Salesforce has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Contentful, a composable content platform trusted by over 4,800 of the world’s leading brands to deliver personalized digital experiences at scale. The acquisition will enhance Salesforce’s Headless 360 with a native, enterprise-grade content layer that connects customer data with engaging content experiences across Salesforce’s leading applications. By leveraging Data 360, Agentforce, and Contentful’s composable APIs, global enterprises can seamlessly deliver personalized, AI-assembled experiences at scale across every channel. 

“Every meaningful customer interaction depends on three things working together: the right data, the right AI-driven content, and a modern, effortless experience,” said Jujhar Singh, President, C360 Applications & Industries, Salesforce. “With Contentful, we complete that picture by adding a native, headless, composable content layer that lets Agentforce dynamically assemble and deliver personalized experiences across every channel, at the speed and scale the AI era demands.”

“Joining forces with Salesforce accelerates our mission of enabling modern enterprises to dynamically assemble and deliver rich digital experiences across every channel,” said Karthik Rau, CEO of Contentful. “Our API-first architecture and deep domain expertise fit perfectly into the Salesforce stack. Together, we will redefine how brands interact with customers by giving Agentforce the content layer it needs to make every interaction truly engaging.”

Also Read: Is AI About to Make Media Buying an Endless Experiment?

Connecting Data, Content, and Customer Experiences   

Following the close of the transaction, Contentful will be integrated natively across Customer 360 while preserving the composability that developers and digital teams expect from a modern headless platform. As a native layer within the platform, Contentful’s structured content architecture becomes accessible to Agentforce, enabling agents to query, assemble, and deliver content dynamically without manual publishing steps.

Together, Agentforce and Contentful will move enterprises from static, channel-specific content to dynamic content orchestration – assembling 1:1 experiences at scale based on context, channel, language, and business rules. This unification gives enterprises a single content layer across all channels (email, web, mobile) and in any use case (marketing, commerce, sales), eliminating the fragmentation that slows time-to-market and undermines brand consistency.

The transaction is expected to close in the third quarter of Salesforce’s fiscal year 2027, subject to customary closing conditions, including the receipt of required regulatory approvals. 

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Markup AI today announced $27.5 million financing, led by Genui Partners and EMH Partners and including Capital Factory and angel investors Brad Feld, Scott Dorsey, David Fox, Jake Heller, David Kidder, Bernd-Michael Rumpf, Greg Sands, and Kindra Tatarsky to accelerate the launch of the industry’s first Content Guardian AgentsSM.  Designed for companies racing to harness generative AI without compromising trust, these agents represent a breakthrough in adaptable, intelligent oversight for AI-generated content. 

“As we enter a new era of AI-generated content, organizations need new solutions to keep pace with the speed, scale, and risks,” said Matt Blumberg, CEO at Markup AI. “Today’s content requires purpose-built, AI-native content guardrails that don’t just check a box, but actively protect brand trust, compliance, and consistency in real-time.”

Why Content Guardian Agents, and Why Now 

Generative AI has unleashed an explosion of content that traditional review processes can’t keep up with. 87% of content marketers already use AI, yet most tools stop at spelling, grammar, or readability checks and are deployed without guardrails. The result is costly risk: copyright lawsuits up to $150,000 per work, defamation, false advertising, regulatory fines, and reputational damage. And this isn’t a handful of blog posts—enterprises operate at industrial scale with thousands of authors, dozens of LLMs, millions of pages, and vast policy and terminology libraries. Without automated oversight, risk compounds fast. 

According to Gartner by 2028, 40% of CIOs will demand guardian agents be available to autonomously track, oversee, or contain the results of AI agent actions. Gartner Distinguished VP Analyst Daryl Plummer said: “As agentic systems scale, gain more agency and become more complex, it becomes impossible for humans to intervene quickly enough to stop them from malfunctioning and becoming unmanageable. Therefore, AI must be used to understand and oversee AI agents to ensure they remain aligned with their intentions and operate in a safe, secure, and reliable manner.” 

