Digital: MarTech and Advertising Solutions

– PLAI, the Mondadori Group startup accelerator aimed at turning AI-based ideas into successful businesses, was a leading player at SMAU (www.smau.it/milano), a reference for the innovation ecosystem in Italy, which was held in Milan at FieraMilanoCity on 29 and 30 October.

During the event, PLAI – the Mondadori Group accelerator — together with other companies of excellence accepted the SMAU 2024 Innovation Award, the prestigious prize for Italian companies with a strong propensity for innovation, capable of driving the country’s growth. It aims to enhance collaboration between companies and startups through open innovation and co-innovation projects to promote competitive solutions internationally. The SMAU Innovation Award is dedicated to companies that embrace innovation as a strategy for growth and success, becoming a model for the Italian and international markets.

‘The SMAU Innovation Award is a source of pride for the entire Mondadori Group, which places technological progress and related applications at the basis of its strategy for success. To do so, it has created an accelerator to select and support the development of innovative startups and open a concrete market outlet for the most promising,’ says Stefano Argiolas, CEO of PLAI.

Stefano Argiolas talked about his experience with PLAI at the live show ‘Open innovation models and approaches, how to stimulate innovation in the enterprise’. Open innovation allows companies in general, but startups in particular, to work with external partners that encourage creativity and open opportunities for growth and the development of solutions and processes.

SMAU proved to be an event full of workshops, networking and unique opportunities to make contact with people driving change: Andrea Santagata, CEO of Mondadori Media and Chief Innovation Officer of Mondadori Group, was involved in the working table behind closed doors, chaired by Alessandro Fermi, Councillor for University, Research and Innovation of the Lombardy Region, entitled ‘Artificial intelligence: ongoing experiences and future prospects’ formed with other companies to discuss issues related to artificial intelligence and collaboration models with startups.

In the matching area, the space designed for networking, PLAI also met the request for interaction to present the solutions of its young businesses — of the 165 invited by SMAU — that align with the interests of Mondadori Group: education, books and publishing, new media & advertising and retail.

‘We decided to participate in SMAU for the first time because we consider the event to be the stage for innovation in Italy and also the preferred place for interaction among entrepreneurs. We have received several requests for meetings from startups that view PLAI as being able to transform the future. Our mapping and scouting does not end here. We are already thinking about the next acceleration cycle,’ declares Stefano Argiolas.

October was a month full of networking and presentations for PLAI, from Milan Digital Week to SIOS24 Florence by Startup Italia, from Codemotion Conference Day to Intersections 2024, the event stemming from the union of IAB Forum and IF! Italians Festival — dedicated to digital innovation, marketing, communication, creativity and technology — and finally to SMAU 2024.

PLAI is the Mondadori Group startup accelerator that aims to transform ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful entrepreneurial ventures. PLAI offers them a distinctive field of application and an industrial market both within the Group and with the initiative’s partners. PLAI operates in the pre-seed and seed phases, selecting and investing in Italian and international startups. In addition to capital, the accelerator provides startups with concrete areas to apply AI, structured training and mentorship courses, and the opportunity to participate in networking events, partly thanks to the unique set of skills and assets provided by major Italian and international partners.

PLAI, the Mondadori Group startup accelerator aimed at transforming ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful companies, has selected 11 startups for its first accelerator programme.

The startups were chosen from among 520 applications based on the quality of the team, the potential for business integration, level of scalability, technological innovation, roadmap, and go-to-market.

‘The decision was incredibly difficult, starting with the first round of selection from the more than 500 applications received. Each startup was full of innovation and ambition. The selection reflected our commitment to supporting the most revolutionary and sustainable ideas, highlighting the fierce competition and high quality of the projects submitted. We selected 11 of them in the end, and we are very eager to work together with the different teams and help them transform their ideas into successful businesses,’ says Stefano Argiolas, CEO of PLAI.

Startups entering in BATCH 2024

AD cube – new media & advertising
Companies waste up to 26 per cent of their advertising budgets due to inefficiencies in channel allocation. AD cube is an AI-driven director that optimizes ad campaigns across multiple platforms, including Google, Meta, TikTok, Amazon, and more. It meticulously manages budget allocation, creative content, and targeting strategies throughout the entire marketing funnel, leading to increases in ROI of up to 30 per cent.

