TechCrunch has discovered and confirmed that software giant Oracle has bought social marketing platform Vitrue for $300 million. [Update: A press release has confirmed the buy at an undisclosed price, though we know it to be $300 million.] As if Oracle didn’t offer enough products and services already, the acquisition will give it a strong Facebook marketing platform to offer its enterprise clients.

Vitrue had taken $33 million in funding over the years and grown to become one of the most popular solutions for big companies trying to win Facebook fans and push out marketing messages to the news feed. Vitrue, according to a source, was on course for revenues of just under $100 million this year, although we have other sources disputing it may have been that high. TC understands there were a lot of potential acquirers interested. Several bidders approached the company but Oracle was the most aggressive.

Oracle is no stranger to massive acquisitions. It bought talent management solution Taleo in February for $1.9 billion.

Beyond Facebook, Vitrue helps marketers manage their presences on Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest, Instagram, and other platforms. One of the hallmarks of Vitrue has been it’s ability to rapidly integrate with new partners like Klout to give it talking points for dissuading clients from going to competitors.  Vitrue is “nearly profitable” and was projected to reach profitability in this fiscal year, said our source. TechCrunch understands that Reggie Bradford, the CEO, will “very much remain part of the equation” when Vitrue becomes part of Oracle. His exact title is to come.

The purchase continues the trend of large, old-world Internet marketing companies buying their way into social after being slow to adopt. Adobe bought social advertising provider Efficient Frontier for $400 million in November 2011, just a few months after Efficient Frontier had bought Facebook marketer and application developer Context Optional for a reported $50 million.

With time, social has proven too important to ignore. Rather than scrambling to build something and trying to pull brands away from established social marketers, Oracle will instantly gain a massive list of notable clients along with Vitrue. Oracle will also inherit Vitrue’s ongoing battle with competitors like Buddy Media, Wildfire, Involver, ThisMoment, and more for social marketing supremacy.

Update 2: I talked with Abhay Parasnis, Oracle’s SVP of Cloud Development, and Reggie Bradford, the CEO of Vitrue, to get the low-down on the deal in their own words. Parasnis said that it helps Oracle fulfil its “broad vision” in end-to-end cloud services, which includes not only marketing, but CRM and commerce services.

And although Vitrue is bringing in a respectable amount of social media enterprise business to Oracle that Oracle can upsell to other products (like CRM and social commerce) Bradford points out how it will potentially give Vitrue access to a much bigger customer base, since Oracle has 400,000 businesses already using its products.

Kevin Systrom, the CEO of Instagram, earlier this week spelled out a few ways that Instragram might, one day, make revenue through marketing and advertising around its photo-taking, filtering and sharing service, which now has 27 million registered users. But for now, another company is using some of the big buzz around the mobile startup for its own business gain:

Vitrue has launched an Instagram “tab module” for brands to use on their Facebook pages, using Instagram’s API to automatically import a selection of pictures based around a specific tag and create albums. The social media marketing company claims that this is an industry first. Perhaps more importantly, it is also a sign of how marketeers are trying to incorporate more visual elements into their Facebook campaigns to make them more engaging with users.

The albums work much like the Instagram albums that may already appear in your own personal timeline if you happen to post pictures to Facebook: users will be able to like, comment on and share the pictures with their friends. Vitrue says it is also going to incorporate a voting element into the mix as well, which will let brands run contests around the Instagram content.

And there are some other key features. The tagging element will let brands create albums around specific campaigns; the album creation is automatic and requires no “posting” from the users; and Vitrue is selling this as a product to its customers, as part of its Social Relationship Management platform, which also includes analytics to measure how well these campaigns do.

“There is no revenue sharing with Instagram in this,” says John Nolt, Vitrue’s director of product management.

The addition of Instagram comes in the wake of Vitrue integrating another hot social media property into the SRM platform, Pinterest. Nolt says its Pinterest integration was launched a couple of months ago and has around a dozen brands using it already.

Vitrue’s first customer for the new Instagram feature is the consumer electronics accessory giant Logitech, which used it to import music and pictures from the SXSW event earlier this month. Nolt says that Vitrue is also working with around half a dozen other brands at the moment and expects to see their Instagram feeds go live on their Facebook pages in the next 15-30 days.

Although Hipstamatic and Instagram are now beginning a new partnership that will see Hipstamatic becoming the first company to import images to Instagram’s own social network, Nolt says there have been no conversations between his company and Instagram either about the new Facebook service, or about any potential marketing partnerships on Instagram’s own platform.

