Wunderkind raises $76M

Wunderkind, a platform that lets brands target web visitors with emails, texts, and other digital ads, raised $76 million in a Series C round led by Neuberger Berman, a financial services company.

Bill Ingram, Wunderkind’s new CEO, says the tranche, which brings Wunderkind’s total raised to over $150 million, will be used for product development, hiring, and market expansion.

“We see this as a real opportunity to expand our products outside of acquisition and conversion and continue to increase the revenue growth of our customers while continuing to grow Wunderkind,” Ingram told in an email. “We’re investing heavily in AI and machine learning.”

Wunderkind, founded in 2010, helps brands build customer relationships online. How? Ingram says analyzing smartphone and desktop web visitors’ real-time and historical behaviors matches value to intent.

Wunderkind claims it can identify visitors by their referral page and content interaction. Ingram claims the platform can predict who will buy a paid subscription and subscribe to a newsletter.

The company offers tools for “trigging” ad campaigns and audience segmentation. It predicts high-intent and at-risk audiences.

“We help drive better outcomes using a company’s existing technology investments and expertise,” Ingram said. “The technical decision maker is concerned about not having their own customer relationship and data, reaching their customers where they are, and executing smart digital marketing initiatives that their consumers expect. We provide data, user profiles, and one-to-one marketing strategies that manufacture outcomes and truly deliver performance.”

Wunderkind’s product sounds creepy to users. Behavioral marketing is being disproven. Many companies find the results worth the controversy. The Network Advertising Initiative surveyed 12 ad networks and found that user behavior-targeted ads converted 6.8% compared to 2.8% for non-targeted ads.

Wunderkind has over 1,000 luxury, direct-to-consumer, and tech clients, including Rag & Bone, HelloFresh, Uniqlo, Sonos, and See’s Candies. Wunderkind—then BounceX—reported $100 million in annual recurring revenue in 2020. Ingram says Wunderkind’s revenue grew 35% last year and will grow again this year.

“We see the headwinds as a mix of larger market economic trends, changes that are in line with consumers’ right to privacy, and changes in audience behavior,” Ingram said. “We’re aware of the challenges of scaling first-party data assets and using them in a meaningful way.”Wunderkind is well-positioned to help our clients and the industry. We have had voluntary consumer data and insights for over ten years.

But Wunderkind, which has 700 employees, wants to grow and launch a one-to-one messaging service for ads to make “cookieless” retargeting possible in a future where ads are more regulated and privacy is more important.An improved “discovery” feature for online stores will suggest products based on how customers use the site and what they like.

“We believe Wunderkind can help our clients increase their customers’ lifetime value and grow better as a business,” Ingram said.