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Marketing
23 February
eBay advertising grows 27%, and execs say it will only get bigger
It's another sign of retail media strength.

Photo by Oberon Copeland @veryinformed.com on Unsplash
At a time when ecommerce marketplaces are building stronger retail media businesses, eBay is posting gains in advertising.
“Our marketplace continues to benefit from innovation in our advertising business, which delivered strong growth in Q4 despite headwinds in the broader digital ad market,” eBay CEO Jamie Iannone said on a call Wednesday to recap fourth quarter results.
The company shared the following data on its advertising business:
Promoted listings revenue rose 27% to $276 million. That was more than 30 points faster than GMV growth.
Over 2 million sellers adopted at least one ad product in Q4.
Live voted listings topped 700 million.
Ad revenue is nearing 1.8% of GMV for eBay.
The top performing ad unit was the standard promoted listing.
Newer ad products, including an advanced promoted listing, grew by more than 20%.
“Seller adoption of advanced has grown, as we have expanded access and automated more elements of campaign management to make this powerful ad unit easier to use,” Iannone said.
eBay also recently launched additional ad features:
Quick setup. This is a one-click campaign creation tool for CPC advertisers in which eBay automates and optimizes campaign structure, ad groups targeting and keyword bids.
Multiuser account access across advertising accounts enables eBay sellers to delegate campaign management to third parties such as brands or ad agencies.
How big can eBay's ad business be?
Iannone said eBay’s advertising business has room to grow. Currently, it is 1.8% of GMV. Company leaders see a path to grow that penetration.
“We have line of sight to 3%, which we still feel great about. If you look at the performance, promoted listing standard continues to be the workhorse of the product, and we're continuing to drive additional penetration there, hitting 2 million sellers and 700 million listings,” Iannone said. “But we're also excited by our new products.”
What’s driving growth?
eBay is among the platforms that are realizing gains in advertising as a result of the wider rise of ecommerce and the recent importance of first-party data, which is collected through direct purchases and loyalty programs.
Privacy-oriented changes in the digital ad landscape such as App Tracking Transparency made the ability to use this purchase level data for targeting within a single platform more valuable. eBay is an example of a retail media network that uses this data to offer advertising within its marketplace.
eBay also made changes to its advertising products. It shifted from display advertising to the promoted listings and CPC ads found on platforms like Google and Amazon.
"This extraordinary result was primarily driven by optimization and performance improvements in our standard promoted listings product, CFO Steve Priest told analysts. "Healthy growth in our newer products, most notably our cost per click as also contributed meaningfully. Our legacy third-party display ads were weaker in Q4 due to industry-wide headwinds over the holidays, but these ads represent an increasingly smaller portion of our mix."
While social media businesses like Meta and Snap are facing slowdowns in advertising, retail media is growing. eBay is one example. Amazon Advertising grew 19% in the most recent quarter, while Walmart Connect grew 41% in the fourth quarter and became a $2.7 billion business in 2022.
Increasingly, marketplaces like eBay are in the retail media business just as much as they are in the ecommerce business.
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Operations
13 March
Patagonia acquires Moonshot, Langers future-proofs with GEN-Z
Dealboard has the latest funding and M&A news in retail media and multichannel commerce.
GEN Z deploys critters for eco-consciousness. (Courtesy photo)
This week, Patagonia acquires nutritious snacks, and a juice company expands through flavorless beverages. Plus, software companies in Amazon marketplace sales, behavioral marketing and EDI raise new funding.
Funding
Threecolts raises $90 million
Threecolts, which provides cloud-based software for Amazon-based businesses, raised $90 million in a Series A funding round.
The round was led by Crossbeam Venture Partners and General Global Capital, with participation from Stratos and CoVenture.
Launched in 2021, the company has grown revenue 6x year-over-year, and made 14 acquisitions.
