Impact a global partnership management platform supporting more than one million partnerships for more than 1,800 brands, announced the close of a successful H1 in 2021.
The company closed a $150m round of funding at a $1.5bn valuation, in preparation for IPO.
Impact exceeded $100m in annual recurring revenue, acquired two companies to expand its offerings, expanded its global footprint by opening new offices in Denmark and Sweden, and launched an integration with BigCommerce one of the world’s largest ecommerce platforms.
Impact.com experiencing exponential growth
“In today’s digital world, consumers are in full control.”
“They determine how and when to engage with brands, leaving businesses to navigate a new, complex environment of discovery and permission,” said David A. Yovanno, CEO of Impact.
“It’s in this world that partnerships thrive, and Impact is enabling clients to forge partnerships with the publishers, creators, businesses, and communities that consumers trust and use daily to learn, get information, interact, and make purchase decisions.”
“Our clients see partnerships driving 28% of revenue and growing 50%, proof that developing partnerships is now a key strategy for brands looking to connect with consumers.”
With Impact’s new BigCommerce integration, BigCommerce’s 60,000 merchants around the globe can maximise their partnership potential with the ability to easily and directly launch affiliate and influencer programs without the use of developers.
Merchants have the ability to recruit partners, negotiate contracts, automate partner payments, track and attribute performance across devices, and communicate updates.
This builds on Impact’s stable of tech partnerships, giving stakeholders in the partnership economy, brands, publishers, and agencies access to the best solutions in a single platform.
Impact.com’s merchant marketing strategy
Impact.com joined Shopify Plus as a certified app partner for influencer and affiliate marketing.
With Impact’s partnership management platform, Shopify Plus merchants can easily and quickly launch and automate affiliate and influencer programs without developer involvement.
Shortly after, Impact acquired Trackonomics, an SSP for publishers’ partnership programs that provides page-level revenue attribution and ROI, and Affluent, an analytics and automation platform designed to help agencies manage partnership programs for brands.
Partnerships Experience 2021, a virtual partnership event dedicated to educating marketers on the best practices and trends in every aspect of the burgeoning partnership ecosystem.
Leading businesses like Canva, Condé Nast, HSBC, Ivory Ella, were involved in this educational four-week event covering best practices and thoughtful analysis of the growing industry.
Topics like partnerships with purpose, building successful B2B partnerships, strengthening commerce content partnerships, and how small businesses can grow through utilising partnerships drove more than 3,000 registrations globally.
Also in H1, impact.com added more than 530 new customers globally, increasing its customer count at the end of H1 by 69% over the same period last year, including Coles, Big Red Group, HSBC, OnePlus, OPPO, Puma, Skyscanner, Zeller, Zero Co and Zalora.
And in recognition of its innovation and best-in-class partnership management technology, impact.com has been acknowledged by several leading industry organizations.
- Most Innovative Use of Martech (Silver) at B2B Martech Awards
- Best Performance Marketing Technology at Performance Marketing Awards (PMAs)
- Best Travel, Leisure, and Lifestyle Campaign with TUI at PMAs
- Best Influencer Marketing Platform (Bronze) at the Influencer Marketing Awards
Impact.com recognised among industry peers
Impact was announced on a shortlist for nine additional awards at the International Performance Awards (IPMAs) and for Marketing Tech Company of the Year at the B&T Awards.
The year promises to be dynamic, with impact.com introducing The Partnership Economy podcast, featuring Yovanno alongside the company’s co-founder Todd Crawford.
In this biweekly series, they will speak with other industry leaders to unpack the future of partnerships as a lever for scale and an opportunity to put the consumer first.
In August of 2021, Impact introduced a free online academy that educates learners about how to drive growth through affiliate marketing and partnerships in various industries.
As partnerships support their customer acquisition strategy, the Partnership Experience Academy (PXA) inspires people to utilise partnerships to provide maximum value to business.
Looking to gain knowledge on the partnerships space, PXA offers beginner courses to in-depth strategic guidance with content created by leading experts in the Partnership Economy.
The company wasted no time in its plans to leverage the new funding to expand globally, opening two new offices in Copenhagen, Denmark, and Stockholm, Sweden, in the past month.
The company’s Scandinavian expansion into Denmark is spearheaded by Nicolai Mariegaard. Marcus Ericson will lead impact.com’s Swedish presence and experience.
The company also enhanced its own referral program, where partners can sign up to earn a percentage of revenue every time one of their referrals becomes a paying Impact customer.
Added Yovanno, “Impact’s powerful, purpose-built platform helps businesses’ brands, agencies and publishers to build authentic, enduring, and rewarding relationships with consumers.”
“We’re eager to watch this growth and momentum continue as we round out 2021.”
Impact can aggregate, orchestrate and optimise the value of the mix of partnerships with ease and transparency, driving growth and creating new value for consumers.