Ahilab – new media & advertising
SEM and SEO are decreasing as they are progressively replaced by Gen AI. Ahilab is a native ads network for AI apps, connecting AI developers to digital advertisers. Developers use the Ahilab API to display ads in any AI-generated content (images, text, or video). Advertisers can run ads and reach only the target audience that interacts with Gen AI apps.

Aidamask – books and publishing
Options to optimize processes through new technologies are often blocked by fears that data protection is not ensured. Aidamask offers an API-based intelligent de-identification system integrated with Gen AI solutions; it is available as both a cloud (SaaS) and on-premises option. The zero-trust approach to data protection enables companies to harness the power of leading Gen AI models safely and effortlessly.

Alfred – education
Preparing for oral exams is challenging for many students. Due to a lack of personalized feedback and limited interaction with teachers, it often results in anxiety and poor performance. Prof. Alfred is an innovative e-learning platform that revolutionizes exam preparation through an intelligent virtual assistant. The platform provides personalized feedback in real time, is accessible 24/7, dynamically adapts to the specific educational content uploaded, and offers an experience that transcends traditional student-teacher interaction.

Equal Education – education
The unguided use of AI risks obscuring students’ and teachers’ actual abilities, and schools are struggling to ensure widespread mathematical literacy. Equal enhances math education with its challenge-based platform: math problems become interactive experiences for students to grow, with assistance and progress analysis. Supported by AI, Equal generates theoretical support and personalized exercises, while providing teachers with learning analysis tools to effectively address individual needs.

IStory – books and publishing
Children’s reading habits are changing due to passive time spent in front of screens, and parents are struggling to find engaging solutions that encourage reading and promote active and positive digital use. Istory provides a unique and personalized reading experience that combines AI-guided print books with interactive digital content that encourages safe, positive reading and use of technology.

Olivia – retail
Demand analysis at retail stores today requires a data-driven approach. Olivia is a retail data analytics platform that enables future demand forecasting through machine learning algorithms and sentiment analysis tools to better allocate budgets and plan commercial offerings appropriately at stores.

Paperbox Health – education
Paperbox’s DINO addresses challenges related to delayed or missed identification of learning disorders by offering an efficient and engaging screening and intervention tool that is highly accessible for children aged 5 to 7. Using Monte Carlo simulations for assessment and monitoring and employing Gen AI to personalize the learning pathway, DINO identifies each child’s learning needs, including potential disorders, and defines the most effective approach to interaction.

Pathway English – education
Preparation for exams and certifications is a challenge, both due to a lack of personalization if done independently and because private tutoring services are expensive. This Digital Academy is AI-based and offers continuous 24/7 personalized support. The virtual tutor analyzes student performance, identifies areas for improvement, and provides real-time feedback, creating a custom learning experience for each user.

Similar – books and publishing
Books based on movies attract fans but adapting a movie for a novel can take up to 6 months, limiting the author’s creativity to the confines of the original screenplay. Similar’s Bookify is a state-of-the-art deep learning system that converts movies to books in a single day and eliminates the need for manual effort.

Stip – retail
AI for customer service is not just about chatbots. Unless supported by additional AI models, chatbots only lead to partial improvements in efficiency. Stip has developed 15 AI models, each dedicated to a specific stage of the customer service process. With Stip, companies can automate content moderation, find similar requests and check how they were handled, generate response suggestions, automatically collect missing information from the customer, categorize requests, and more. All in their CRM software.

What the selected startups will do now

The four-month acceleration cycle for these 11 startups begins this afternoon with the kick-off at PL7 (WAO, Milan).

During this period, each startup will participate in workshops, dedicated operating and hands-on sessions, inspirational masterclasses led by Italian and international experts — divided into General AI Trends and Industry Verticals to help them understand their industry — and tailored mentorship sessions.

In addition, the startups will be able to participate in ecosystem events, networking meetings with partners, and company visits to stimulate collaboration and provide new opportunities for business development and growth.

The first appointment is with Milano Digital Week, the popular event that opens a discussion on new technologies with citizens and businesses. On Monday, October 14, all the startups in the PLAI accelerator programme will have the unique opportunity to present their innovative ideas to the professionals in the city of Milan at the Palazzo dei Giureconsulti.

