Mediaboss Marketing

AUBURN HILLS, Mich. and NEW YORK, June 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- Indicating the continued strength of content-driven brand marketing, Project: WorldWide today announced the acquisition of Affinitive, a word-of-mouth and social media agency and Facebook Preferred Marketing Developer (PMD) that handles consumer assignments for brands such as Random House, E.&J. Gallo Winery, Major League Soccer and Ubisoft. Financial terms were not disclosed.

Founded in 2002 and headquartered in New York City, Affinitive provides social business solutions combining innovative consumer engagement strategies with proprietary technology, real-time monitoring and integration with clients' existing enterprise systems to create a seamless platform for creating and executing integrated brand programs.

Over the course of a decade and more than 200 campaigns, Affinitive has created and managed online brand communities, customer insight/advisory panels, loyalty/rewards programs, social and mobile applications, digital promotions and much more. As a founding member of the Word of Mouth Marketing Association, the group is recognized as an industry pioneer and a leader within the industry's ongoing efforts to evolve social media marketing practices and standards.

"Affinitive is a natural fit for Project in that we share the same belief about how brands must adapt to spark two-way dialogue and actively participate in customer-driven conversations," said Robert G. Vallee Jr., Chairman & CEO of Project: WorldWide. "Brands today seek to engage through more meaningful stories and experiences, and Affinitive will help advance our mission to do just that."

"Project is built on a foundation of engagement, and they understand that social media is the fabric that ties everything together - from online and offline consumer behavior and experiences to the marketing, loyalty, CRM and research functions of any organization," said Bob Troia, Affinitive's founder and CEO. "Affinitive shares that vision, and by joining the Project: WorldWide family, we can now provide fully integrated, best-of-breed social business solutions for our customers on a global scale."

Affinitive's creative, technology and strategy teams put brand personality and a customer-centric approach to work on client campaigns, rather than focus on technology for its own sake. This philosophy has allowed Affinitive the freedom and flexibility to create ideas that work across multiple channels even as new social media platforms rise to shake the status quo on a seemingly regular basis.

"The rapid pace of innovation in the social media marketing sphere sometimes distracts clients from the real revolution happening in terms of what online and mobile mediums make possible for really powerful consumer engagement," said Warren Ackerman, EVP of Affinitive. "It's been a wonderful journey helping clients see the real opportunity, and now with a platform like Project behind us, it's exciting to imagine what we can do for clients who share our same vision."

In joining Project: WorldWide, Affinitive is teaming up with a diverse roster of highly collaborative, award-winning agencies including experience marketing agency George P. Johnson, G7 Entertainment Marketing, interactive marketing shop JUXT Interactive, multimedia production content company Spinifex, creative ideas agency Partners + Napier and 3D marketing production shop Raumtechnik.

About Project: WorldWide (project.com)

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Project: WorldWide Acquires Social Marketing Firm Affinitive

TYSONS CORNER, Va., June 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ --MicroStrategy Incorporated (MSTR), a leading worldwide provider of business intelligence (BI) software, today announced that its Social Media Marketing iCommerce Summit (SMICS) will be held July 10-11 at the Amsterdam RAI International Convention Center and will run adjacent to MicroStrategy World 2012 Amsterdam.

SMICS attendees will have an exclusive opportunity to learn about innovative technologies from MicroStrategy in Social Intelligence and hear the views and experiences of industry luminaries at the cutting-edge of social media monetization. Digital strategists will share their perspectives on the future of social media and commerce, with a focus on how companies can best compete for consumer attention and relevance. Featured guest speakers include:

"MicroStrategy is excited to be hosting SMICS, the second annual summit of its kind where companies can immerse themselves in the lucrative opportunities and meaningful connections that social media networks present," said Karl-Heinz Land, Chief Evangelist and SVP Social iCommerce at MicroStrategy. "SMICS will educate companies on the value of social CRM and social commerce, present cutting-edge strategies for connecting brands to their consumers via social media, and explore how companies can set their sights on social media, social commerce and the future of television and social TV."

For more details on this event, visit http://smics2012.com, download the SMICS brochure, or follow SMICS on Twitter.

About MicroStrategy

Founded in 1989, MicroStrategy is a leading provider of enterprise software platforms for business intelligence (BI), mobile intelligence, and social intelligence applications. MicroStrategy's BI platform enables leading organizations worldwide to analyze the vast amounts of data stored across their enterprises to make better business decisions. Companies choose MicroStrategy BI for its ease-of-use, sophisticated analytics, and superior data and user scalability. MicroStrategy's mobile intelligence platform helps companies and organizations build, deploy, and maintain mobile apps across a range of solutions by embedding intelligence, transactions, and multimedia into apps. MicroStrategy's social intelligence platform includes a number of applications that help enterprises harness the power of social networks for marketing and e-commerce, as well as a suite of free consumer friendly apps that use MicroStrategy's enterprise technologies. The MicroStrategy Cloud offering combines MicroStrategy and third-party software, hardware, and services to enable rapid, cost-effective development of hosted BI, mobile, and social applications. To learn more about MicroStrategy (MSTR), visit http://www.microstrategy.com and follow us on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/microstrategy) and Twitter (http://www.twitter.com/microstrategy).

