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Salesforce acquires Sequence to build out its UX design services
Salesforce has made another acquisition that underscores how the CRM and cloud software giant is looking to sell more services to its customers that complement the software they are already buying. It has acquired Sequence, a user experience design agency based out of San Francisco and New York that works with brands like Best Buy, Peets, Apple, Google and many more. The news was announced… Read More
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Snapchat’s next Lenses could identify and add to landscapes as well as faces
Snap, Inc. is working on an updated version of its in-app Snapchat lenses that would be able to recognize landscapes as well as faces, according to The Information, and intelligently overlay augmented reality animations and objects overtop of scenes captured through your camera. This is different from its existing smart Lenses, which can add features like snowfall to scenes, because it… Read More
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Emoji marketing startup Inmoji raises another $1.5M
Emojis — not just a fun way to avoid writing actual words, but also an opportunity for 💰💰💰? Well, Inmoji, a startup that creates emoji-focused marketing campaigns, is announcing that it has raised an additional $1.5 million, bringing its total funding to $9 million. This comes a week after announcing a self-serve platform that should make these emoji campaigns accessible to… Read More
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10 big earnings questions Facebook probably won’t answer
Teens and Snapchat? Instagram earning money finally? The impact of the fake news scandal? These are what we wish Facebook would talk about on today’s Q4 earnings call. Facebook’s business is expanding in every direction, but it breaks out very little of that, keeping investors and the public in the dark about its newer revenue streams. Meanwhile, controversies and competition can… Read More
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Instagram Stories is stealing Snapchat’s users
Good enough and convenient. That’s proved a winning strategy for Instagram’s clone, according to a dozen analytics providers, social media celebrities, and talent managers who told TechCrunch they’ve seen a decline in Snapchat Stories usage since Instagram Stories launched on August 2nd. Read More
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Facebook Messenger begins testing ads…and they’re big
Facebook today is beginning to test integrating ads into its mobile messaging app’s user interface. The company says it will launch what it characterizes as a “very small test” in Australia and Thailand, which will allow businesses to place an ad on the Messenger home screen. These fairly prominent card-style ads include image thumbnails accompanied by text and a link. Read More
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Google took down 1.7 billion dodgy ads in 2016, over twice as many as in 2015
Google has been under the gun when it comes to the power of its massive ad network — the biggest on the internet — being used for nefarious purposes, but the search giant is intent on using its tech to battle that problem. Today the company published its latest update on how its fighting spam, bots and other problematic “ads” on its network, and said that in 2016 it… Read More
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Verizon fourth quarter earnings fall short of analyst expectations
Verizon this morning reported adjusted fourth quarter earnings of 86 cents per share, on revenue of $32.3 billion. On the earnings side, that falls short of what Wall Street analysts had expected — EPS of 89 cents per share and $32.1 billion in revenue. That also marks a 5.6 percent revenue decline from the fourth quarter of 2015. Verizon said it added 591,000 postpaid wireless… Read More
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Google wants to make YouTube a better place for advertisers
Despite its massive success with viewers, Google always had a hard time convincing advertisers that its video platform was the best place for them to reach their target audiences. Now, Google promises to give advertisers and agencies better tools to measure their reach and target specific audiences — all with a focus on mobile. As Google notes in today’s announcement, 50 percent… Read More
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Buzzvil acquires Slidejoy for a lockscreen ad consolidation
New York City startup Slidejoy has been acquired by South Korean competitor Buzzvil. Both companies offer a way for Android users to earn rewards in exchange for allowing ads on their lockscreens — in Buzzvil’s case, that’s both through its HoneyScreen consumer app and through its BuzzScreen platform for publishers. The financial terms are not being disclosed, but… Read More
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Snapchat embraces offline purchase ad targeting its CEO called “creepy”
Snap Inc.’s quest to earn enough money to IPO sees it flip-flopping after pledging not to use “creepy” ad targeting. Snap will now allow advertisers to use Oracle’s Data Cloud (formerly Datalogix) third-party data about what users buy offline to target ads on Snapchat, according to The Wall Street Journal. Snap tells TechCrunch that this rolled out over the last few… Read More
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DataSift connects with LinkedIn as its latest social marketing partner
DataSift, which taps and structures data from social networks to provide more insights into it, has added a new partner to its own network. The company has linked up with LinkedIn — the social network for the working world with 467 million users that was acquired by Microsoft recently for $26.2 billion — to help develop a stronger marketing profile for LinkedIn by parsing its… Read More
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WalkMe acquires Abbi.io to add mobile A/B testing and engagement
After raising $50 million last year on a $400 million valuation, WalkMe — a company that offers on-screen site guidance and engagement analytics — has made an acquisition to beef up its presence in mobile. The startup has acquired Abbi, specialists in mobile A/B testing and app engagement (“Abbi” is both a reference to A/B testing and BI, business intelligence). Terms… Read More
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Article recommendation startup ZergNet adds sponsored links, but promises to remain “content only”
ZergNet pitches itself as a higher-quality alternative to content recommendation widgets like Taboola and Outbrain. Now co-founder and CEO Reggie Renner is planning to become a bigger source of revenue for ZergNet publishers with the launch of what the company is calling its Content-Only Monetization Platform. Before this launch, ZergNet’s main selling point to publishers was helping… Read More
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Instagram Stories hits 150M daily users, launches skippable ads
Instagram Stories now has as many users as the last number announced by Snapchat, the app Instagram copied. And it’s swiftly moving to monetize that massive audience. Along with the new 150 million daily user stat, Instagram today announced the launch of ads mixed into Stories. The unclickable five-second photo and 15-second video ads appear between different people’s stories and… Read More
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