On October 22 and 23, the 11 startups will also have the opportunity to preside over a booth entirely dedicated to them at the Codemotion Conference in Milan.

This will be followed — in parallel with training and mentorship — by other presentations at SMAU Milan 2024 (October 28 and 29), Italy’s reference event on innovation and startups. The startups will also participate in Intersections 2024, the largest event in Italy dedicated to marketing, communication, creativity, and technology, stemming from the collaboration between IAB Forum and IF! Italian Festivals (October 29 and 30).

At the end of the acceleration period in early 2025, the startups will be featured at Demo Day, a full day where they can make themselves known to investors and companies, kicking off another important stage of development.

PLAI is the Mondadori Group startup accelerator that aims to transform ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful entrepreneurial ventures. PLAI offers them a distinctive field of application and an industrial market both within the Group and with the initiative’s partners. PLAI operates in the pre-seed and seed phases, selecting and investing in Italian and international startups. In addition to capital, the accelerator provides startups with concrete areas to apply AI, structured training and mentorship courses, and the opportunity to participate in networking events, partly thanks to the unique set of skills and assets provided by major Italian and international partners.

PLAI, the Mondadori Group startup accelerator aimed at transforming ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful companies, will make a strong contribution to the 7^th edition of Milan Digital Week.

This widespread, collective event — with more than 190 events in more than 100 locations —will be held from October 11 to 14 in Milan, focusing on artificial intelligence as a driver of digital development and innovation for the benefit of people and the business community. The Central Hub of this event will be Palazzo dei Giureconsulti, a meeting place for conferences, workshops and round tables in the heart of Milan, serving to connect citizens and businesses to create a constant interaction between them.

PLAI will be present for the entire duration of the event, with a desk in the Expo area. Together with Mondadori Group, it will also enrich the schedule of activities and meetings planned for Milano Digital Week, delving into new aspects of digital Milan through its experience both as a multimedia publishing group and in the selection and acceleration of business ideas that impact different areas of people’s lives.

The morning of Monday, Oct. 14, from 9:30 a.m. to 1 p.m., will be completely dedicated to artificial intelligence, under the title: ‘Italy’s Strategy for Artificial Intelligence’. At this session, Andrea Santagata, the Managing Director of the Digital and MarTech Units at Mondadori Media S.p.A. and Chief Innovation Officer of Mondadori Group, will give a keynote speech at 10 a.m. entitled ‘Turning artificial intelligence into a driver of change: The Mondadori Case’ and will then participate in the round table moderated by Emilio Mango (TIG, The Innovation Group) entitled ‘The Ethics of Algorithms and The Ethics of Speed’.

In the afternoon, Stefano Argiolas, CEO of PLAI, will introduce the workshop ‘Unveiling Innovation: Generative AI as a Tool for Crafting New Business Ventures’, while the startups selected for PLAI’s first acceleration round — which were announced on Oct. 7 — will have the opportunity to introduce themselves to the audience of professionals attending Milan Digital Week at Palazzo Giureconsulti from 4 to 4:30 p.m.

PLAI is the Mondadori Group startup accelerator that aims to transform ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful entrepreneurial ventures. PLAI offers them a distinctive field of application and an industrial market both within the Group and with the initiative’s partners. PLAI operates in the pre-seed and seed phases, selecting and investing in Italian and international startups. In addition to capital, the accelerator provides startups with concrete areas to apply AI, structured training and mentorship courses, and the opportunity to participate in networking events, partly thanks to the unique set of skills and assets provided by major Italian and international partners.

PLAI, the  Mondadori Group’s startup accelerator aimed at transforming ideas based on the use of artificial intelligence into successful entrepreneurial ventures, has successfully reached a new milestone just a few months after its launch: in 60 days, since the start of the “call 4 startups”, 520 applications have been received.

After an initial selection of 203 startups, only 18 were given the opportunity to present themselves during the Selection Day before an audience of professionals: through a 3-minute elevated pitch and dedicated interactive tables – with partners, members of the Advisory Board and the PLAI team, as well as the Mondadori Group – they had a chance to present themselves and therefore continue their selection process to access the acceleration programme promoted by PLAI.