MicroStrategy, MicroStrategy Business Intelligence Platform, MicroStrategy Cloud, MicroStrategy Mobile, Cloud Personal, MicroStrategy Transaction Services, Wisdom, MicroStrategy Wisdom and Emma are either trademarks or registered trademarks of MicroStrategy Incorporated in the United States and certain other countries. Other product and company names mentioned herein may be the trademarks of their respective owners.

MSTR-G

Contact:Warren Getler MicroStrategy Incorporated 703-744-6258 wgetler@microstrategy.com

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The Future of Social Commerce Sets the Agenda at MicroStrategy's 2nd Annual Social Media Marketing iCommerce Summit ...

In the past three years, the average budget spent on social media marketing has grown 133%. In an effort to transform social media from a promotion and engagement tool to one more focused on lead generation and closing, HubSpot and HootSuite have joined forces to close the loop on social media marketing efforts.

The partnership is focused on a central idea that, they should make it easier for marketers to generate, nurture, and manage leads via social media, so they can finally close the loop on their social media marketing efforts (what theyre calling closed-loop social for short).

At the heart of the partnership is an app which allows integration into the HootSuite app directory. It automatically puts HubSpot lead and keyword data into HootSuite. The beta app allows users to monitor their leads tweets in HootSuite to identify opportunities to follow up on their leads with a tweet back. Using the app to monitor their best-performing keywords in HubSpot, users can identify leads through relevant conversations.

It may sound complex in theory, but through what could be the worlds largest webinar, and a series of ebooks to go along with their closing the loop initiative, its easy to start making their partnership work for you.

Also, HootSuite will present at HubSpots three-day marketing conference in Boston running from August 27th through the 30th entitled, Inbound 2012. You can download the beta app. and take advantage of a series of educational resources by following this link. Take a look at the tools available to guide you:

* A white paper on closing the loop for social leads. Download now.

* A HootSuite University Lecture Series led by HubSpot Social Media Scientist about the Science of Social Media, Dan Zarrella. Watch today.

* The Science of Inbound Marketing A world-record breaking webinar hosted by HootSuite and HubSpot. Register here!

Ryan Holmes, CEO of HootSuite Media, Inc. comments on the sheer utility of partnering with HubSpot:

Social media spending is on the rise. We watch as companies invest significant dollars into driving marketing campaigns using social networks as the next marketing platform,

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HootSuite & HubSpot Announce Partnership to Close the Loop on Social Media Marketing

VANCOUVER, BRITISH COLUMBIA and CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS--(Marketwire -06/06/12)- Editor's Note: There are four pictures associated with this release.

HootSuite, makers of the market-leading social media management system, have entered into a strategic partnership with HubSpot, the world's only all-in-one marketing software platform. This partnership will directly connect social media to generating, managing and nurturing leads for the first time, finally "closing the loop" on social media marketing. Joint efforts include an app integration in HootSuite's App Directory, plus educational content and presenting sponsor of HubSpot's Inbound 2012 Conference - follow hashtag #closedloopsocial for details. The companies will also join forces to break the existing Guinness World Record for world's largest webinar with The Science of Inbound Marketing July 12 at 1:00pm ET.

Click to tweet: Teaming of @HubSpot and @HootSuite finally allows marketers to use social to drive direct revenue #InboundSci http://ow.ly/biK7G.

Driving the partnership is the app integration, currently in beta, which automatically pulls HubSpot Lead and Keyword data into HootSuite providing an opportunity for social engagement with leads and those mentioning top performing keywords without leaving the HootSuite dashboard. This powerful integration breaks ground on lead management by closing the loop on social media and inbound marketing. Interested customers are encouraged to apply to participate in the beta program which will run for two weeks prior to the public launch at the end of June.

Click to tweet: Breaking: @HootSuite and @HubSpot tie social to lead gen with first lead-focused social app #closedloopsocial http://ow.ly/bhtgU.

Be part of marketing history: The World's Largest Webinar

HootSuite will also co-host HubSpot's 2012 World's Largest Webinar, going after the Guinness Record of 31,000 registrants set by HubSpot in 2011. All marketers are invited to be part of marketing history by registering for The Science of Inbound Marketing, taking place on July 12 at 1:00pm EST. and hosted by HubSpot's Social Media Scientist, Dan Zarrella, and HootSuite's VP of Marketing, Ben Watson. Together, the two companies will demonstrate the important role real data, facts and science play in inbound marketing. Follow hashtag #InboundSci for the latest on this groundbreaking webinar event.

