Ecommerce marketing automation platform Klaviyo is no slouch when it comes to fund-raising, notching $358 million to date. But their latest news is benchmarks that let clients compare measures including average order value, open rates, click-throughs, and abandoned carts against average results for similar companies within Klaviyo’s 65,000+ client base. They’ve also added “conversational” SMS.
Switching gears: the Marketing AI Institute (no relation) reports that AI is still an aspiration for most companies: just 17% of marketers said it’s deployed widely at their company, although 80% think more than a quarter of their tasks will be automated five years from now. Lack of training was by far the most common barrier (70%); poor technology and data were far down the list at 35% and 31%, respectively.
6sense, which unifies B2B account engagement for marketing and sales teams, has raised a $125 million Series D, bringing total funding to $226 million. The system relies heavily on machine learning to build a unified data layer, predict next best action per account, and orchestrate customer journeys. We’ve never called them a CDP but they probably qualify.
Procrastinators of the world can throw a party whenever they get around to it: Google has once more pushed back complete third-party cookie deprecation. The new target is “early next year.” Reasons for the delay include concerns expressed by U.K. data regulator Information Commissioner’s Office, an ongoing inquiry by the U.K. Competition and Markets Authority, and widespread discontent in the advertising ecosystem.