The partnership is emblematic of the flood of advertisers into the digital sphere as the technological promise of targeted advertising grows ever-apparent.

In addition, Adchemy CEO Murthy Nukala sees a growing effort to narrow the digital attention gap — although Americans spend 20% of their time online, many advertisers spend a disproportionate portion of their ad
budget online.

“Accenture is making a big bet on digital media,” he said. “But it is a response to demand from customers.”

He believes the ad industry is stepping away from the broadcast model, where a campaign is averaged out to be most effective, into the digital audience-based model, which can be customized near-instantaneously

The partnership will add to the capabilities of Accenture’s recently launched Accenture Interactive division and Adchemy’s audience management platform will be integrated with the Accenture Intelligent Digital Platform. In addition, Accenture has purchased an equity stake in Adchemy and Tim Breene, Accenture’s senior managing director of Strategic Initiatives, has joined Adchemy’s board of directors.

This is a huge step for the five-year-old Adchemy; the company’s platform allows marketers to customize banner ads, search ads and websites in real time while also consolidating audience data and identifying segments for delivering appropriate content.  Adchemy strives to bring the same customization as customer relationship management, only to potential customers and not ones already won over. The machine learning algorithm evolves with target response to placement, learning from missteps.

Results so far have been stunning, with clients witnessing their conversion rates grow as much as six times. More interesting, companies have seen their volume increase as costs have decreased.

With the alliance, Adchemy has switched into hiring mode as it expects a boom in business. However, all resources are going to be dedicated to growing the audience management platform and the advancement of
the audience relationship management category. The need for such technology as well as the doors opened seem limitless.

“ARM is swinging at the first pitch of the first inning,” Nukala said. “It’s a long game ahead and we are committed to winning.”

Their top gripes: researchers found that 55% of those surveyed said stores didn’t have enough registers open and 49% complained that stores were frequently out of the items they were shopping for. Shoppers looking for entertainment equipment and furniture were especially quick to turn to their mouse – about nine out of 10 went online after striking out at just one store.

When asked to identify the factors that have the most powerful influence on purchase decisions, the greatest number of respondents – 48% — cited word-of-mouth, followed by traditional advertising (31%). Nearly half (47%) said special promotions are the best way to retain their business, while 40% said improved customer service is the key to making them loyal shoppers.

Accenture is a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company.