Although Facebook is probably the world’s biggest cloud-based repository of images at the moment, it’s unclear whether it has any services like this — catering to marketers, filtering those images — up its sleeve. But with the layout of Facebook still largely text-driven, it’s a fair bet that brands, craving more visually-led methods of engagement, will probably be on the hunt for more like it.

Vitrue, a social media marketing company, is rolling out version 3.0 of its social media management platform for brands. New features include localization and enhanced analytics and metrics within one dashboard interface.

As we’ve written in the past, Vitrue’s SaaS platform allows brands and marketing agencies to
communicate with fans and consumers across Facebook, YouTube and Twitter accounts, location based services, and via mobile applications. The company’s SRM (social relationship management) platform is being used by a number of high profile brands including Harley Davidson, Mentos, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Crocs, Eddie Bauer, Maybelline, Purina, McDonald’s, YouTube, Ford, AT&T, Disney and Best Buy.

The newest version of Vitrue’s software comes with a new dashboard and user interface, allowing marketers to see, access and manage all of the available functionalities, tools and modules within one interface. The company has also added enhanced analytics and metrics to give marketers specific metrics on demographics and engagement of their social pages and users including insight into traffic sources, overall user demographics, top fan profiles, fan growth breakdowns, top location snapshots, per-post publishing metrics, and user engagement statistics by action (i.e., like, comment, share, play, etc.) and by day of week and time of day.

Other features include the ability to publish targeted content to specific users, the ability to add coupons, quizzes, and more to campaigns, and 24-7 customer support.

Vitrue, which has raised $32 million,
faces competition from Buddy Media.

Editor’s note: Reggie Bradford is the CEO of Vitrue, a social media marketing platform based in Atlanta.

Do serious tech companies still need to be based in Silicon Valley? There seems to be an endless debate about this among founders everywhere. My own startup, Vitrue, turns 5 this week. That’s forever in startup years, and it’s got me to thinking about my friend Ron Conway. Ron invested in Vitrue on October 28, 2006. He’s a true industry legend (noteworthy enough to have his own Wikipedia page) and a long-time Valley resident. At the time, we had several late-night, semi-sober conversations about moving the headquarters to Silicon Valley. Five years later I’m glad I stuck to my guns and kept the company in The Big Peach.

We have quite a vibrant startup community here with companies such as MailChimp, MFG.com, and Scoutmob, and Solo Health. Vitrue is now a large and growing provider of social marketing (SaaS) software for brands and agencies worldwide. We tripled revenues last year, added more than 90 new employees during Q1 alone and are expanding worldwide. Our platform is currently managing more than 500 million fans. This is my third startup. The first two—WebMD and N2 Broadband—were both acquired. All from right here in Atlanta.

So with all due respect to my good friend and uber-Angel investor Ron Conway, here are five reasons why I’m glad I didn’t move us from Atlanta to the Valley. And why Silicon Valley, despite still being the capital of the technology world, doesn’t necessarily make or break a company.

1. Social media is a global phenomenon.

Many of the world’s most iconic brands use our products. How many of them do you think are headquartered in Silicon Valley?

2. Today you can find talent everywhere, not just the Valley.

Having said that, however, there is no doubt that the sheer concentration of incredible talent within the Bay area is unmatched. No one is disputing that. But there’s a price (literally) for that concentration, and looking outside the valley for the key personnel to build your company can be cost effective and just plain effective-effective.

In Atlanta we have a massive geek-generator called “Georgia Tech” that keeps us well-stocked with talented, young, enthusiastic, affordable software engineers. Think Radian6, which was recently acquired by Salesforce.com for $326 million. It’s headquartered in New Brunswick, Canada. And how about Omniture? They were based in Orem, Utah. Look for this trend to continue.

3. Cities are getting it.

Other cities have come to appreciate the value of innovation and are providing the resources and environments for companies to find success and scale in the technology space. Cities that have historically never been considered particularly innovative are fostering startup after startup. Think Austin, Boulder, even Indianapolis.

For example, in Atlanta, our home base, we had much success working with non-profit organizations like Atlanta’s ATDC (Advanced Technology Development Center), a partnership with Georgia Tech, which offers tremendous resources for technology companies and entrepreneurs to grow and develop. And cities across the nation have similar incubator programs to encourage technology.

4. You don’t have to live in the Valley to experience it

You think it matters for access? There are airplanes, phones, Skype, and heck, Facebook. For funding? So far we’ve raised $33 million. For recruiting board members and other upper-level participants? Former Facebook Ad Sales Chief Mike Murphy recently joined us as my special advisor. Not a bad get for an “Atlanta-headquartered” company.

I will, however, note here that access in the Valley is pretty special…and technology companies must spend time networking there. We do. We’re not fools. I spent the first two weeks of the year in the Valley raising capital. The ability to network and get 10 meetings per day is extremely productive. But I don’t have to live there to experience it. We don’t have to be headquartered there. I can visit regularly via modern innovations in transport. Like the airplane.

