Whatever happens to Audience Network, Facebook is working hard to build its ecommerce business. Its latest step is Facebook Shop, a new section in its main app that lets users buy from multiple merchants. This is a big step up from the Facebook Shops that exist on merchants’ own pages. Raise your hand if you think becoming more dependent on Facebook is a good idea.
In a mischievously terse, 91-word statement, Walmart yesterday said they will, or might, join Microsoft’s bid for TikTok. Walmart is aggressively growing its ecommerce and advertising businesses, so this announcement makes more sense than several other aspects of TikTok saga. Walmart was already expected to pass eBay this year to become the second-largest ecommerce company.
Here’s a less common coupling: retailers running digital ad networks. The connection is the retailers’ huge troves of customer data. CVS Pharmacy is the latest retailer to take the plunge, following Walmart, Target, and others. Troves for everyone!
GrowthLoop will use TransUnion identity data to improve U.S. consumer match rates on client files sent to advertising media such as Facebook and Google Ads. The data should also help clients to find matches among records within their files, building more accurate customer profiles. GrowthLoop calls itself a “composable CDP”, meaning it works with data assembled in external data warehouses.