Field Agent, a Fayetteville, Arkansas-based provider of crowdsourced data for the retail and consumer goods industries, has acquired the retail media firm Smack, along with its online properties and marketing products.
Field Agent says the purchased affords it new opportunities to leverage its mobile panel of more than 1.4 million U.S.-based shoppers and to provide companies new, shopper-driven methods for generating product awareness and purchase.
“For years we’ve been connecting companies with their core consumers,” said Rick West, co-founder and CEO of Field Agent. “With this purchase we’ll now start using our crowd of consumers to build awareness of new products and ultimately move those products off store shelves.”
With the acquisition, Field Agent launches a new division, Field Media, consisting of two digital-content properties, Aisle 9 and Product 1. In contrast to conventional, “top-down” methods like banner ads, both Aisle 9 and Product 1 will showcase high-quality, trial-based, user-generated content for extensive distribution through social media and sponsored-content channels.
According to Smack founder Sean Womack, who will serve as Field Media publisher, the new division will be managed separately from Field Agent’s research and auditing arms.
“We’ve been working with Field Agent for over two years developing our publishing technology,” Womack said. “Once we landed on the Digital Demo, we realized how much sense it made to join forces.”
Field Media’s Digital Demo is disrupting the way brands think about shopper marketing and sales. The program directs shoppers to “buy and try” specific products in-store or online. Their feedback then becomes the basis for digital content published on Aisle 9 or Product 1, which is shared via social media or sponsored content channels. This program combines trial research, content generation and everyday influencers into a single tool proven to drive sales for the world’s largest brands.
“We build awareness through the audience themselves by turning them into everyday influencers, which means other consumers are more likely to trust and act on the message,” Womack added.
Field Media specifically will serve marketers and brand managers who previously lacked a targeted media solution, building on Field Agent’s current client base of Fortune 500 sales, operations, category and research teams.
Field Agent created the mobile crowdsourcing solution for the retail and branded-goods industries in 2010 and has defined the space for nine years. Field Agent leverages its global network of over two million app users to connect businesses with fast, reliable information.