"Threecolts' impressive execution over the past year means that sellers can now access a one-stop shop solution for an increasing number of pain points, easing vendor fatigue and administrative loads,” said Sakib Jamal, senior investment associate at Crossbeam, in a statement.
Wunderkind raises $76M
Wunderkind, a behavioral marketing platform, raised $76 million in a Series C round, according to TechCrunch.
Financial services company Neuberger Berman led the financing.
Founded in 2010, Wunderkind recently brought on Bill Ingram as CEO. TechCrunch described the platform’s capabilities this way:
Founded in 2010, Wunderkind aims to scale brands’ abilities to foster customer relationships through digital channels. How? By analyzing smartphone and desktop web visitors’ real-time and historical behaviors to match value to intent, Ingram says.
Wunderkind claims it can determine who visitors are based on the web page that referred them and the content that they’re interacting with.
Wunderkind works with more than 1,000 brands, including Rag & Bone, HelloFresh, Uniqlo, Sonos and See’s Candy.
Odyssey Wellness raises $6.3M for functional mushroom energy drink
Odyssey Wellness, a sparkling energy drink with functional mushrooms, raised $6.3 million in a Series A round.
With functional mushrooms including Cordyceps and Lion’s Mane, Odyssey Wellness aims to promote brain performance, energy, focus, and mood without caffeine.
The brand launched in 2021, and is now available at over 5,000 brick and mortar locations, including natural, conventional retailers, and c-stores. The brand has also carved out a presence in upscale bars, restaurants, hotels and music festivals.
Crstl launches with $4.4M in seed funding for B2B ecommerce platform
Crstl, which provides a platform to DTC brands to do business with larger retailers and supply chain companies, raised $4.4 million in seed funding.
The financing was led by Mastry Ventures, with support from Village Global, Alumni Ventures, SuperAngel VC, On Deck, Mensch Capital Partners, Harizury, as well as founders and executives from Uber, Faire, Instagram, Stedi, ShipBob, OpenStore, Motive.
Crstl’s technology is provides an update to the electronic data interchange (EDI) that uses APIs and is built for commerce.
“There is palpable pain felt by thousands of U.S. brands expanding into retail. Diversification from direct-to-consumer to retail and marketplaces is not a nice to have, but a necessity today. And even when these brands win business with Target or Walmart or Whole Foods, they are stuck dealing with legacy solutions that create delays and big holes in their plans, and thus P&L,” said Fatima Husain of Mastry Ventures, in a statement. “Crstl is the painkiller these brands have been looking for: a faster, better, affordable EDI solution.”
Mergers and acquisitions
Moonshot acquired by Patagonia Provisions
Moonshot, a cracker brand, was acquired by Patagonia Provisions, the food and beverage division of Patagonia.
Moonshot is a climate-friendly snack brand that makes wheat using regenerative and organic practices, and has a supply chain where its farmer, miller and manufacturer are all located within 100 miles of each other.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Gen Z acquired by Langers
GEN Z, an aluminum bottled water company, was acquired by Langers, a family-owned company in the juice industry.
Founded in 2021, GEN-Z sells “flavorless, transparent liquid” in a reusable, recyclable bottle that cuts through Zoomer's high BS-meter.”
While the brand features critters on packaging and doesn’t take itself too seriously in messaging, it has a serious mission to reduce plastic waste. The brand initially grew through ecommerce.
In Langers, it is joining a company that has sought to push away from glass bottles, and is looking to “future-proof” its business, said CMO Erin Campbell.
Terms were not disclosed.
Criteo acquires offline media platform
Criteo, a commerce media company, acquired Brandcrush, a platform that enables buying of offline media.
Over the last year, Criteo has worked with a variety of retailers to establish retail media networks that enable advertising on their ecommerce marketplaces.
The addition of Brandcrush comes as additional opportunities emerge to serve digital advertising in stores and through other offline channels such as samples and inserts.
Brandcrush’s platform provides a single place to manage orders, inventory, and supplier management across channels.
Terms were not disclosed.
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