies toward human attention metrics and outcomes.
The PMW View
Market Research Council data shows that 70% of all viewable inventory in the US is delivering less than half a second of real human attention. What's more, advertisers are being tasked with justifying every dollar of ad spend as economic uncertainty increases. Amplified Intelligence is pitching its services as allowing advertisers to get more attention for the same budget… or the same attention for less budget.
Bidstack launches dedicated sports division for in-game ads
The launch of Bidstack Sports will focus on activations for sponsorship and fan engagement models in virtual sports environments.
How it works
Bidstack Sports will power innovation for traditional sports sponsorship and fan engagement through all-new tech solutions designed for virtual stadiums. It enables both league and club rights holders to instantaneously deliver dynamic content and messaging within their virtual stadiums and environments, supporting the versatile control of highly-valuable digital spaces. Bidstack has also signed a multi-year technology partnership with SimWin Sports, a virtual sports league that provides daily fantasy players and esports fans with the ability to watch, predict, collect, play and earn.
What the provider says
Bidstack Sports is led by EA SPORTS veteran and former Head of Commercial Partnerships for Madden NFL, Alex Nunez, who partnered with Pizza Hut to create the world’s first virtual stadium rights deal inside Madden NFL 20.
Alex Nunez, now SVP and Head of Bidstack Sports, commented:“The new product we've created addresses the largely untapped media values available for the sports industry in gaming by enabling publishers and rights holders to natively monetize and dynamically communicate inside virtual stadiums through a controlled content management dashboard. This tech solution represents a remarkable opportunity to drive net-new sponsorship revenues and increase communication with the next generation of fans.
What the client says
San Diego Battleships Owner, Marshall Faulk, commented: “Bidstack takes SimWin’s in-game advertising capabilities to the next level. My San Diego Battleships team utilises this tech to mirror every aspect of a traditional pro sports sponsorship inventory, from ad space across jumbotrons and ribbon boards to stadium naming rights and jersey patch sponsors. With Bidstack, SimWin franchises maintain full creative control, supported by a range of data-targeting and advanced reporting capabilities that help demonstrate clear value to our sponsors.”
The PMW View
Gaming and esports are huge… and only getting bigger. This marks a step-change for traditional sports sponsorship by establishing a technological gateway that enables real and virtual world activations to operate in parallel, unlocking new complementary revenue models, whilst simultaneously supporting next-gen fan engagement and continued industry growth.
Shutterstock introduces generative AI to it's creative platform
AI image generator allows anyone to create high-quality visuals by simply describing what they’re looking for, ready in seconds.
How it works
The text-to-image technology converts prompts into larger-than-life, ethically created visuals ready for licensing. It is the latest addition to Creative Flow, Shutterstock’s toolkit that has been designed to power creative experiences.
What the provider says
“Shutterstock has developed strategic partnerships over the past two years with key industry players like OpenAI, Meta, and LG AI Research to fuel their generative AI research efforts, and we are now able to uniquely bring responsibly-produced generative AI capabilities to our own customers,” said Paul Hennessy, Chief Executive Officer at Shutterstock.
“Our easy-to-use generative platform will transform the way people tell their stories — you no longer have to be a design expert or have access to a creative team to create exceptional work. Our tools are built on an ethical approach and on a library of assets that represents the diverse world we live in, and we ensure that the artists whose works contributed to the development of these models are recognized and rewarded.”
The PMW View
Generative AI has made a big leap forward in recent months with the introduction of several more accessible user tools. But worries remain over licensing, ethics and brand safety. Shutterstock is aiming to combat that with a tool that pays artists, provides one-stop convenience and huge back catalogue of licensed content.
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