Marketing Tactics

Rakuten has confirmed that it is in the process of acquiring Ebates, a provider of the largest cash-back shopping website in North America, for a total consideration of $1 billion in cash and will hold 100% of Ebates’ outstanding voting stock.

Tilly’s, a leading specialty retailer in the action sports industry selling clothing, shoes, and accessories, has enlisted visual search platform Slyce to assist it in the creation of Tilly's Snap Shop.

The service leverages Slyce visual search technology to enable users to access the retailer’s mobile website on their smartphones, snap photos of desired items within any of Tilly's seasonal collection catalogs and purchase the item directly at the moment of impulse.

Maxwell House has launched a sponsored digital content series called "Made Right Here," that showcases “made-in-America” stories as part of its efforts to rejuvenate the brand and tap into a new generation of coffee drinkers.

Produced in partnership with Coolfire Studios and Mr. Here Productions, "Made Right Here" features the people behind products manufactured all across the country, from the small sheds and workshops of artists to large gleaming factories run by assembly lines.

New York -- Omnichannel retailer Century Martial Arts will share insights on how it leverages business intelligence to better monitor and engage with customers during a Chain Store Age webcast on Tuesday, September 23, at 2 p.m. EDT (11 a.m. PDT). Sponsored by Microsoft Dynamics, the presentation will take BI from buzz word to a “getting down to business” strategy and discuss how to elevate reporting to real intelligence – and actionable insight.

New York -- Panera Bread would like its customers to leave their guns at home. The bakery-cafe chain joined a handful of other high-profile retailers, including Starbucks, Chipotle, and Target, to make the request.  

Ottawa, Canada - The retailers who “won” during the holiday season in 2013 were those that offered meaningful discounts on a sizable number of products on Black Friday instead of discounting a small number of door crashers. According to analysis from 360pi and Retail Systems Research, poor financial performance followed those retailers who discounted during the week leading into Black Friday, and those who kept discounts in place following Cyber Monday generally fared better than those who raised prices.

Austin, Texas - Whole Foods Market and one-hour grocery delivery service Instacart are launching a new partnership that enables customers to have Whole Foods Market products delivered in as little as one hour. Customers will soon also have the option to place orders via Instacart and pick up their order at a local Whole Foods Market store.

Austin, Texas - Nearly all Americans (96%) are coupon users, according to the latest edition of the Shoppers Trend Report conducted in conjunction with The Omnibus Company. The number of Americans who rely mostly on mobile coupons has been steadily increasing during the past few years (15% in 2014, compared to 10% in 2013 vs. 4% in 2010).

Las Vegas - Cricket Wireless and GameStop Corp. are launching a new strategic retail relationship that will offer Cricket Wireless' no-annual contract service in more than 2,800 GameStop U.S. store locations. Starting in October after a successful trial in select markets, GameStop will begin selling Cricket Wireless no-annual contract service and smartphone devices and accessories.  

Saks Fifth Avenue is launching a new user-generated content hub on its e-commerce site. Called #SaksStyle and based on the Curalate Fanreel image integration platform, #SaksStyle allows customers to display photos from Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and Tumblr in a social shopping environment.

Here are three reasons to like (and very possibly emulate) what Saks is doing with its latest social venture.