"Social media spending is on the rise. We watch as companies invest significant dollars into driving marketing campaigns using social networks as the next marketing platform," says Ryan Holmes, CEO of HootSuite Media, Inc. "Through this partnership, the professional marketer can finally follow up with social media leads, nurture relationships in real time, and close deals easier than ever before."

"We built HubSpot software to make marketing easier, and then expanded it by launching the world's largest marketing software marketplace just under a year ago," said Brian Halligan, CEO of HubSpot, the all-in-one marketing software provider. "Of 60+ apps we've seen, HootSuite is building one of the most exciting. Plugging social media management into HubSpot's end-to-end marketing software makes social accountable for generating leads, customers and true ROI."

HootSuite Goes Big at HubSpot's Inbound 2012 Conference

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HootSuite & HubSpot Announce Partnership to Close the Loop on Social Marketing & Lead Management #ClosedLoopSocial

CHICAGO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--

Mercent, a leading technology company that enables retailers to profitably reach and convert more shoppers online, and Moontoast, a leading provider of social activation applications and analytics, today announced a partnership that integrates Moontoasts Social Activation Engine with Mercent Retail. Through the partnership, Mercent and Moontoast will provide leading brand name retailers with the ability to drive online sales and profits through robust social media, interaction and commerce.

Moontoasts Social Activation Engine will be integrated with the award-winning Mercent Retail platform, enabling leading retailers to drive lead generation, email acquisition, and product sales through social networks, ad networks, and affiliate websites.

Mercent is a trusted, leading technology company that enables retailers to profitably reach and convert more shoppers online, said Blair Heavey, CEO of Moontoast. We are pleased and excited to help Mercent customers to be able to seamlessly use Moontoasts Social Activation Engine and social apps to improve their social reach and engagement while delivering meaningful customer acquisition and sales through social networks, including sites such as Facebook, ad networks, and affiliate sites.

According to Mercent CEO Eric Best, Were excited to partner with Moontoast to offer Mercent clients a dynamic, proven and revenue-generating social media platform. This partnership expands channel reach and product capabilities Mercent offers to its portfolio of brand name retailers and we look forward to driving even greater revenue and profits for this growing base.

Moontoasts platform is based on four stages of fan activation discovery, interaction, transaction, and endorsement to give fans relevant content while giving online marketers the ability to interact and transact with consumers through a series of powerful apps distributed to engage users on social networks, ad networks and websites. Moontoasts Social Analytics provides online marketers rich intelligence on the relationships between social reach, engagement and transactions with fans, enabling marketers to achieve meaningful business results. Retailers will have direct access to Moontoasts patent-pending Social Analytics Suite, which provides rich data that ties social activity to interaction and revenue, improving social performance and measuring Return on Fan. Moontoast Social Analytics delivers critical insights to help better understand relationships, relevancy, and results.

Mercent optimizes retail product and offers visibility across leading shopping destinations that include online marketplaces Amazon.com and eBay; paid search platforms Google AdWords and Microsoft AdCenter; product ad platforms Google Shopping, Google Product Listing Ads (PLA) and Amazon Product Ads; comparison shopping engines (CSEs); affiliate networks; and social and mobile shopping channels. The Mercent Retail platform complements product ad placement with deep retail analytics and business intelligence tools that highlight the products, categories, brands, promotions, ads, and channels contributing most to online performance and ROI. Mercents proprietary tools allow retail marketers to take action on these real-time insights.

Moontoast and Mercent are attending and exhibiting at Booths #132 and #529 respectively, speaking and blogging at the worlds largest eCommerce tradeshow in the nation - Internet Retailer Conference & Exhibition (IRCE), which is being held at the McCormick Place West in Chicago June 5-8, 2012.

To learn more about Mercents complete product portfolio, or for an in-person demo of Mercent Retail for Google Shopping at IRCE, please contact Mercent at206-832-3900or hello@mercent.com. Information regarding Mercent Retail shopping feed management technology, Mercent Performance marketing services, and the complete list of online marketing channels in the Mercent Shopping Network is also available atwww.mercent.com.

To see Moontoast in action or schedule an in-person demo of the Social Activation Engine and Social Analytics Suite at IRCE, contact Moontoast at sales@moontoast.com. To learn more about how Moontoast helps brands activate their fans, please visit http://www.moontoast.com or contact Mercent.

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Mercent and Moontoast Partner to Provide Powerful Social Marketing Solutions for Leading Retailers