Rakuten Advertising Wins Martech Breakthrough Innovation Award 2023

We are thrilled to announce that we have been awarded the MarTech Breakthrough Award for Performance Marketing Innovation in the 6^th annual MarTech Breakthrough Awards! MarTech Breakthrough is a leading market intelligence organization that recognizes the top companies, technologies, and products in the global marketing, sales, and advertising technology industry.

We were recognized for our Insights and Analytics Portal (IAP) which brings advanced capabilities to affiliate marketing through AI-driven analytics tools. The first-of-its-kind self-service solution offers unprecedented insights and predictive performance analytics to affiliate programs of all sizes.

“Recent industry studies show that every affiliate dollar spent averages a $12 return on investment—and with our AI-driven Insights and Analytics Portal available at no additional cost, we’re aiming to extend that ROI even further,” said Adam Rostan, SVP of Product at Rakuten Advertising. “We’re grateful to MarTech Breakthrough for this recognition, and we will continue to refine the platform to deliver actionable program optimizations. Predictive forecasting, partner evaluations, media recommendations, and accelerated data analysis and processing are just the beginning.”

Game-changing analytics for affiliate marketers

Our Insights and Analytics Portal (IAP) is propelling the industry forward. It’s designed to nurture growth, propel your affiliate marketing achievements beyond expectations, and set new standards in performance. This award isn’t just our win; it symbolizes a breakthrough for the entire affiliate marketing community.

IAP displays granular performance benchmarks so brands understand their results relative to industry norms and the Placement Recommender feature leverages data across thousands of clients to pinpoint placements that deliver a target ROI for brands. Additionally, IAP’s new capabilities improve processing time for large data sets and enable affiliate managers to perform macro- and brand-level analytics across more extended time series and broader partner sets.

The breakthrough portal provides AI-powered performance forecasts based on commission and partner scenarios. Marketers can test the impact of changes in commission rates and other program elements and get immediate, accurate assessments. Advertisers can also identify their “best next” partners in order to deliver incremental revenue by surfacing actual in-category performance, activation likelihood, and brand fit.

The benefits of IAP:

• Unlock Insights: Gain predictive analytics and insights tailored for all affiliate programs.
• Optimize Partnerships: AI forecasts for real-time testing and finding your best partners.
• Placement Recommender: Pinpoint placements that hit target ROI, using data across thousands of clients.
• Enhance Analytics: Faster processing for macro- and brand-level analytics across extended data.
• Surpass Industry Norms: Gauge results and strive for excellence with granular benchmarks.

What MarTech Breakthrough says about IAP

“Affiliate marketing is the last frontier in performance marketing for predictive data science and optimization. While other performance channels have been transformed with data intelligence, affiliate has lagged behind,” said James Johnson, Managing Director at MarTech Breakthrough. “Rakuten Advertising is a pioneering innovator in this space, delivering the first-of-its-kind analytics toolset for affiliate, focused on applying AI and machine learning to deliver insights beyond topline performance. The solution’s breakthrough analytics capabilities and self-service tools make obtaining recommendations and optimizations turnkey. Congratulations to the Rakuten Advertising for bringing home the well-deserved win for our ‘Performance Marketing Innovation Award’ in 2023.”

Stay tuned for more updates as we continue to innovate and empower you to thrive in an ever-evolving digital landscape. Together, we’ll shape the future of affiliate marketing and inspire exceptional growth.