xAd Unveils MarketPlace, the First Self-Service, Fully Transparent Platform for the Buying and Selling of Locations

BARCELONA, Spain, Feb. 23, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- xAd, the leading location platform that enables marketers to reach the right people based on the real places they visit every day, today announced MarketPlace, the first and only transparent, self-serve marketing platform for real-time, location-based campaign planning, buying and reporting. MarketPlace is the only end-to-end location buying platform that enables marketers to reach consumers in the moments that matter most, allowing them to finally break the barrier between online and offline.

Today, consumers are "always on" and more likely to make their purchase decisions instantaneously than ever before. With the rise of mobility, consumer behaviors and expectations have shifted dramatically and marketers must adapt in real time to meet their spur-of-the-moment needs—no matter where they are. As a result, a consumer's location has become one of the most important variables in leveraging these precise moments of consumer intent.

However, in order to fully leverage location-based marketing, marketers must have the ability to match real-time customer data to the correct context. Despite the growing importance of location, few marketers today have the necessary capabilities to effectively identify, deliver on and measure these moments. As Forrester Research identified in a recent survey, only 16% of marketers actually have the tools to build a campaign that is both based on customer data and relevant to an individual's context, whether that be location, time of day or any other crucial state-of-mind indicator. MarketPlace will change this.

"For the first time ever, marketers will now be able to leverage real-time consumer intent like they can do today for search—but for the physical world," said xAd founder and CEO Dipanshu "D" Sharma. "Users will be able to buy places like keywords, leveraging past behavioral trends and real-time data to make incredibly informed marketing decisions. They'll then be able to execute those campaigns almost immediately from within the platform. These capabilities have never been offered within a singular, transparent, self-serve solution, and we think it's going to revolutionize how brands approach mobile marketing."

MarketPlace key highlights include:

• One End-to-End Platform: One singular marketing platform that offers full access to competitive and behavioral trends, and the ability to create, execute and measure campaigns based on those trends in near real time.
• Transparency & Control: Marketers of all sizes gain transparency and control into the real-time, real-world data and behaviors that are driving their businesses.
• Self Service: Within a few clicks, users can create their own new campaign or make adjustments to a current campaign in real time. No more wasting time on proposals or cumbersome IO processes.

As a first adopter of MarketPlace, Jack Foley, digital brand manager at KFC, explained: "Through our ongoing partnership with Blue 449 and xAd, we've been able to leverage the most accurate location data to reach our target demographics in the most critical moments of intent. The continued growth of mobile will only increase the importance of location data and our need to leverage it in the most strategic way possible. MarketPlace has the potential to help us do this through providing a more granular view into real-time consumer behavior, then allowing us to act on that behavior within one platform." 

Joshua Lowcock, EVP, head of digital, US, at McCann Worldwide, another MarketPlace first adopter, said: "One of the most critical challenges in engaging with a potential customer is having the scale to reach that individual wherever they may be, while remaining agile enough to create a personalized, relevant, in-the-moment interaction. Unlike search and social, MarketPlace's location data paints a picture of the here and now, allowing us to flex with our target audience."

MarketPlace is available now in limited beta, with further availability to be announced in the near future. Current MarketPlace beta partners include CCI (core Dentsu digital agency in Japan), Blue 449, iHeartMedia, KFC, OMD Worldwide, OUTFRONT Media and Universal McCann. For more information on MarketPlace, or to be considered for the MarketPlace limited beta program, please visit www.xad.com/marketplace.

About xAd
xAd enables real-time, location-based mobile marketing, without the guesswork. Working with xAd, marketers can deliver more relevant, personalized messages to the right people they want to reach, based on the real places they visit every day through the most scalable and precise mobile marketing platform on the planet. Each month, xAd's patented location platform helps marketers reach over 300 million people globally with the ability to reach users at nearly 100 million unique points of interest. With xAd, marketers can say goodbye to assumptive marketing and reach the right people at real places in real-time with precision, relevance and confidence. Learn more: www.xad.com.

Contact:
Theresa Nasi
VP, Global Marketing Communications
[email protected]

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SOURCE xAd