Also Read: How Retailers Are Using AI in Marketing to Drive Store Visits and Offline Sales

Introducing Markup AI Content Guardian Agents 

Launched as a spinoff of NLP pioneer Acrolinx, Markup AI is the first to deliver an integrated suite of Content Guardian Agents purpose-built for enterprise use cases. Key innovations include: 

• Scan, Score, Rewrite – Agents automatically analyze content against brand, terminology, compliance, and industry standards, assign a deterministic trust score, and instantly provide actionable rewrites.
• Customizable Criteria – Enterprises can set governance rules (rewrite automatically or require human review) to balance efficiency and oversight.
• Developer-First Architecture – With an API-first, MCP-powered design, Content Guardian Agents integrate directly into the tools enterprises already use including Cursor, Figma, ChatGPT, Github Actions, Zapier, and more. These integrations deliver immediate compliance and quality checks without disrupting workflows.
• Enterprise-Ready Scalability – Built for mission-critical environments, Guardian Agents plug into CI/CD pipelines, authoring tools, and enterprise applications to guard content wherever it’s created and to automate content audits. 

Launching Five New AI Agents 

Markup AI also announced the launch of five specialized AI Agents, each designed to address a core element of content quality:

• Terminology Agent – Ensures consistent use of approved vocabulary and product language.
• Consistency Agent – Enforces editorial style and brand-specific conventions.
• Tone Agent – Adjusts communications to align with brand voice and audience expectations.
• Clarity Agent – Improves readability, removes jargon, and enhances comprehension.
• Spelling & Grammar Agent – Provides foundational accuracy in every piece of content.

These AI agents are bundled into the industry’s first Brand Guardian Agent that provides confidence that every word published is on-brand and compliant with a company’s standards.  

Early Adoption and Partnerships

Companies produce content everywhere across marketing, technical documentation, HR policies, customer success, help desk responses, training materials, and regulated communications. At this scale, organizations may have thousands of authors, dozens of AI tools in use, and millions of pages governed by hundreds of policies and terminology rules. Without oversight, the risks multiply quickly. 

Leading technology companies, including Amazon, Adobe, ServiceNow, Gainsight, and more than 75 AI-first innovators, have already joined Markup AI’s early access program. 

Markup AI is also partnering with Contentful, the API-first composable content platform, to bring governance directly into digital content workflows. Together, the companies are closing the gap between content creation and compliance. The partnership is the first of many, as Markup AI builds an ecosystem of integrations to expand its reach and deliver on its vision. 

“At Contentful, we’re focused on helping teams deliver digital experiences that truly connect with people,” said Contentful CMO Elizabeth Maxson.  “Markup AI’s Content Guardian Agents bring both speed and confidence into our content workflows — giving us the ability to scale while ensuring every piece of content meets the highest standards for quality and compliance. That kind of assurance isn’t just operational efficiency, it’s what allows marketers to move fast and maintain the trust that customer relationships depend on.”

Also Read: The 4Ps of Martech Unlocking Marketing’s Tech Revolution

New Leadership Driving the Vision 

Following the appointment of Matt Blumberg as CEO earlier this year, Markup AI has expanded its leadership team with proven experience scaling technology companies:  

• Shawn Nussbaum, Chief Technology Officer
• Ken Takahashi, Chief Corporate & Business Development Officer
• Louis Bucciarelli, Chief Revenue Officer

Markup AI also welcomed Jake Heller, founder of CaseText (acquired by Thomson Reuters), to its Board of Directors, bringing deep expertise in legal AI and compliance. 

Content Guardian Agents in Action 

The $27.5 million investment, which is a mix of Series A equity and debt, will accelerate product development, expand developer integrations, and scale go-to-market efforts globally.

“Having worked for decades in the legal field, I immediately recognized the potential benefits GenAI tools could bring to the industry. At the same time, I understood that without the proper guardrails in place these tools could quickly become a legal and compliance nightmare,” said Jake Heller. “Markup AI is creating the essential layer of trust that enterprises need to fully embrace AI. Their Content Guardian Agents solve a mission-critical problem at the exact moment the market is demanding solutions, and I’m excited to help guide the company’s journey as a Board Member.” 

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In a marketing landscape reshaped by artificial intelligence and composable content platforms, Elizabeth Maxson, Chief Marketing Officer at Contentful, offers a compelling vision for the future of enterprise marketing. As companies pivot away from traditional monolithic systems, Contentful is helping brands harness agility, scale, and personalization through its innovative approach to content orchestration. 

In this exclusive interview, Maxson explores how marketers can strategically leverage AI to close the personalization gap, rethink customer experience in an age of zero-click search, and balance data-driven insights with creative risk-taking. With real-world examples from leading enterprises, she reveals how composable CMS and AI are not just tools but essential drivers of marketing innovation and operational resilience in 2025.

