How badly have marketers been hit by the pandemic? More than half – 55% — reported a budget cut, according to this Chief Marketer study. The marketing mix is also changing, with growth in social media, content marketing, influencer marketing, and email. Losers include search marketing, referrals, and, of course, live events.
I guess there’s some irony in talking about location tracking at a time when much of the country is rarely leaving home. But the pandemic shall pass and when it does, marketers will be eager to connect the dots between advertising and in-store customer behaviors. Which brings us to this announcement that location-based ad and attribution vendor Reveal Mobile is partnering with Tapad, which will help them to measure retail foot traffic and target store visitors (and their households) across devices.
In more quotidian news, Mailchimp has purchased AI platform Inspector 6, which analyzes marketing content, looks at its performance, and suggests improvements. The target is small businesses that lack human staff to do such things. But if you human marketers aren’t looking over your shoulder, you should start.
Google lashed out at the Department of Justice’s threat to break up the company, calling the proposals “radical.” Among other things, Google says the proposals would threaten users’ privacy, stifle innovation and break Android and Chrome. Given the appeals process, it will likely be years before we know whether Google will stay in one piece.