Epsilon Hints at Changes To Its Conversant Business
Epsilon is going through changes as it continues working towards integrating Conversant, the company formerly known as Valueclick, which it purchased it for $2.3 billion in September. That acquisition was in part about Conversant’s ability to make cross-channel targeting — specifically in mobile — more viable for the data-services company. Today, Epsilon is dead set on updating what Conversant has to offer to help clients make better use of their first-party data.
That means de-emphasizing the less-valuable aspects of Conversant’s business that have become commoditized. In an earnings call yesterday, Ed Heffernan, president-CEO of Epsilon parent company Alliance Data Systems, discussed plan to move Conversant into the modern digital-data era.
“It’s a very deliberate transformation,” he said. “We’re going to be focused on those businesses where that real rich first-party data will be driving the offerings and the more commodity-like businesses we will be de-emphasizing.”
