Blending advanced technology and marketing strategies, Blueshift, a San Francisco-based startup, has recently secured $40 million in debt financing from Runway Growth Capital. Led by co-founder and CEO Vijay Chittoor, Blueshift utilizes artificial intelligence to help brands personalize and automate engagement across various marketing channels. According to Chittoor, the funding will be used to refinance existing debt and expand sales, marketing, and other operations.
“With the increasing influx of customer data, manual approaches to marketing are no longer sustainable,” Chittoor explained in an email interview with TechCrunch. “Blueshift is at the forefront of personalized engagement across multiple channels through the use of AI-driven decision-making.”
Since its establishment in 2014 by Chittoor, Mehul Shah, and Manyam Mallela, Blueshift has been revolutionizing marketing by employing AI to automate various processes. Through its platform, Blueshift unifies and organizes customer data from external sources to create comprehensive customer profiles. Utilizing AI, marketers can then segment customers and identify the most effective channels and times to engage with them.
The adoption of AI by marketers is on the rise, particularly with GenAI, as they strive to achieve greater consumer engagement. Studies show that personalized experiences lead to higher purchase rates, with 90% of respondents in a recent Epsilon survey stating that they were likely to buy from businesses offering personalized experiences.
However, personalization is easier said than done, with Gartner reporting that 63% of marketers struggle with personalized ad technology. This is where Blueshift’s GenAI suite comes in, offering a solution to this challenge.
Over the past year, Blueshift has added new features such as customer profile summaries for call center agents and personalized content variations generated by AI in different tones and styles.
While some may question the accuracy and potential biases of AI, Chittoor assures that Blueshift takes extensive measures to mitigate algorithmic shortcomings.
Blueshift faces competition from other players in the marketing automation market who also utilize AI in their solutions. WorkMagic, which emerged in October, specializes in automating marketing tasks for e-commerce retailers. Retail Rocket focuses on retaining brand customers through AI technology. Pixie offers a comprehensive AI-powered marketing platform, while Aampe caters to mobile app marketers. Connectly, on the other hand, leverages automation to prompt shoppers to complete purchases.
One of the biggest challenges for Blueshift and other startups in the marketing automation space is gaining market share from incumbents. As of June 2023, HubSpot held 37% of the market share, followed by Adobe, Oracle, and ActiveCampaign, all with approximately 7%.
However, this is a highly lucrative market, with the marketing automation segment expected to reach $13.32 billion by 2030, up from $4.62 billion in 2021, according to a study by Emergen Research.