It was an intense and dynamic day of speeches, presentations, and networking, packed with ideas and inspiration. This unique opportunity provided all participants with a special insight into the Italian and international ecosystem of generative artificial intelligence, focusing in particular on four application areas: education, book and publishing, new media & advertising and retail.

In the coming weeks, the names of the 10 startups selected for the first acceleration cycle will be announced based on the criteria of team quality, integration potential, scalability, technological innovation, roadmap and go-to-market. For these startups, the acceleration cycle will begin in October and last four months. During this phase, each startup will benefit from more than 50 hours of dedicated workshops led by Italian and international experts, 20 hours of tailored mentorship and participation in dedicated events.

A Demo Day is planned for early 2025, when startups will be introduced to the market, enabling them to present themselves to investors and companies and therefore kick-start a further important stage of development.

During the Selection Day, PLAI welcomed two new strategic partners: Fastweb, one of Italy’s leading telecommunications operators, and StartupItalia, the independent digital hub of Italian technological innovation.

“We are proud to have important Italian and international partners with us, who will support us in building a functional ecosystem to support startups and with whom we will be able to discuss various innovation and AI topics. The accelerator activities are proceeding at a fast pace, with great enthusiasm and the best professionalism, partly thanks to their contribution,” comments Stefano Argiolas, CEO of PLAI.

Together with those who had already joined the project, the two new partners will provide the PLAI-Ground – the ecosystem around PLAI – with unique skills and assets. Selected startups will be able to join structured training and mentorship courses, participate in networking events, access cutting-edge technologies and thereby accelerate their growth and reach their full potential.

Fastweb and StartupItalia are also joining the PLAI Advisory Board, composed of a group of established professionals, academics and managers with wide-ranging expertise in AI and business development.

Fastweb’s partnership with PLAI is part of a broader agreement reached with the Mondadori Group. Fastweb, which in July launched NeXXt AI Factory, the first supercomputer in Italy dedicated to generative AI – and presented the first release of MIIA, the new LLM (large language model) trained natively in Italian on high-quality Italian data both public and from third-party companies –, will be able to count on an important set of editorial content from Mondadori Media’s vertical media brands (such as GialloZafferano, Focus, MypersonalTrainer…).

The agreement is based on the Mondadori Group’s conviction that a national language model based on the Italian language, such as Fastweb’s, is a useful asset for the Italian economy to take advantage of the many opportunities related to the AI revolution. Moreover, the AI model developed by Fastweb is based on the utmost attention to data protection and copyright, which are essential aspects for reconciling development, rights, innovation and fair distribution of value.

Fastweb will therefore be an important partner not only for PLAI, but also for the development of AI within the entire Mondadori Group.

The collaboration with StartupItalia, initiated from the very first stage through support for PLAI in the call 4 startups, will continue in the future with a focus on a serial, multi-channel and multimedia value communication path, which will see the creation of editorial and social content on specific strategic topics and PLAI’s participation as a partner in the Florence (2 October) and Milan (17 December) editions of the StartupItalia Open Summit (SIOS) – since 2015, the leading, most recognised and most widespread Italian event dedicated to innovation.

PLAI is the Mondadori Group’s startup accelerator that aims to transform ideas based on the exploitation of artificial intelligence into successful entrepreneurial ventures. PLAI offers them a distinctive field of application and an industrial market both within the Group and with the initiative’s partners. PLAI operates in the pre-seed and seed phases, selecting 10 Italian and international startups for each annual acceleration cycle. In addition to capital, the accelerator provides startups with concrete AI application areas, structured training and mentorship courses and the opportunity to participate in networking events, partly thanks to the unique set of skills and assets provided by major Italian and international partners

AdKaora, an international digital agency with full-funnel advertising solutions under the Mondadori Group’s MarTech Pole, has created a proximity marketing strategy outside Italy for Safilo Group, one of the most important companies in the eyewear market, to promote the Marc Jacobs eyewear line.

The purpose of the campaign, which went online in April and was managed together with OMD, Omnicom Media Group’s media agency, was to cover the entire customer journey, increasing brand awareness of the product line and stimulating drive-to-store for points of interest in France.

