i33 specializes in online user experiences which includes designing and developing social media applications, widgets and rich media experiences for clients including PBS, Target and Borders.

While 360i often produced online ad campaigns — for clients like NBC and Bravo — featuring widgets and search applications, it previously didn’t have the tools to create them.

“To compete and reach audiences effectively online, smart marketers today require a whole new kind of agency – one that has a deep understanding of how to create engaging interactive consumer experiences that are searchable, integrated and provide measurable impact to the marketer,” said Bryan Wiener, CEO of 360i. “We’ve worked with i33 on a series of integrated programs and have consistently found their team and their work to be nothing less than exceptional.”

“This is a perfect marriage, combining our skill sets with 360i’s roster of blue-chip clients, as well our joint focus on delivering engaging and measurable results to our strategic clients,” said David Levin, President/CEO of i33.

The acquisition follows an industry-wide trend of indie digital agencies being snapped up by bigger fish. iCrossing recently acquired Proxicom and Search Rev recently bought AKQA.

360i is a digital agency specializing in search, behavioral marketing and social media.

Services assisting the Attendi launch are being provided by i33 such as strategy development, creative design, technical planning, build and architecture and online marketing. President and CEO of i33 communications David Levin stated, “Attendi approached i33 with a novel concept – leveraging custom search functionality combined with Web 2.0 technologies to connect people who share similar ideas, passions and expertise. Given our search and social networking know-how, i33 turned Attendi’s ‘big idea’ into a functioning reality.”
 
Currently a “live ad unit” is being built. This means advertising is served only when a live brand representative is ready to field inquiries about a product or service through Attendi’s real-time chat functionality. “Our live ad unit will leverage chat technology enabling traditional ad banners to spark real-time interactions between a brand and prospective customers,” said Drew Rayman, founder of Attendi.
 
The company plans on reaching out to identified “luminaries in key online communities” so they and their peers may leverage Attendi, giving them a unique approach to marketing. When Levin spoke with Adotas he said “We thought the site should be altruistic. People helping people.  What makes us different than other social networks is it’s about what you know, not who you know.”

“A risk-sharing pay structure changes the relationship between agency and marketer,” Levin said in a press statement. “Clients like to know that we want to succeed as much as they do and that we work that much harder to deliver results. We’re in the trenches with them, and it allows us to work together as a real team.”

While many companies are beginning to move away from traditional agency commission and fee models to performance-based options, Levin said, there is still a significant number of marketers and agencies averse to this model.

Levin began i33′s interactive practice in 1997, and has since focused on maintaining high-volume sales and lead generation for the company. i33′s proprietary service AdMaximize(SM) is the first and most customizable ROI-reporting tool in the industry.