ividence raises $4.2M for email ad network

The company gets backing from A Plus Financing

Email ad network ividence on Thursday announced a $4.2 million round of financing raised from A Plus Financing. The new funds will be used to power ividence's international expansion and hiring efforts.

The company, which takes credit as the "first email AdNetwork in Europe and the U.S.," offers a SaaS platform that provides email lists for advertisers' customer recruitment campaigns. But ividence says that it isn't a simple mass-email ad network. The company connects advertisers with potential customers based on users' behavioral characteristics, which indicate whether or not they'll be receptive to a certain brand or ad. The company's "Behavioral Email AdServer" could potentially cut down the volume of email an advertiser sends out by as much as 2-3x. 

But that's not the most interesting part. The most interesting part is the fact that the company says in its announcement that its proprietary technology "results from more than 10 man-years of research." Not ten dog-years of research. Not ten lightyears of research. But ten MAN-years of research. 

All of that research resulted in a unique technology that allows advertisers to select the email addresses of consumers whose Web-surfing behavior indicates they'll be more receptive to the campaign. 

Additionally, for its publishing clients, ividence says it monetizes more than 10 million email addresses in France and in the U.S. and manages more than 3,000 campaigns a month. The company's advertising clients include Cdiscount, Voyageprive, Groupon, Citroen, Idmacif, PCH, Match, and Dish Network.

"We were impressed both by the quality of ividence’s executives and the performance of its acquisition emailing platform. We believe the company’s model is very promising as there is high demand for e-marketing solutions which use behavioral profiling to maximise campaign performance," said Pierre Loup of A Plus Finance, in a prepared statement.

The company was recently ranked the fifth most innovative startup in the world in the Innovate 2010 competition, in which more than 1,000 startups participated. Additionally, ividence was named a finalist in the "Best Innovation in E-Marketing Technology" category at the 2011 E-marketing Awards.

The company says it plans to use the new funds to boost its international expansion, starting by consolidating its presence in France, and hiring another 20 employees to add to its current 25-person team. 

Image source: ividence.com