Full interview; 

What’s the biggest advantage for marketers embracing composability and AI-driven personalization in 2025?

The biggest strategic advantage is agility without compromise. Composable platforms allow marketers to orchestrate content across multiple channels and geographies, while AI tools help deliver personalization at scale. We just released a new research report based on surveys and interviews with hundreds of senior marketing leaders, and we found that while 89% of marketing teams are using AI, only 25% are applying it to audience segmentation and personalization. 

Contentful blends composability and AI so that marketers can close that gap. Our platform helps marketers adapt quickly, reuse modular content, and consistently and confidently deliver personalized experiences at enterprise scale. 

How should marketing teams adapt customer experience strategies to stay visible in the era of zero-click search and AI discovery?

Even in the era of AI-powered discovery and zero-click search, marketing fundamentals haven’t changed: we’re still in the business of telling stories that resonate and build trust. What has changed is how customers discover and engage with those stories. Search engines and LLMs now surface answers directly, which means our content needs to be more structured, conversational, and optimized for generative engine discovery. The good news is that strong SEO fundamentals — clear structure, relevant keywords, and consistent updates — already give brands a strong foundation. From there, it’s about adapting for AI discovery by using our customers’ language and leaning into the insights only our brand can provide.

At the same time, we need to evolve how we define success. Traditional traffic metrics will decline, but the customers who arrive are more qualified because they’ve already done their research in AI results — and they’re converting at higher rates. That means the KPIs that matter most are conversion, pipeline impact, and share of voice within AI and search results. Tracking branded searches and direct traffic also helps us understand whether our efforts are creating demand across channels.

So the strategy is threefold: first, ensure solid SEO fundamentals; second, keep leaning into what only our brand can uniquely provide — insights, perspectives, and storytelling; and third, measure success through impact and visibility rather than raw traffic. That’s how we stay discoverable, trusted, and differentiated in the age of AI discovery.

How do you balance data-driven decisions with fostering creative risk-taking in marketing teams?

We call this evidence-based creativity, and it’s a must-have skill set for modern marketers.  Our findings show that data analysis and interpretation are now the top-ranked skills for marketers. This tells us that marketers are expected to be both creative and analytical. For me, it’s about giving data and creativity equal weight. I encourage my teams to use data as a compass, not as a constraint. Data allows us to see what’s resonating, but creativity sparks ideas people remember. I want my teams to take creative risks while validating ideas through testing frameworks, such as A/B testing, and customer feedback loops. This balance ensures campaigns are imaginative and anchored in measurable outcomes. 

How does Contentful’s AI integration ensure scalable, accurate personalization in multi-language and regulated industries?

AI-powered personalization is only as effective as the guardrails around it.  Our regional data found that 58% of EMEA marketers test AI selectively with a defined plan, and nearly a third emphasize governance skills like brand voice, compliance, and quality standards. At Contentful, we’ve built composability and native AI into the platform so teams can scale personalization across languages and markets while ensuring consistency, compliance, and brand integrity. For example, Biogen, a leading biotechnology company, uses our platform to unify its content strategy and has dramatically streamlined translation workflows to support roughly 1500 pages published per year, across 30 languages. Tools like Contentful are critical in regulated industries where accuracy isn’t optional, and teams need to publish faster, more consistently, and at scale.

How do headless CMS and composable architectures help enterprises deliver omnichannel experiences with AR, video, and conversational AI?

Headless and composable systems are the foundation for meeting audiences across new formats. By separating content from the front end, marketers can create once and deploy everywhere. For example, a marketer can design a single piece of content and deploy it across different channels such as AR and video (and whatever else comes next!) without reinventing the wheel every time. This approach helps brands adopt new platforms faster without worrying about creating inconsistencies in the customer experience.  

How does Contentful ensure quality and trust in AI-generated content, and what guardrails should marketers use?

AI is valuable not just because of speed but because it gives marketers the freedom to focus on tasks only humans can do. Our research shows that 42% of marketers define campaign success by content quality and consistency, which tells us that trust and creativity can’t be outsourced to machines. We recommend giving AI clear guardrails while keeping humans at the center of judgment and reviews.   Marketers are already tackling the issue, with 45% of organizations offering AI training. At Contentful, we encourage teams to use AI as a creative accelerator for drafting, generating options, or testing variations, while keeping humans in the loop to make the final judgment on quality, compliance, and brand voice.