The AdKaora Creative Studio customised a rich and advanced media format with a highly interactive and innovative character to users a unique experience in discovering the brand. Using the Find&Go Now! interactive map, customers actually entered the shops, increasing footfall and passes by the shops where the product was sold.

The proximity marketing developed by AdKaora covered all steps in the funnel, from awareness to consideration to stimulating footfall in shops, through a mix of display formats, rich media and integrated channels that denote proximity.

The campaign recorded a 25.7% engagement rate thanks to the Find&Go Now! map and a 17.3% increase in shop visits.

 The complete success of this strategy was also due to inclusion of the Brand Lift Survey (BLS) tool by AdKaora and Hej! which relied on user interception and user activation to gather valuable information on the target audience tied to precise campaign objectives and KPI measurement.
The objectives of the BLS included:

• analysing brand consideration and brand favourability, i.e. the degree to which users prefer and favourably consider the brand and product;
• extracting more details on the target audience in terms of socio-demographics;
• analysing the perception of competitors;
• collecting insights and KPIs from the entire marketing funnel.

The advertising recorded a 50% increase in brand consideration and a 38%increase in brand favourability, confirming users’ positive sentiment towards the brand. Marc Jacobs also verified the product’s discriminating factors and learned a little more about the target group, such as geographic composition and brand perception amid the competition due to AI-integrated conversational marketing technology.

Mondadori Media’s innovative MarTech Centre – created around the digital company AdKaora following the acquisition of Hej! in 2021 and then the Spanish media agency Adgage, completed a few months ago – aims to offer the market a wide range of next-generation marketing and advertising services.
The offering ranges from proximity marketing solutions to data-driven performance conversational marketing solutions, from mobile first video advertising solutions to a creative studio able to offer customers high-impact and highly effective advertising formats.

The synergies between AdKaora, Hej! and Adgage – which today make up Mondadori Media’s MarTech Centre – began at the end of 2022 with the aim of guaranteeing, from a technological standpoint, better development of new integrated solutions, to enhance the different professional skills available and to maximise commercial effectiveness and go-to-market.
It was a successful undertaking, cemented by the results achieved in 2023, which showed total revenues of more than 32 million euros, up by almost 30% compared to the previous year, alongside the team continuing to grow stronger, and which now numbers 80 professionals across Milan, Rome and Madrid.

GROWTH DRIVERS

International development is one of the strategy’s most important drivers. The acquisition of the Spanish company Adgage opened up important new international opportunities in 2023, starting in Spain itself and, in recent months, Latin America.
This allowed AdKaora and Hej! to expand into foreign markets and to extend the AdKaora Value Network, thanks to the entry of important new publishing groups worldwide, with entry into other European markets and beyond also planned for 2024.

The second development lever for the coming years is the search for companies that can be integrated in order to offer innovative and complementary solutions to the range of services already offered. A number of interesting special operations are already under consideration in this area.

The third area of development focuses on the strong ability of the in-house marketing, tech and innovation teams to continue developing new products by understanding the opportunities that technological developments provide ahead of time. Along these lines, AdKaora has recently launched new advertising solutions on the market, like Impact Video, a high-impact, full-screen mobile format that is part of an advanced total video strategy covering different channels and focusing on the most interesting current KPI: Attention. The effectiveness of AdKaora’s video formats has been proven by the excellent results in ‘The Attention Game’ research conducted by GroupM and by KPIs provided by third-party certifiers such as Lumen and DoubleVerify.

Proximity marketing has also taken a further leap towards even more effective coverage of the entire consumer funnel thanks to the partnership with Savi – a marketing technology company specialising in coupon-based shopper activation services – where the aim is to strengthen product consideration and purchase incentives through mobile couponing.

Consideration becomes a crucial stage to oversee in order to achieve more concrete results: 2024 will therefore see the consolidation of AdKaora and Hej’s! full funnel proposal, which combines the quality of products with branding focus of the former with the performance strength of the latter.
The strength of Hej! Lies in harnessing Artificial Intelligence at different product and analysis levels. Using its proprietary platform, which is increasingly advanced in terms of analysis automation, Hej! can offer its customers in-depth qualitative analyses aimed at optimising the results of the entire supply chain. With data collected in real time, it is possible to achieve optimal performance and act on the subsequent marketing steps, like processing a qualitative lead.

