Last week Notion completed a $2m investment in idio and it’s one I’m very excited about.

idio provide a content analytics and recommendation engine that works in real-time and across all the major channels of email, web, social and mobile. The service uses powerful artificial intelligence and natural language processing to develop an ever-growing profile of every user and deliver content that is most relevant to them.

I’ve been looking hard at the marketing automation space for some time. I think there are two major themes that are having a transformational effect on this sector. First, more and more marketing is becoming technology-enabled. This is changing an industry known for its art into much more of a science. Second, brands are having to invest more and more time and money into content if they want to get noticed.

It used to be that you could rely on a captive audience and bombard them with fairly generic marketing messages. The marketing was generally very broad brushed and didn’t necessarily reveal much about the company and the products. But companies now need to develop content that pulls a now much more empowered audience towards them.

So marketers are having to become publishers on one side and technologists on the other. This is something that is leading to a profound change in the industry - a change that will leave some people and companies behind but also provides great opportunities for those who can adapt quickly enough. It also provides opportunities for both service providers who can help companies benefit from these changes and also for investors who are backing them. There is a general view within the IT industry that CMO’s will soon overtake CIO’s in terms of their spend on technology.

idio is well placed to take advantage of this dynamic and changing market. idio sits between the content creation and the customers ensuring a more relevant and personalized experience. For the brands this drives far greater engagement and therefore makes their content work that much harder and deliver better results.

Imagine being a bank and knowing your customers or prospects have been showing an interest in houses for sale so you can provide information on your latest mortgage products?

Imagine being a research company and knowing exactly what information a user has been reading so that you can offer them the most relevant reports to download?

The product is now a full SaaS, cloud-based platform with a number of well-known brands using the service including Diageo, Unilever and eConsultancy. In every case there is clear evidence that engagement and response levels are materially improved using their technology. Diageo increased email click-through-rate by a staggering 630% and Unilever saw social engagement levels rise by 254%.

What’s also really important is that idio follow an ‘opt-in’ model whereby users have chosen to receive further information from these companies thus alleviating any privacy concerns.

idio has a young and talented team led by their CEO and Co-Founder, Ed Barrow. They have been working on predictive analytics and CRM for many years and I’m confident they have what it takes to be a leader in this category and continue to innovate ahead of the competition.

We are thrilled to be making our investment in idio. In the years to come marketing departments will be faced with an ever-increasing volume of content, delivery channels and users. idio will help clients connect these dots and find the true signals in all the noise.

In other news, Notion invests $9m into the rocket driving the Direct Booking Movement.