Warby Parker, like so many other lifestyle/tech hybrid companies, faced the problem many small companies see while trying to launch a real brand: how do you make the story resonate? → Read More
Last year, Tim Sae Koo, Nikhil Aitharaju, Eunice Noh and Ryo Chiba launched HypeMarks to give people a less hectic way to consume social media. The startup aggregated tweets, articles, links and more shared by influencers and celebrities on social media accounts and, by grouping those by topic, aimed to give people a snapshot of an industry through the eyes of the people who know it best. → Read More
Whenever a new platform launches these days, brands are instantly checking them out to see how they can “become a part of the conversation.” What that really means is how they can use a site like Twitter, or its new app Vine, to get your eyeballs, interact with you and, of course, sell you more stuff. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s commerce at its purest. The story… → Read More
Boomerang, the Chicago-based social gifting service which sprung up this summer as a way for users to send gifts to friends (similar to Wrapp), is now moving into the B2B space with the debut of a platform for brands. At launch, Boomerang has 20 national brands on board, as well as some local businesses in Chicago, Austin, New York, and Indianapolis. → Read More
Visual content marketing service Reachli (formerly Pinerly), has raised a seed round from 500 Startups, PNP Ventures, Zelkova Ventures (Early Klout, Fab investors), Philquo Ventures (Fab investor), GVA ventures, and angel investors including William Lohse (invested in Pinterest’s first round), Howard Love (CEO Lovetoknow.com), Saeed Amidi (Plug and Play founder), plus a few others from the… → Read More
In this month’s report, app store analytics firm Distimo examined how the top 100 global brands approach the Apple App Store and how well they perform. Not surprisingly, most now have a presence there – in fact, only 12 do not. The most successful brands in terms of downloads are also not a huge shocker: Apple, Disney, Facebook, Google and eBay. → Read More
Powervoice, the social media marketing company founded by former IBM consultant Ryan Landau and his ex-Googler brother Andrew, has pivoted. Hard. And the founders have left the company. Originally, the service was operating as a place where users were paid to share brands’ messages on social networks, in a manner similar to Adly but open to all – not just celebrities and other influentials. → Read More
I don’t always play social games, but when I do, I like them to help me pay for my education. If “The Most Interesting Man In The World” were to endorse Grantoo, this might be his conclusion. Grantoo is a social gaming platform that allows college students to compete against each other to win tuition grants and donate to charity in brand-sponsored gaming tournaments. → Read More
Before you start commenting about how much I cover Google+, just hop over to The Next Web (my previous employer), to see the root of it all. I’m a firm believer in Google’s approach to become more social, as I’ve watched it not only happen within its products, but company wide. → Read More
When we wrote about Napkin Labs last year, the Boulder-based startup had created an online lab space that functioned as a collaborative community in which fans could help their favorite brands incubate new ideas and make their voices heard. However, the startup soon found that creating a new destination community is an uphill battle.
Shifting its strategy, Napkin Labs began building tools that… → Read More
Editor’s note: James Gross is co-founder of Percolate, a marketing company with a mission to help brands create content at a social scale. Follow him on Twitter: @James_Gross.
There’s been much buzz around the term “native advertising” lately. And with the buzz has come a bit of backlash, and it’s been mostly from publishers who are looking at the native solutions for their sites and… → Read More
Olapic, a NYC-based startup which allows publishers and brands a way to collect photos from their fans for use on their own websites, has closed a $1 million seed round. Investors include Bonobos, Warby Parker, and Geeklist backer Great Oaks Venture Capital, as well as Brad Harrison Ventures, Columbia University’s Lang Fund, and several other angel investors.
The company has already worked with… → Read More
BNDWGN, a new app from the makers of free texting service HeyWire, is launching what’s being called a “content messenger” service. The app is a combination of private friend-to-friend(s) chat and social media aggregation. Using BNDWGN, you can combine various streams from sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram into an interest-focused group which can be as narrowly defined as “Lady… → Read More
Social loyalty platform PunchTab, which raised its $4.4 million Series A in November, is rolling out its new platform for agencies, allowing them to run customized incentives campaigns to promote customers’ brands on any social network. That’s a differentiating factor between PunchTab and some other social loyalty plays which often only focus Facebook and Twitter. With PunchTab, agencies can also… → Read More
Crowdtap, a web-based network that allows brands to connect with their most engaged fans and customers through social media, has just expanded to two more platforms: Facebook and mobile. The mobile application comes in the form of an iPhone app which allows fans to participate in the brand’s “challenges” (games and contests) in order to earn rewards.
Meanwhile, the new Facebook tab sets up a… → Read More
According to a new report by Experian, 91% of online adults now regularly use social media in some form or another. This makes social networking the top online activity in the U.S. today, with 15% of all U.S. Internet visits going to a social networking site. Experian’s report also found that Pinterest is now the third most popular social network in the U.S., right behind Facebook and Twitter. → Read More
Amid the increased speculation surrounding Silicon Valley darling Pinterest’s forthcoming revenue model, competitor Fancy, a social photo-clipping service popular among the style-conscious set, has been quietly working on revenue ideas of its own. Previously, the service was doling out coupon code to users who “fancy’d” images belonging to specific merchants, but today, the site is diving… → Read More
Promoboxx, a TechStars Boston 2011 company focused on brand-to-retailer marketing, has just closed its seed round of $565,000. The funding comes from individual angels Dave Balter, Peter Bordes, Adam Berrey, Jean Hammond and others. In addition, institutions including SK Ventures, Brand Ventures, and Launch Capital have also committed.
The company’s online service allows retailers to quickly… → Read More
A report being released today from mobile analytics firm Distimo finds that the majority of the top 100 brands (91%) now have a presence in at least one of the major mobile application stores, usually Apple’s iTunes. This finding is notable because just 18 months ago, only half (51%) of the top brands even had any mobile applications published. → Read More
Social media marketing software maker Wildfire is announcing its integration with the new Facebook Insights data, the update to Facebook’s analytics system for Pages, also announced today. Wildfire had helped advise Facebook on the development of the new Insights system, so it was prepared to provide the new data to its clients via its own suite as soon as it became available.
However, the… → Read More
Fanzila is a new startup that lets brands upgrade Facebook pages with blogs, forums, competitions and more. The company announced this week that it raised $1 million in Series A funding in round led by Blumberg Capital, who joins previous investors, Dr. Yossi Vardi, Shiomo Nechama and the Haaretz Newspaper Group. The announcement was timed perfectly to coincidence with Fanzila’s spot in the… → Read More
Rehashing the idea set forth by all of those useless “Intel Inside” and “Designed for Windows XP” stickers that have been on laptops for years, 17 companies (including Asus, Dell, Microsoft, Lenovo, Toshiba, and 12 other heavy hitters) have banded together to bring out a new and equally useless “Mobile Broadband” sticker. What the hell is the point of these… → Read More
Time heals all wounds? Not if you’re the Packard Bell brand in America. At the Acer dog and pony show today, the company’s execs went on and on about how its goal of using its three brands—Acer, Gateway and Packard Bell (they said little about eMachines)—makes total sense. Acer for the more high-end computers, and Gateway and Packard Bell for the more entry-level computers. → Read More
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