• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, December 2, 2009

Information Resources Inc. (IRI) has entered into strategic partnerships with [X + 1] and Dynamic Logic to better support consumer product goods (CPGs) and retail industries through data analysis and a series of technologies and digital media platforms.

The separate technologies from [X + 1] and Dynamic Logic integrate into IRI's core Consumer Network purchase data, predictive modeling and analytic platform to monitor online research and advertising for the CPG and retail industries. The data aims to confirm the effectiveness of online campaigns.

About 55,000 households scan every grocery item that comes into the home. Consumers keep diaries on where they bought the goods. IRI provides data to CPGs. The agreement gives CPG companies the metrics to verify that their online campaigns work.

Internet advertising is the only segment to see growth in advertising spending share -- up 6.5% in the first half of 2009, according to Robert I. Tomei, president at IRI Consumer and Shopping Insights. "Marketers must find new ways to identify high-potential consumers online to target their digital media campaigns and drive increased ROI," he says. "For the first time, this initiative will help brands cull and analyze their campaign targets from a pool of about 90% to 95% of Internet users.

Tomei says IRI's consumer sales data and digital media platform, combined with the online advertising network and research capabilities of this partnership, aims to help marketers better target, execute and understand digital marketing campaigns.

The partnership also allows the group to take a subset of the data and create target consumer profiles for CPG companies, such as Kraft Foods. "It's as simple as targeting heavy users of competitor's products," says John Nardone, CEO at [X + 1]. "We would take the list of IRI of panelists and model their online cookies and push the information to our targeting platform."

Supporting the partnership, [X + 1] released CPG Connect, a digital optimization platform that lets marketers and agencies turn online marketing into a brick-and mortar sales engine, according to the company. The platform is powered by IRI.

Nardone says [X + 1] can control the delivery of cookies that collect consumer data, and pass that data back to IRI to evaluate. This means [X + 1] can track consumers in aggregate to monitor the effectiveness of the ad, and to determine whether the company gained customers based on a specific campaign.

Dynamic Logic also launched AdIndex Connects with IRI as part of the agreement. The solution is part of the DL Connects platform, and is built on Dynamic Logic's AdIndex technology.

"To be considered effective, advertising placed on any media must either change people's perceptions or increase sales," says Ken Mallon, senior vice president of custom solutions at Dynamic Logic. "Partnering with IRI allows us to enhance our DL Connects ad effectiveness to offer a tangible way to help clients maximize ROI."