There is a special corner of the marketing automation world for “multi-location” businesses, in which a central brand coordinates with (often fiercely) independent local dealers or franchise holders. SOCi lives in that corner with clients including Ford, Ace Hardware, and Stanley Steemer. They just raised $120 million in financing, which they’ll use to integrate with – you guessed it – OpenAI to help local partners make better, faster marketing decisions.

Can’t we just agree that all software will include generative AI-based assistants for most tasks, so I don’t have to report on each one? The latest announcement is from Microsoft Dynamics 365, whose “Copilot” will do cool things like help find customer segments in your CDP and create draft emails. Most features are in a limited preview mode.

Just over one-third of marketers plan to either buy a new CDP (21%) or replace an existing one (13%) this year, according to this Optimove survey. Unfortunately, it doesn’t report how many have a CDP already in place, which would put the other values in perspective. It does seem that CDPs are a relatively low priority: they rank sixth on the list of new systems and eighth on the list of systems to replace.