Internet services company Rakuten has rebranded its marketing arm to Rakuten Advertising.
Alongside the rebrand, the company has unified its performance marketing, global media assets and consumer insights from Rakuten Intelligence all under the one umbrella.
Rakuten Advertising managing director of international Anthony Capano told AdNews the move means Australian brands looking to go global will be able to do so now with these capabilities.
“What this now enables them to do is use our global performance network but also now tap into new audiences,” Capano says.
Formerly known as Rakuten Marketing, the business has been in the Australian market for close to seven years but until now only offered brands its performance marketing capabilities.
These capabilities include affiliate marketing, display and search marketing.
Capano says Rakuten’s Sydney and Melbourne teams will now be able to consolidate buying power and boost the reach brands can have into markets like the United States and Europe.
“What we’re finding, bringing it all under Rakuten Advertising is that we can actually yield a lot more together and bring solutions that are packaged up for advertisers,” he says.
“Our Sydney and Melbourne teams will now be able to tap into all of our media assets, as well as all of our performance assets on behalf of Australian brands looking to expand.”
Rakuten Advertising’s global media assets include Rakuten TV which is a transactional advertising video on demand service across all of Europe; Rakuten Viki which is a a streaming platform for Asian television and film; messaging app Rakuten Viber; and Rakuten Rewards, its cash-back and shopping rewards business.
The consumer insights area of the business will utilise Rakuten’s first-party data which Capano says is already prepared for the wave of global data privacy laws coming into action.
“We have first party data that is, of course, GDPR compliant for Europe specifically but as well will prepare us for additional privacy regulations,” he says.
“We make sure that we get consent throughout the user journey.”
Rakuten’s affiliate network operates today in more than 200 countries and regions around the world.
The company is headquartered in San Mateo, CA, offices in Australia, Singapore, Brazil, France, Germany, Ukraine the United Kingdom and throughout the United States.
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