And it is specifically Generative Artificial Intelligence that the Mondadori Group intends to invest in significantly in the coming years, not least to support the growth of the MarTech Centre. In this respect, a major Open Innovation project will soon be launched, which will also see Mondadori Media at the centre of the AI-related revolution in publishing and marketing.

A NEW STRUCTURE FOR THE MARTECH HUB

In order to achieve its ambitious goals, the MarTech Centre has established a new organisational structure.
Reporting directly to Andrea Santagata, Managing Director of Mondadori Media, Davide Tran, formerly Director of AdKaora, was appointed as Director of the MarTech Centre, with the aim of implementing the new development strategy and maximising synergies.
Reporting directly to Davide Tran, Stefano Argiolas was confirmed as Managing Director of Hej! and appointed the Head of Artificial Intelligence for the Mondadori Group; Paolo De Santis, Co-Managing Director of Hej!, was appointed the Head of Development of New Acquisitions for the MarTech Centre.
To strengthen international development, Luca Nigro, former Managing Director of Adgage, was appointed the Director of Development for the MarTech Centre in LATAM countries; Francesco Binetti, Head of Operations at AdKaora, was appointed the Director of International Development for the MarTech Centre’s Publisher Solutions.
The central sales department is entrusted to Paolo Ingrosso, appointed as Sales Manager for the MarTech Centre, and Luigi D’Alterio, Sales Manager of Hej! and MarTech Centre’s direct customers, while Walter Ferrari assumes the role of Marketing Manager.

AdKaora and Hej!, the Mondadori Group’s MarTech Centre digital agencies, and Savi, a marketing technology company specialising in managing shopper activation services using discount coupons, have been chosen by Sofidel, a leading manufacturer of paper for hygienic and domestic use to promote the Regina Asciugoni product with a proximity marketing campaign aimed at distributing digital discount coupons.

The campaign ran online in November and December 2023, together with Wavemaker, and was aimed at product awareness and drive to store, through multichannel planning: standard and interstitial display, push notifications, formats and notifications on the Stocard app, Hej! social media. All these formats were shown to the target group of shoppers and frequent shoppers nearby Esselunga sales points and let them get on Savi’s form or on Hej!’s “AI based” conversational landing page, in the case of social media, with the aim of getting the users to download the coupon.

The project’s goal was to intercept the target audience nearby the relevant sales points for the campaign and tell them about the existing product offer, influencing the shopper journey through mobile couponing. According to research by Iri FMCG Demand Signals, more than 40% of Italian households search for discounts and offers when shopping.

The results were positive: on four different placements (AdKaora network, Push Notification, Stocard, Hej!) the campaign reached about 1 million users and about 24,000 users lgot to the landing pages, and over 4,000 coupons were generated.

Moreover, a CTR on AdKaora display formats of 1.63% and on push notifications of 2.45% were recorded, confirming the users’ interest and consideration for the product and the offers activated.

The combination of AdKaora’s advanced proximity marketing suite and Savi’s shopping activation technology enables brands to enhance their marketing strategies, boosting brand awareness, consideration and conversion through the integration of Savi’s technology in the main sales point checkouts and through AdKaora and Hej!’s multi-channel planning. This makes it possible to engage users at the points of interest involved in the campaign, but also to gather important insights for brands about consumer behaviour through footfall and post-campaign analysis.

AdKaora and Savi are active with digital coupons on a major retailer network covering several large-scale retail chains in Italy, including Coop, Acqua e Sapone, Iper, Esselunga, and Carrefour. Savi’s platform is integrated with the ecosystem of individual retailers and allows the shopper to redeem promotions in every large or small sales point increasing product consideration and encouraging impulse purchases.

Andrea Zermian, Sales and Marketing Director for Savi said: “From the outset, Sofidel showed great interest and confidence in the proposal we presented to the market through our partnership with AdKaora. The results were encouraging and this further strengthens the partnership’s development prospects. Today, we are able to offer brands an end-to-end, measurable, omnichannel tool that closes the circle of every promotion by providing timely data on both consideration, thanks to issuing coupons, and actual conversion, thanks to the use of coupons at checkouts. This means it’s not only a matter of engaging customers when they are inside the sales point doing their shopping, but also in the consideration phases: announcements, supported by having a voucher, positively impact on perception by leveraging a concrete benefit that supports the customer through the subsequent phases of the funnel”.