With privacy regulations tightening globally, how is Contentful evolving its data governance and transparency features to give marketers actionable insights while ensuring compliance and ethical personalization?

At Contentful, we see data governance and transparency as core to building customer trust and enabling marketers to work responsibly with AI and personalization. That’s why we’ve built our platform to meet the highest standards, including SOC 2 Type 2 compliance and features like EU data residency that help our customers store their user data in the EU, while staying aligned with global regulations like GDPR.

Another way we do this is through our Privacy Plugin, which gives brands the flexibility to decide what data is collected and how it’s used with clear consent options for customers. This means marketers can personalize experiences responsibly, tailoring them to regional requirements without being boxed in by one-size-fits-all limits.

Ultimately, we’re helping marketers derive actionable insights from compliant data, so they can personalize experiences to respect user boundaries, maintain brand integrity, and strengthen long-term customer relationships.

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Sitecore, the digital experience leader, unveiled findings from the commissioned Forrester Consulting Total Economic Impact™ (TEI) study of Sitecore XM Cloud, exploring the value created for organizations by the SaaS-native, AI-first content management solution. XM Cloud is the foundation of Sitecore’s Digital Experience Platform (DXP), uniting content, data and AI and delivering customer experiences that are fast, relevant and engaging.

Sitecore XM Cloud accelerates the pace at which marketing and digital teams can move from idea to execution, turning compelling content into commercial outcomes with precision, speed and agility. Built for the ways marketing and technology are being transformed in the agentic era, Sitecore goes beyond bolted-on AI features to deliver a truly embedded agentic platform. The platform allows marketers to shift from managing tasks to achieving business goals, letting AI understand intent and autonomously chart the path forward.

Also Read: How Retailers Are Using AI in Marketing to Drive Store Visits and Offline Sales

XM Cloud enables real-time personalization across channels, brands and regions, moving beyond static segments to respond instantly to behavioral signals. With it, campaigns launch faster and continuously optimize themselves. Sitecore gives marketing teams, digital teams and agency partners agents and configurable agentic workflows that move at the speed their market demands. Marketing becomes adaptive, contextual and continuously evolving.

“In an era where AI is reshaping every customer interaction, the winning brands won’t be the ones who use AI the most, but those who use it best,” said Michelle Boockoff-Bajdek, Chief Marketing Officer at Sitecore. “XM Cloud is a strategic growth engine for digital marketers at a time when customer journeys are rapidly evolving. The Forrester study shows how XM Cloud empowers marketers to personalize in ways that enable them to earn trust, scale faster across every touchpoint and innovate confidently.”

Also Read: Winning the Holiday Shopping Season in the US with Google, YouTube, and AI

According to the Forrester TEI study, a composite organization representative of interviewed customers using XM Cloud achieved:

• 371% ROI over three years
• 50% improvement in digital conversions as marketers rapidly deployed content and personalized experiences with greater precision, closing the gap between content with commerce
• 60% improved digital marketing effectiveness as teams launched campaigns faster and more consistently across brands and regions
• 40% time savings for website operations thanks to XM Cloud’s fully SaaS architecture streamlining content integration and new feature deployment

Further, XM Cloud is reshaping enterprise marketing and continues to be recognized across the industry as a leading AI-first, SaaS-native platform for digital experience innovation. In fact, XM Cloud was recently named “Best Content Management Platform” in the 2025 MarTech Breakthrough Awards. The recognition adds to a growing list of accolades, including being rated the #1 Digital Experience Platform on G2 and receiving a CSO Award for cybersecurity innovation.

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ChannelEngine, the global marketplace integration and automation platform, announced its strategic partnership with Salsify, the leader in Product Experience Management (PXM) and content syndication, to empower brands to expand their reach, optimize performance, and scale efficiently across digital marketplaces and retail channels worldwide.

This collaboration combines the strengths of two category leaders to help brands seamlessly connect rich, accurate product content with the growing universe of marketplaces and sales channels.

“Digital commerce is the primary growth engine for global brands, and the online shopping experience is directly tied to the quality of the product content,” said Julie Marobella, Chief Product Officer at Salsify. “Our collaboration with ChannelEngine ensures that our joint customers can deliver accurate and consistent product content across every touchpoint, building consumer confidence and driving sales in a rapidly evolving market.” 

