Publisher Spotlight: Connexity
Can you briefly introduce yourself?
I am the Director of Business Development at Connexity, and I look after new businesses in the French market. I have been with Connexity for over 15 years in both retailer and publisher roles in the UK and France.
Can you introduce Connexity? What’s the story and the core business value behind Connexity?
Connexity is a Performance Marketing technology business helping retailers (such as eBay, Walmart, OTTO, Dell, Boulanger, Mano Mano, Groupon & AO.com) access qualified shoppers through our content and shopping publishers as well as through enterprise product ad platforms such as Google Shopping Ads, Microsoft Bing PLA and Facebook. This unparalleled access to qualified shoppers is optimised to COS% targets using proprietary technology and localised optimisation teams across Europe, the US and APAC. To give you a sense of scale, we have generated 600m leads with 14M sales between April 2020 and April 2021, which equates to €1.7bn/$2bn in incremental sales revenue to our 1600+ retailers.
What is CSS? Why use a CSS partner?
Since 2017, for retailers to appear in Shopping Ads by Google, they need to work with a Comparison Shopping Service (CSS) partner. They can either use Google Shopping (which is a CSS) or they can use another CSS such as Connexity. If they use a CSS other than Google Shopping, they will be able to save up to 20% on their Shopping Ads by Google activity. Each CSS is different and will have its own approach, optimisation tools, service model (self-service or fully managed) and strategy, and it’s important to highlight that there is no limit to the number of CSS partners a retailer can work with. Based on a survey of our own retailers, over 40% of them work with more than 3 CSS partners and for many retailers, having a multi-CSS strategy is the best way to maximise the opportunity and to secure incremental sales. The Shopping Ads by Google Auction is a second-price auction so a retailer will only ever pay the next bid from a competitor, irrespective of the number of CSS partners they are working with.
What are the benefits for advertisers working with Connexity?
We also provide unique access to 3rd party CSS partners giving retailers more reach, product shelf-space/visibility and subsequently more sales.
Why did you join the Tradedoubler network and what features do you enjoy?
We have joined the Tradedoubler network due to its list of extensive clients across the EU markets, its longstanding experience in the affiliate industry and the dedicated support the Tradedoubler retailer and publisher teams provide.
Where do you think is the affiliate space heading to in 2021 and what are the main market disruptions?
The past 12 months have seen a huge growth in online shopping and this upwards trend is likely to stay as it becomes the “new normal”. Retailers are looking to affiliate partners to help provide stability and growth at a time of uncertainty so in our view the affiliate space will continue to see strong growth through 2021.
Do you have any upcoming promotions, new launches, or exciting news you would like to share?
With the successful integration of Skimlinks last year, what’s exciting this year for advertisers is that they’ll be able to take advantage of both marketplace and editorial placements through our network, leveraging the broader network of quality enterprise publishers in all markets to acquire new customers and generate incremental revenues. There’s also a busy product roadmap ahead with releases that are tightly focused on generating maximum value for our partners and customers.
A big thank you to Marc for this very informative interview!
