IM marketing platforms

2021. Charles raises €6.4M to bring ‘conversational commerce’ to WhatsApp



Charles, a Berlin-based startup that offers a “conversational-commerce” SaaS for businesses that want to sell on WhatsApp and other chat apps, has raised €6.4 million in funding. Charles enables businesses to sell products and services via WhatsApp and other chat apps in order to “increase conversion rate, customer loyalty and ultimately revenue. The SaaS connects chat app APIs, such as WhatsApp and Messenger, with shop and CRM systems, like Shopify, SAP and HubSpot, all delivered through a user-friendly interface. The idea is to make it easier for businesses to meet their customers on the channels they already use and to bridge the gap between sales enquiries and support, and actual conversions.


2020. MessageBird acquires real-time notifications and in-app messaging platform Pusher



MessageBird, the omnichannel cloud communications platform has acquired real-time web technologies company Pusher for $35M. The Pusher product will be kept independent for existing customers, while Pusher’s tech, with its focus on in-app notifications and a developer-friendly API and SDKs built around “push,” will help plug a gap in MessageBird’s own communication platform, which is stronger in SMS and messaging-first channels such as Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Line and WeChat, etc. Specifically, Pusher is said to bring features like in-app messaging, push notifications and location tracking.

2020. Yalochat, a fast-growing conversational commerce startup, lands $15M



Yalochat, the conversational commerce platform that enables customers like Coca-Cola and Walmart to upsell, collect payments and provide better service to their own customers over WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger and WeChat in China, has closed on $15 million in Series B funding. The startup started with Coca-Cola in Brazil and helped them run their commerce when it comes to talking with small mom-and-pop shops. They had such success running their ordering process that they then took Yalochat to Mexico and Colombia. Yalo's AI-powered agent allows to create workflows that boost revenue and decrease costs by automating customer conversations. The platform also dathers data and insights on your customers to better understand their mobile customer journey.


2020. Attentive raises another $40M for mobile messaging



Mobile messaging startup Attentive has raised a $40 million Series B. Attentive drives an average of 18.5% of total online revenue for modern e-commerce brands. Apparently, the number of new customer sign-ups is only increasing, with Attentive now working with more than 1,000 businesses. Companies like Coach, Urban Outfitters, CB2, PacSun, Lulus and Jack in the Box use the platform to manage their mobile messaging, with tools around adding text message subscribers, creating engaging messages and tracking the results of those campaigns.