ATLANTA, GA — (Marketwire) — 07/19/11 — Vitrue (), the leading social marketing platform, today announced it has acquired San Francisco-based GamesThatGive (), the social gaming platform designed to engage brands- customers in charitable activities through branded-gaming experiences. As part of the acquisition, GamesThatGive co-founder Adam Archer and the team will now operate out of Vitrue-s newly opened San Francisco office and oversee all gaming-related functionalities on the Vitrue SRM platform. Vitrue will also be adding as many as five new staff members to the team as part of the acquisition. Financial terms were not disclosed.
“A key goal for Vitrue this year is to provide our customers with the most robust and innovative platform for social marketing, whether through partnerships, integrations, or new acquisitions,” said Reggie Bradford, founder and CEO of Vitrue. “We-ve seen great results from incorporating elements of charity and gaming into brands- social campaigns. With this acquisition of GamesThatGive, a company that has developed a successful, smart platform, we are now offering both the gaming and charitable elements through our platform to continue to help brands reach and engage with their target audiences in new and effective ways.”
The acquisition allows Vitrue to add gaming functionality to their leading social marketing platform, the Vitrue SRM, allowing brands to seamlessly create custom games on Facebook and maintain consistent brand visibility during the entire experience, all the while supporting a brand-s charitable programs. The platform will now allow clients to create custom, fully skinned, branded casual games to increase brand loyalty, integrate charitable giving features, and add new customer touch points.
“Charitable game mechanics are a new way to motivate Facebook fans to play while giving brands a truly unique and charitable manner to engage with their fan base,” said Adam Archer, co-founder and CEO of GamesThatGive. “Our gaming solutions allow brands to drive fans to their Facebook pages and increase user retention and brand affinity. We give brands a platform to showcase and raise funds for their charities through engaging gaming experiences for Facebook fans.”
GamesThatGive has been successful in boosting fan engagement and spreading brand awareness for many brands across Facebook. Many of their apps have players averaging more than 40 minutes of game play per visit. The company also notes that many apps have more than 80 percent of visits coming from returning players and some games have achieved more than 100 percent virality, bringing in more than 1,100 additional fans for every 1,000 fans driven to the game. GamesThatGive has also raised more than $100,000 for charities including the Ronald McDonald House, American Heart Association, U.S. Fund for UNICEF, St. Jude-s Hospital and The Breast Cancer Fund.
Vitrue, whose clients include many of the world-s most recognizable brands and agencies, has cross-over clients with GamesThatGive including Pepsi and Domino-s. GamesThatGive has also worked with MasterCard, Dial Soap, Quaker, Dockers, UNICEF and Propel, to name a few.
“Domino-s puts a priority on reaching and building real social relationships with the millions of people that are on Facebook and other emerging social networks,” said Russell Weiner, Chief Marketing Officer, Domino-s Pizza, a Vitrue and GamesThatGive client. “But there are also millions of people playing games for free online every day and we-ll certainly jump at the chance to put our product in front of them and demonstrate our commitment to the community at the same time. As a partner of both Vitrue and GamesThatGive, we can easily manage our entire social presence in one place, and not only acquire and engage with fans in ongoing, innovative ways but also tie-in our charitable foundations in a seamless manner.”
Chris Jackman, Senior Manager of Dockers Digital Marketing, explains, “It-s been a great experience working with GamesThatGive. Not only were we able to support a charitable organization of our choosing, but it helped us lower our fan acquisition costs. Additionally, total traffic to our Facebook page increased — helped by the fact that 65% of the game visits are from returning players. We-ve also found that the players tend to be engaged with our page — posting and commenting — no doubt spurred by the fact that the players average over 40 minutes per visit.”
GamesThatGive () combines gaming with giving to engage brands- Facebook fans in charitable activities. The company builds games that provide brands with a way to increase the impact of their online marketing and to maintain user engagement through entertaining and engaging games. GamesThatGive works with some of the biggest brands in the world including Domino-s, MasterCard and Dockers to create custom games that build customer loyalty through engaging and dynamic interaction. Facebook fans can interact with their favorite brands and help give to charities they care about without having to install or purchase anything.
Vitrue () is the leading social marketing platform, offering software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions to help brands and agencies harness the marketing potential of social and manage their expanding and sophisticated social communities on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, emerging networks and mobile applications. The industry-leading Vitrue Social Relationship Management (SRM) platform is currently managing more than 700 million fans in 47 countries across 3,000 Facebook and Twitter accounts. Vitrue-s stable of clients include McDonald-s, American Express, Amway, YouTube, Intel, State Farm, P&G brands, Johnson & Johnson, Samsung, Ford, Chanel, JCPenney, Disney, Baskin-Robbins, Best Buy, Domino-s Pizza and AT&T, as well as many global marketing and public relations agencies.
Aly Brady
LaunchSquad
415-625-8555
vitrue (at) launchsquad (dot) com
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