Marketplaces are now the front line of commerce for global brands. According to ChannelEngine’s recent Marketplace Shopping Behavior Report 2025, 47% of shoppers begin their product discovery on marketplaces, compared to only 24% on search engines, making multichannel visibility critical to the buying journey.

Also Read: The 4Ps of Martech Unlocking Marketing’s Tech Revolution

This opportunity also brings complexity with fragmented systems, regional compliance challenges, siloed content, and manual processes that slow down growth and increase costs.

Together, Salsify and ChannelEngine offer brands a streamlined solution to:

• Enrich and localize product content through Salsify’s PXM platform, including support for GDSN standards
• Activate listings across 950+ global marketplaces via ChannelEngine’s direct integrations
• Automate operations like inventory syncing, pricing, order flows, and returns
• Track performance and optimize growth with built-in reporting and insights

ECR4Kids, a children’s furniture brand, uses Salsify and ChannelEngine to streamline content syndication, automate marketplace operations, and improve consistency across channels.

“With Salsify and ChannelEngine working together, we’ve finally been able to get our product content right and in front of customers wherever they shop. Salsify helps us keep all of our product information organized and enriched in one place, and ChannelEngine makes sure that content flows smoothly into the marketplaces we rely on. It’s taken a lot of the manual work off our team’s plate and allowed us to focus on expanding our reach and better serving our customers.” – Justin Siegel, General Manager of ECR4Kids.

Also Read: Why Enrollment Systems Fail Without an Operational Blueprint

“We see every day how shopping behavior is shifting to marketplaces,” says Jorrit Steinz, CEO & Founder, ChannelEngine. “Brands need to meet their customers wherever they are, but managing content and operations across so many channels can be overwhelming. With Salsify, we are giving brands not just the tools to manage today’s complexity, but the foundation to grow smarter and faster in a marketplace-first world.”

This partnership signals a broader shift toward modular, scalable ecommerce architecture that gives brands the agility to grow in a channel-agnostic world, where marketplaces are not just sales outlets, but strategic growth engines.

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Edge Marketing, an award-winning full-service agency specializing in strategic marketing and public relations for the legal, accounting and professional services industries, is proud to announce the launch of its generative engine optimization (GEO) service: a strategic approach to digital visibility that positions clients as trusted sources in today’s AI-driven search landscape.

As search engines, voice assistants and chatbots now use artificial intelligence to surface and summarize sources, brands face a new visibility challenge. Traditional SEO alone is no longer sufficient; success now means being cited, sourced and recommended by both human audiences and generative AI.

“AI is changing the rules of digital visibility at a breathtaking pace,” states Amy Juers, MBA, CEO at Edge Marketing. “With our new GEO service, we’re helping our clients move beyond being just seen. We ensure they’re cited, trusted and recognized as industry leaders in the most important moments.”

Edge’s GEO service is built on a proven foundation of content and PR strategies, now evolved for the next era of search. Clients benefit from:

• Bylined articles and thought leadership: authoritative content optimized for both readers and AI engines.
• Earned media and PR campaigns: brand mentions and expert commentary for enhanced credibility and AI citation.
• Blog content: well-crafted articles that directly answer client questions and drive visibility.
• Press release writing and distribution: news built for media pickup, industry influence and SEO/GEO results.
• FAQs and ask-and-answer content: structured Q&As tailored for discovery in AI and voice search.
• Digital content optimization: metadata, schema markup and technical enhancements for better discoverability.
• Multimedia integration: podcasts, videos and infographics extending brand reach across AI-accessible channels.
• Thought leadership amplification: placements in interviews, speaker slots and podcast features.

To support the launch of its GEO services, Edge is providing a new free downloadable Guide & Tips PDF, “Making Every Click Count: SEO Meets GEO for Real Results,” filled with actionable steps to accelerate discovery in the era of AI search and a dedicated episode of Edge Unscripted, Edge’s podcast for future-ready marketers and leaders.

Cindy Moen, senior account manager at Edge, says, “Consider that nearly 100,000 Google searches happen every second and almost 65% now end without a single click due to AI-driven answers and generative summaries. Through our existing marketing and PR services, Edge clients are ahead of the game for GEO. They’re seeing an increase in the results compared to traditional SEO alone. If AI doesn’t cite your brand, you’re missing out on a massive opportunity to reach your audience.”

