Special Report: The company now has ‘a seat at the table’ as it gets a first-mover advantage in the next generation of digital marketing technology.

Social commerce company Crowd Media (ASX:CM8) has taken a key step forward in the deployment of its cutting-edge digital marketing technology.

The company has successfully executed on the first rollout of its “talking head” platform for professional skincare company MDComplete.eu.

Delivered 12 months ahead of schedule, the beta version of the talking head platform will offer “conversational commerce” to customers, with a visual chatbot that can help them select the appropriate products.

The AI-based technology has been developed in conjunction with Crowd’s commercial partner Uneeq Ltd and combines  Crowd’s own proprietary technology, which leverages more than 10 years of experience and tech infrastructure in the Q&A Chatbot space.

Over that time, the chatbot technology has processed more than 180 million questions. And Crowd’s market-leading interactive solution also gives it a first mover advantage in the future direction of the ecommerce sector.

Commenting on the company’s new initiatives, Crowd CEO Domenic Carosa said conversational commerce technology is the “future of ecommerce”.

“We are excited to have executed these various initiatives that bring forward the reality of one to one conversation’s between influencers and their respective followers,” Carosa said.

“It takes us that much closer to our stated goal of actually changing the way products and services are sold via digital influencers.”

Crowd Media “Emma Talking Head” beta version

Partnership approach

Along with its successful product launch, Crowd also announced two new strategic partnerships as it establishes a global footprint across multiple online sales channels.

The company has executed on a three-year binding Heads of Agreement (HOA) with UneeQ Limited, to work on the creation of “Digital Ambassadors” as part of its conversational commerce platform.

The aim of the partnership is to develop intellectual property in Digital Ambassador technology, leveraging influencer marketing channels as well as Crowd’s talking-head platform.

The partnership will be run jointly with a management board comprised of the CEOs of Crowd and UneeQ respectively.

Working together, the management board meet monthly to “review the collaborative activities and agree on new activities based on the alignment of strategy, objectives and forthcoming opportunities”, Crowd said.

In addition, Crowd has also executed a binding HOA to form a Joint Venture with Israeli based tech company VFR Assets and Holdings Ltd.

In line with CM8’s conversational commerce strategy, VFR has already developed one of the world’s first digital media influencers, Zoe Dvir (an AI-based digital personality).

The JV “will bring together the technical and commercial expertise of both parties to create a platform that will allow Crowd to roll out many “talking heads” in days and at a fraction of the cost of current platforms”, CM8 said.

Both companies will take a 50 per cent stake in the JV, with the aim of developing a proof-of-concept for the rollout of multiple ‘talking heads’ within the next 180 days.

Crowd will provide an upfront investment of $USD250,000, while “VFR will provide the intellectual property, know-how and development resources to develop the POC”, Crowd said.

Both partnerships are evidence of the company’s commitment to executing on the strategic version first laid out at its AGM in November last year.

At the meeting, Crowd clearly established its mission to become a market leader in influencer marketing, via “a platform that enables conversational commerce between follower and influencer, augmented with a digital visual ‘talking head’ experience”, the company said.

More broadly, the commercial opportunity in digital marketing is “tectonic”, Crowd chairman Steven Schapera said.

“By linking Crowd’s existing Q&A Chatbot technology with the voice and visual technology of our respective partners, we will create an entertaining “conversational commerce” experience between consumer and influencer,” he said.

“As the nature of influencer marketing changes, this gives us a seat at the table.”

 

This article was developed in collaboration with Crowd Media, a Stockhead advertiser at the time of publishing.  This article does not constitute financial product advice. You should consider obtaining independent advice before making any financial decisions.

 

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