The 2016 CRM Market Rising Stars: Vibes Integrates Mobile Messaging and Mobile Wallet into Marketing Campaigns
Mobile marketing solutions provider Vibes has been busy this year. In addition to the launch of a transactional mobile messaging solution, the company has collaborated with both IBM and Marketo, with the goal of empowering marketers when it comes to mobile messaging and mobile wallet marketing.
Vibes added transactional mobile messaging capabilities to its cloud-based mobile marketing platform Catapult in April 2016. The capabilities enable users to establish messages and rules that are triggered by events such as shipping updates, service prompts, processing alerts, and product updates. Users can initiate automated service messaging programs through text (SMS and MMS), push notifications, and mobile wallet applications such as Apple Wallet and Android Pay. According to Mark Tack, vice president of marketing at Vibes, mobile wallets and push notifications “are new and exciting areas for mobile messaging.”
Vibes was announced as a launch partner for the IBM Universal Behavior Exchange (UBX) in October 2015. The UBX assists companies in unifying data from various systems, and organizations that subscribe to the UBX are granted access to Vibes’ Catapult platform, enabling marketers to utilize text messaging, push notifications, mobile analytics systems, and mobile wallet solutions. Catapult also integrates with several IBM Commerce features: Users can personalize their mobile campaigns with IBM Campaign, for target text messaging and mobile wallet offers; connect Web site and e-commerce data and insights from IBM Digital Analytics with all mobile marketing touch points; and manage and send push notifications based on customer data, behavior, and business rules with IBM Engage Mobile.
Vibes’ partnership with Marketo was announced in May 2016. Together, the two companies offer an integration that enables marketers to add text messaging into Marketo-driven marketing campaigns, add mobile wallet content to email marketing campaigns, and establish mobile wallets as the post-click destination for Marketo digital advertising campaigns. Furthermore, marketers can offer consumers a choice in how to receive personalized messages—for example, if a consumer prefers receiving sale notifications via text instead of email, marketers can alter their campaigns accordingly. Prior to the announcement, Vibes was already a part of Marketo’s LaunchPoint ecosystem, a marketing solutions network.