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Smint.io, a leading innovator in content activation platforms, is thrilled to announce a strategic OEM partnership with Cloudinary, a recognized leader in digital media management.

Launched in October 2024, Cloudinary integrated Smint.io’s advanced technology into Cloudinary Assets, enabling users to seamlessly create highly personalized, branded content experiences. With the new Cloudinary Portals module, businesses can now design and manage bespoke portals tailored to their unique requirements, including Brand Portals, Media Download Portals, and Sales Enablement Applications.

This innovative module offers users with sophisticated branding tools and content management system (CMS) capabilities, empowering them to design custom landing pages, contextualize assets, and integrate effortlessly with various platforms through custom components. As a result, brands can curate engaging content experiences that resonate with audiences, both internally and externally.

Reinhard Holzner, CEO of Smint.io, commented on the partnership, stating, “We’re excited to integrate our content experience technology with Cloudinary’s robust media management system. Together, we are creating a powerful solution that allows brands to deliver rich, on-brand experiences with ease. This partnership not only enhances the functionality of our platforms but also unlocks new avenues for growth and engagement for our clients.”

Also Read: Marketing in 2025: Shifts, AI, and Gen Z

Rob Daynes, Managing Director of Digital Asset Management at Cloudinary, expressed his enthusiasm for the collaboration, “Our partnership with Smint.io underscores Cloudinary’s commitment to empowering brands with innovative solutions for their visual media. With Cloudinary Portals, customers are able to amplify and activate their content with different audiences in a compelling, cohesive manner.”

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Launched in October 2024, Cloudinary integrated Smint.io‘s advanced technology into Cloudinary Assets, enabling users to seamlessly create highly personalized, branded content experiences. With the new Cloudinary Portals module, businesses can now design and manage bespoke portals tailored to their unique requirements, including Brand Portals, Media Download Portals, and Sales Enablement Applications.

This innovative module offers users with sophisticated branding tools and content management system (CMS) capabilities, empowering them to design custom landing pages, contextualize assets, and integrate effortlessly with various platforms through custom components. As a result, brands can curate engaging content experiences that resonate with audiences, both internally and externally.

Reinhard Holzner, CEO of Smint.io, commented on the partnership, stating, “We’re excited to integrate our content experience technology with Cloudinary’s robust media management system. Together, we are creating a powerful solution that allows brands to deliver rich, on-brand experiences with ease. This partnership not only enhances the functionality of our platforms but also unlocks new avenues for growth and engagement for our clients.”

Also Read: Marketing in 2025: Shifts, AI, and Gen Z

Rob Daynes, Managing Director of Digital Asset Management at Cloudinary, expressed his enthusiasm for the collaboration, “Our partnership with Smint.io underscores Cloudinary’s commitment to empowering brands with innovative solutions for their visual media. With Cloudinary Portals, customers are able to amplify and activate their content with different audiences in a compelling, cohesive manner.”

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Fortis, a payments technology leader for software providers, ERP customers, and scaling businesses, announced its partnership with Xina AI, a revolutionary voice-ordering application designed to streamline the ordering process for restaurants and hotels. This collaboration strengthens the shared vision of both Fortis and Xina AI to help businesses reduce inefficiencies and deliver a superior experience by combining Fortis’ trusted payment processing with Xina’s AI-powered ordering platform.

The integration offers tangible benefits to both businesses and their customers by reducing wait times, ensuring order accuracy and providing greater flexibility in menu customization. This directly translates to increased efficiency, lower labor costs, improved customer experience and data-driven insights.

“This partnership marks a significant step forward for the restaurant industry,” said Carl Sconnely, CEO of Xina AI. “By combining Xina’s AI-powered ordering system with Fortis’ secure payment processing, we’re offering restaurants a comprehensive solution that will revolutionize the way they operate.”

Xina AI harnesses artificial intelligence (AI) and natural language processing (NLP), enabling customers to place voice orders and remove the need for menus or touchscreens. The AI intuitively responds to prompts, creating a seamless, conversational experience. The platform also offers easy menu customization, personalized upsell suggestions, and real-time order tracking, allowing customers to track the status of their orders instantly.

Fortis’ integration ensures that Xina AI users benefit from seamless, secure payment processing within the app including features like:

• Enhanced Security: Fortis adheres to industry standards like PCI DSS, protecting both business and customer financial data.
• Payment Flexibility: The partnership offers multiple payment options, including credit and debit cards, mobile payments and gift cards.
• Scalability: Fortis’ payment system scales effortlessly to handle higher transaction volumes as businesses grow.
• Compliance: Fortis helps businesses meet regulatory requirements such as GDPR and PCI DSS, ensuring compliance with relevant laws.

