Mastercard Buys Engagement Platform SessionM

In the US, Mastercard has acquired customer engagement and loyalty platform SessionM, enhancing its own ability to help brands deliver personalized, real-time offers and campaign measurement based on data-driven insights. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Boston-based SessionM gathers customer behavior data across multiple channels, appends the data to each individual's profile, and triggers personalized responses in real time. Metrics such as customer 'recency', frequency and monetary spend are visible on each profile for more 'impactful' targeting. Lars Albright, co-founder and CEO of SessionM, says his firm shares Mastercard's commitment to creating experiences that 'drive lasting loyalty and meaningful, impactful customer engagement'.

During the past decade, Mastercard has made a number of investments to advance its data-driven services for retailers and other brands. This includes the acquisition of Applied Predictive Technologies, which provides business analytics software to help large consumer-facing businesses understand their stores, customers and employees. Kevin Stanton (pictured), Chief Services Officer at Mastercard, comments: 'With our suite of data-driven services, we aim to help our customers end to end - from advice to execution and everything in between. Our complementary technology and teams will help brands drive greater loyalty with both proprietary and card-based programs, reinforcing Mastercard as their partner of choice'.

Web sites: www.mastercard.com and www.sessionm.com .