Special Report: The deal will accelerate Crowd Media’s first-mover advantage in the future of influencer marketing.

With strong tailwinds across all of its online sales channels, social commerce company Crowd Media (ASX:CM8) has taken an exciting new step to build out its product offering in the digital marketplace.

The company announced today that it has taken an eight per cent stake in Forever Holdings Ltd, a London-based company that specialises in cutting-edge interactive media.

The deal will be accompanied by a product integration strategy, which further builds on Crowd’s longer-term vision to create a market-leading digital marketing platform with “conversational commerce” between influencers and customers.

 

High-tech

Forever Holdings’ core technology provides a platform for influencers to engage across digital channels in a 1-to-1 setting with followers and customers.

Following Crowd’s investment, that technology will now act as a complement to CM8s Q&A Chatbot – a market-proven technology with an AI capability, that facilitates online conversations in multiple languages.

The combined offering opens up “numerous commercial opportunities across entertainment, sport, influencer marketing, health and educational fields”, Crowd said.

CEO Domenic Carosa added that the deal positions Crowd at the forefront of digital marketing technology, which will increasingly move towards engagement with digital influencers.

Company chairman Steven Schaperra said the deal represents a “historic” market opportunity for the business.

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

The net result is a “talking head” technology platform that will allow consumers to engage with digital versions of famous historic figures and contemporary celebrities.

The total consideration for CM8’s eight per cent stake will amount to around $365,000 comprised of cash (~50 per cent) and shares (~25 per cent), with the remainder comprised of technology services provided by Crowd.

Execution on the deal takes the company “that much closer to our stated goal of actually changing the way products and services are sold via digital influencers”, Carosa said.

“We believe conversational commerce is the future of ecommerce.”

It marks another step in a run of positive news flow for CM8, after company made further inroads in its core European market at the start of August via the Amazon EU marketplace.

 

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.

 

Read MoreTech

Featured Companies

You might be interested in