Also Read: Oracle’s Adtech Exit: A Ripple Effect on the Industry

“Fortis is excited to partner with Xina to empower restaurants and those in hospitality with cutting-edge technology that enhances both operational efficiency and customer satisfaction,” said Greg Cohen, CEO of Fortis. “By integrating our secure payment processing with Xina’s innovative voice ordering platform, we’re providing a faster, more convenient ordering experience for guests while streamlining back-office operations.”

Now, businesses using Xina AI can boost their operations, increase revenue, and provide customers with a better, more modernized experience.

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Emplifi, a leading customer engagement platform, released “How UGC Drives Revenue and Boosts Engagement in Social Commerce” report, sharing findings from a 12-month study of user-generated content (UGC) published across Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, X, and Twitch by B2C brands spread across 49 different industries. According to the report, Emplifi’s data shows that UGC is a critical component of a brand’s social media strategy, delivering a 63% year-over-year growth in revenue and contributing more than $8 billion annually to social commerce revenue.

In addition to having a direct impact on conversion rates and revenue, Emplifi found that the brands leveraging UGC on their website generated three times more repeat site visits compared to sites that failed to use such content. Also, consumers spent more than double the amount of time on a web page that featured UGC, a clear indication that online shoppers respond to authentic, peer-generated content.

Also Read: Oracle’s Adtech Exit: A Ripple Effect on the Industry

EMARKETER forecasts social commerce will continue to skyrocket over the next three years, driven by an increase in spend by online shoppers—a trend that’s expected to nearly double by 2027. “This is expected to drive most of the sales growth, rather than the acquisition of new buyers,” reports EMARKETER. With more online shoppers relying on authentic content from actual consumers, UGC will continue to be a critical component of social media marketing and social commerce strategies for B2C brands.

“We want to know that people are coming back and trying new things. We want to know who pointed them in the right direction,” said Jeremy Barrett Lipkin, CEO & Founder at NAVY Hair Care. “We want to know anything and everything that we possibly can as far as data that you don’t just pull from analytics but data that you have to pull from actual cuts, like a customer leaving a comment – which we can only get with Emplifi. That’s a very high value for us.”

Lipkin’s team was able to increase the company’s repeat-visit rate by 265% and boost engagement rate on shoppable Instagram by 73% after implementing Emplifi’s platform.

“We really strive to have our community make content for us. The best endorsement is endorsement from your clients, but also your neighbor…It’s like having an Avon lady, but instead of having a woman come to your house, [content] is just posted on Instagram.”

When analyzing how UGC impacts various verticals, Emplifi discovered fashion and apparel brands lead all industries in UGC-driven revenue, with customer content driving 50% of total online revenue. But, according to Emplifi’s data, fashion brands are often the least likely to use UGC, averaging only three posts per month. In fact, the fashion brand sector ranks eighth among the industries leveraging UGC in their social commerce efforts.

Also Read: Salesforce in Advanced Talks to Buy Informatica

For the travel sector, UGC content helps drive nearly 10% of online revenue, 5% for home and living brands, 4% for retail brands, and 3% for the sporting goods vertical.

One of the more interesting findings from Emplifi’s report is how UGC regularly outperforms traditional advertising for engagement. Emplifi’s data shows that, on average, UGC generates nearly four times higher engagement rates compared to Instagram ads. The travel industry sees the highest engagement rate from UGC at 17%, followed by accommodation (16%) and fashion (12%). In comparison, Instagram ads typically see engagement rates below 4%, with some exceptions like retail food (4%) and home and living (6%).

“When integrated into a brand’s social media marketing and social commerce strategies, user-generated content has proven to boost a brand’s results. Providing the authenticity and relatability that consumers crave has an immediate impact on everything from time spent on site to online conversions and revenue,” said Susan Ganeshan, CMO of Emplifi. “Companies that overlook UGC and fail to incorporate it into their social strategy risk leaving millions of dollars on the table. Our clients have seen substantial growth by leveraging UGC. With the holiday season fast approaching, now is the time to double down on UGC across your social and e-commerce strategies, especially if you want to gain a competitive edge through the end of the year.”

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