5. College Football.

Okay, not everything is about business. No offense to you Pac-10 fans but that is hardly respectable football. I mean, come on, you realize that, right? You’ll find the most elite football being played every Saturday in the fall on campuses across the South, especially a short 40-minute drive up the road from Vitrue HQ to Athens. Go Dawgs. Baseball? Even Buster Posey, the pride-and-joy of the Giants and last year’s Rookie of the Year is a Georgia boy. Of course I would be remiss if I didn’t mention my amazing family – all with strong Atlanta connections. Not to mention sweet tea, Chick-fil-A, great weather, Coke, CNN, Gladys Knight’s Chicken and Waffles, and brunch. Atlanta loves brunch, let me tell you. It’s been a hell of a ride over the last five years at Vitrue, and I can hardly wait to get started on the next five. From right here in good ol’ Hotlanta.

As we’ve written in the past, Vitrue’s SaaS platform allows brands and marketing agencies to
communicate with fans and consumers across Facebook and Twitter accounts, location based services, and via mobile applications. The company’s SRM (social relationship management) platform is being used by a number of high profile brands including Harley Davidson, Mentos, Dick’s Sporting Goods, Crocs, Eddie Bauer, Maybelline, Purina, McDonald’s, YouTube, Ford, AT&T, Disney and Best Buy.

And Vitrue is growing in terms of revenue and is cash-flow positive. From Q2 2010 to Q3 2010, Vitrue’s revenue grew nearly 100 percent as the company tripled accounts using their SRM platform and expanded its API.

Currently, the service manages over 2,500 Facebook Pages and Twitter accounts for various clients, which adds up to 450 million fans/followers in 47 countries. That’s up from 680 Twitter and Facebook accounts managed in October of 2010.

With the new financing, Vitrue will be opening offices in seven U.S. markets including New York, San Francisco, Dallas, Chicago, Detroit, Cincinnati and Los Angeles. The company is also expanding globally, creating presences in London, Toronto and Singapore. And to support all these new outposts, Vitrue will be hiiring between 100 and 150 new employees in 2011.

It’s been a while since we’ve written about the company — in fact, as far as I can tell, it has been about four years. Back then, Vitrue was just getting started, taking seed funding from Ron Conway and others. Since then, they’ve raised several million more dollars, but have also developed an SRM (social relationship management) platform that is used by some of the largest companies in the world.

Four years ago, Facebook wasn’t anything close to what it is today, and Twitter didn’t exist. Now, of course, Vitrue’s business is heavily wrapped around social networks such as those. The blog Inside Facebook did a good Q&A recently with CEO Reggie Bradford on how specifically his company utilizes Facebook.

From Q2 to Q3 this year, Vitrue says revenue grew nearly 100 percent as they tripled accounts using their SRM platform while also greatly expanding access their their API. To manage the growth, the company has also doubled their workforce in 2010, we’re told. But even after that, they remain cash-flow positive.

Currently, the service says it managed over 680 Facebook Pages and Twitter accounts for various clients. That adds up to some 276 million fans/followers (a nearly 250 percent jump in growth from Q2). They also moderate some 5 million comments for clients. Ugh — that would be my least favorite job ever.

Seeing as the company seems to be rocking and rolling, it probably won’t be another four years before we update on them again. Just a guess.

ViTrue hosts user-generated (UG) video a la YouTube with an advertising focus. This relatively new type of advertising is called Branded Video Community, meant to promote “brand engagement.” So if you love the San Francisco Giants, (and who doesn’t?), you can create a video promoting the team and post it through ViTrue.

For now, ViTrue only has homemade video for Moe’s Southwest Grill, Lance Foods, The Cincinnati Bengals, and something called The Nerd League. Not exactly brands I want to “engage” with but I’m not saying this kind of advertising won’t be effective. It’s too soon to tell, but Ted Turner is a believer.

Maybe this is how the online video world will finally figure out how to monetize UG video and avoid copyright lawsuits? Lord knows YouTube is worth a lot of money, but Google hasn’t been talking much about how they’re going to cash in on the acquisition. Plus they keep having to filter content for illegal uploads of copyright material. So if sponsoring UG content is the new plan, ViTrue just has to hope and pray that someone will come up with something hilarious for Moe’s Southwest Grill. (Note to contributors: competitive eating is always a winner!)

Turner Broadcasting will test this model later this year when it launches an online campaign called “Funny or Not?”

ViTrue is no stranger to UG video. The company owns Sharkle.com, the online video-sharing community.