Davide Tran, CEO of AdKaora, stated: “Together with Sofidel and our partner Savi, we wanted to achieve very specific communication goals, such as reinforcing product consideration and encouraging purchase by using digital coupons. In addition to achieving high reach numbers with multi-channel planning, another important result was the collection of qualitative leads through Hej!’s conversational marketing, which enabled significant performance in terms of coupon generation and redemption at the sales point. We would like to bring continuous innovations into proximity marketing strategies not only for distribution channels but also in terms of results by adding other “last mile” solution that give a nod to customers’ wishes”.

AdKaora, the Mondadori Group’s digital agency specialising in user-centric mobile advertising and proximity marketing, has been recognised by Google as a Google Certified Publishing Partner (GCPP), an important certification that strengthens the partnership between the two companies, underlines the development of an increasingly solid expertise in favour of the market and the knowledge of Google’s main online advertising products.

The AdKaora Value Network team has, in fact, been committed over the years to provide publishers with a technological and strategic consulting service, to maintain the highest results and market standards when it comes to advertising KPIs such as brand safety and viewability, and to meet and exceed the expectations of the clients in managing their advertising sales.

Publishers today face increasingly complex challenges due to changing user habits towards media and the emergence of new regulations to keep up with. At the same time, there is a growing demand for high-quality advertising experiences and especially for impactful video formats.

AdKaora, therefore, is recognised as one of the first partners in Italy skilled in the use of Google’s entire suite of advanced tools, which, combined with its proprietary technology, make it possible to amplify advertising revenues and unlock new avenues for growth, even abroad.

In addition, AdKaora’s Value Network has now crossed the Italian borders and started its international expansion thanks to Adgage, a Spanish company recently acquired by Mondadori Group, that is already working with top tier publishers in the Spanish, Portuguese and LATAM markets. The strategy for the future is to bring the footprint of AdKaora’s products and services to many other countries worldwide.

For AdKaora, being a GCPP means:

– having a privileged channel with Google and defining an integrated workflow with Google’s technological solutions for publishers

– creating an additional level of trust between customers and partners, as the evaluation process to obtain certification was careful and scrupulous

– allowing publishers to focus on what they love doing most: creating great content.

The certification is further proof of AdKaora’s ability to maximise advertising revenue, implement innovative, next-generation formats including in AMP, and deliver international brands’ premium campaigns on publishers’ web properties, all while providing advanced advertising trend analysis.

Davide Tran, CEO AdKaora comments: “We are proud to be recognised as a Google Certified Publishing Partner: this distinguishes us within the market and confirms our commitment to supporting and developing innovative solutions and quality services for clients and publishers. Thanks to the unique combination of our proprietary technologies, state-of-the-art formats, Value Network and sales teams, we help publishers to reach an ever higher level in their monetisation strategies. For the future, we are determined to further improve our performance and become not only an important but an essential partner for our customers, helping them to effectively grow their advertising revenues.”

AdKaora, the Mondadori Group digital agency specializing in user-centric mobile advertising and proximity marketing, was chosen by Boehringer Ingelheim to promote the launch of a new antiparasitic tablet available for purchase without a veterinary prescription, with a combined proximity marketing and digital out-of-home strategy.

The campaign appeared online in May and June and was managed together with Hearts&Science. The objectives were product awareness and drive to store, achieved by combining high-impact creative formats with advanced proximity tools. The result was a highly effective circular, multichannel project involving more than 2,000 pharmacies and nearby digital totem circuit.

To boost product awareness and encourage footfall in the related stores, the strategy involved the delivery of a mix of geolocal mobile display advertising and near-store push notifications, shown to customers near the related stores to direct users to AdKaora’s proprietary technology, Find&Go Now! It consists of a specially created interactive map customized with brand-recognition elements to guide consumers to the nearest store that carries the product.

