Now that consumers expect speed and hyper-personalization in all things, marketers have to find innovative ways to meet demands and maximize their budgets. To do this, marketers are turning to artificial intelligence and machine learning. In fact, there is a new term just for this – "AI Marketing." Customer expectations have never been higher. Amazon, Netflix and Google have set the standard for what customers have come to expect from technology and marketing.

Intent marketing aims to affect prospect purchase decision by analyzing consumer behavior. By leveraging intent marketing, 64% of companies reported improvement in return on investment and conversion rates. Intent marketing is a marketing practice relying on identifying and meeting the intent of the customer. Intent refers to what customers want or need in a given period. Intent-based marketing helps marketers determine a brand's real audience and their purchase behavior at any particular time.

ZoomInfo, a global leader in go-to-market (GTM) intelligence solutions, announced that it has acquired Clickagy, a leading provider of artificial intelligence-powered buyer intent data. Along with this acquisition, ZoomInfo is launching Streaming Intent, an innovative solution that identifies companies with above-average search volume on business-to-business (B2B) topics within minutes of their web activity. As ZoomInfo continues to enhance its comprehensive go-to-market intelligence platform, the acquisition of Clickagy provides sellers and marketers with streaming behavioral intent data that is expansive and customizable. Using an advanced natural language processing engine which correctly identifies context, Clickagy's technology delivers stronger, more reliable intent signals in real time. Clickagy's extensive database gathers intent data from over 300,000 publisher domains and includes 6 trillion-plus new keyword-to-device pairings each month, sourced from over 91 percent of accessible devices in the United States.

For decades, behavioral intent prediction has been the holy grail of business. The more accurately we can predict when someone will act and what triggers will precipitate that action, the more effective we can be in everything from sales to medical diagnosis. Well before AI and Machine Learning enabled a more in-depth analysis of big data sets, studies were being performed to analyze the relationship between stated intentions and the subsequent behavior of consumers. Did people follow through on their intentions? How honest were they in stating those intentions?

In today's age of Big Data and rapid technological growth, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is revolutionizing how business-to-business (B2B) marketers engage with their target accounts. But while some organizations are seizing the opportunity, many still have a long way to go. For example, a recent Forrester report shows that 88% of marketers have used AI. Less than half, however, say technology is helping them meet their objectives, and only 15% of enterprises are effectively using AI to enhance the customer experience. In addition, according to a survey by Demandbase, Salesforce Pardot and Demand Metric, while there is strong interest in AI – with 84% of Sales and Marketing professionals currently planning, evaluating, implementing or using AI – 40% of respondents are not aware of or fully taking advantage of existing AI capabilities in their vendor-supplied technologies.

The global "hotspot of the digiconomy" for the next two days is Cologne, Germany, where 50,000 digital marketers have gathered to learn about the latest and greatest in digital innovation. From the business of drones to the chatbot revolution, dmexco is off to a great start. And with the announcement of our partnership with Bombora, the leading provider of B2B demographic and intent data, even B2B marketers had something to get excited about. The partnership, which Outbrain's VP of Products, Amit Elisha, discusses below, allows B2B marketers to take their content marketing and account-based marketing to the next level. We've already started to roll out the offering with a select group of customers and seen some great results.

The 6sense patented approach enables, in certain embodiments, the collection of intent and/or static, profile fit data, transformation of unstructured data into structured data, calculation of buyer intent signals, mapping of unknown prospects to known buyers, and the ability to determine where buyers are in their journey (awareness, consideration, decision, purchase). The patent supports what 6sense views as the future of B2B marketing and sales: Omni-channel connectivity, visibility, attribution and the predictions to target the right audience at the right time, when they have demonstrated a need and propensity to purchase. "Among our accomplishments over the last several years, receiving this patent tops the list. After years of hard work and a five-year-long filing process, I hope this patent communicates to our customers, prospects and the wider industry that we truly were the first to market," said Kahlow. "When we started this journey, I knew we were onto something that no one else was thinking about, let alone doing yet. Aside from what this milestone means for 6sense, if it can serve as an inspiration to any woman at a time when women hold only a small fraction of technology patents, I've succeeded beyond my wildest dreams; I know at the core of it all, my purpose in life is to inspire women and girls."