The results were positive. The engagement rate stood at 26.4% and the footfall analysis showed that visitation uplift, i.e. the increase in visits to points of interest, reached 41.9%.

Francesca Santoro, Digital Brand Specialist Boehringer Ingelheim: “Working closely with stores through a multi-touch point approach is key in getting users to go the last mile. The activity with AdKaora in 2023 allowed us to bring a lot of people to pharmacies in just a few weeks”.

Davide Tran, CEO AdKaora: “The proximity marketing project implemented together with Boehringer Ingelheim shows the success of a multichannel planning, which acts effectively across the entire consumer funnel. From display formats that reinforce user engagement to push notifications that aim to intercept them at micro-moments of interest, combined with footfall analysis that measures increased visits to the related stores, the strategy has allowed us to achieve important results with great customer satisfaction and compliance with the required KPIs. In addition, by integrating the DOOH channel, we were able to plan hyperlocal content on the main digital systems in major Italian cities. Users exposed to the dual mobile and digital out-of-home channels had significantly higher visit rates and visitation uplift performance than users affected by only one of the channels”.

AdKaora, the Mondadori Group’s digital agency specialising in user-centric mobile advertising and proximity marketing, and Savi, a marketing technology company specialising in the management of discount voucher-based shopper activation services, form an exclusive partnership that aims to promote the use of digital coupons at the main retail brands.

It’s a project that aims to offer customers a new level of proximity marketing able to influence the shopper journey through mobile couponing. More than 40% of Italian families are dedicated to looking for discounts and offers, and almost 60% of them carefully evaluate prices and quantities of the products they intend to buy (Iri Fmcg Demand Signals, October 2022).

This is a buying habit that, according to research by Savi, has grown by 25%, compared to 2021, and which today represents 10.5% of total cash transactions.

The integration between AdKaora’s advanced proximity marketing suite and Savi’s shopping activation technology therefore makes it possible to enhance brands’ marketing strategies, encouraging brand awareness, consideration and conversion thanks to the involvement of different media channels: from standard display formats and rich media created ad hoc by AdKaora Creative Studio, to push notifications, through Stocard formats and social planning carried out together with Hej!.

These tools are combined with drive to store objectives, as well as product launches, loyalty, customer acquisition and sales increases, allowing us not only to engage the user in the points of interest involved in the campaign, but also to collect important insights for brands thanks to footfall and post-campaign analysis.

Andrea Zermian, Savi’s Sales and Marketing Director: “Until today, media strategies often stopped ‘outside the store’, failing to follow the customer until in converted into a transaction at the checkout. Today, thanks to the partnership with AdKaora, the loop of a promotional initiative closes with the purchasing act being measured promptly. The transaction, that uses digital coupons and that is done in a fully automated manner through the retailer’s checkout, allows you to follow the shopper through their journey, starting thanks to online media and ending with the transaction in the physical point of sale. So, ultimately, it’s a fully measurable, omnichannel end-to-end experience. Now, thanks to this new collaboration, we’ll also be able to influence customer purchasing behaviour in the ‘moment of truth’, i.e. when they’re inside the store and are shopping”.

Davide Tran, CEO of AdKaora: “The partnership with Savi allows us not only to enhance our advanced proximity marketing offering with an additional user engagement channel, but also to improve their shopping experience, getting close to what’s called the ‘last mile’ in a targeted manner. Savi’s digitalisation of the coupon was what many customers wanted and having an exclusive partnership with this solution allows us to be a unique player on the market. In fact, sending the coupon directly greatly affects the purchase behaviour since the user is more encouraged to use the discount they receive on a certain product in the next few days by going to the points of sale. So there’s an opportunity for brands to achieve very specific communication objectives, which at the same time strengthens the drive to store”.

How digital coupons work
The promotion is created digitally on the Savi platform and is distributed through AdKaora channels. It can be used exclusively in a paperless form, which helps both the user experience and managing accepting the coupons at the point of sale.

The CouponLink page, a web page delivered to the consumer with a unique URL, hosts multiple discount coupons, but using them at the checkout only requires that a single “box” barcode located at the top of the page be used. This way the coupons are used favours security and generates useful insights in real time, promoting a seamless experience for the shopper, without requiring them to subscribe to or download any mobile apps.