SmartBug Media® — a leading digital agency that assists both B2B and B2C organizations in growing revenue by generating leads, scaling revenue operations and building market awareness through inbound marketing, digital strategy, design, marketing automation, revenue operations, public relations, paid media and web development — today announced that it has acquired Chair 10 Marketing, a Seattle-based performance marketing agency and leader in paid media, paid social and local SEO to franchise networks, multi-location businesses and other B2C brands.
SmartBug has seen a sharp increase in demand from B2B and B2C clients alike who require paid media services as part of a comprehensive, omnichannel go-to-market strategy. Paid advertising, when paired with other owned and earned digital media efforts such as inbound and content marketing, public relations and organic social media, can accelerate lead generation results while supporting customer marketing initiatives, resulting in increased customer loyalty and growth. Acquiring Chair 10 deepens the bench of the company’s paid media team in terms of both expertise and personnel.
Chair 10 Marketing is a trusted provider to many of the nation’s top franchise networks, providing search engine marketing (SEM) and paid social media to more than 700 B2C franchisees. As part of its service offering, Chair 10 combines lead generation and local SEO to help power the customer growth of these franchise networks. The company is a Google Premier Partner, a prestigious invite-only program which includes only the top 3% of agencies every year. The requirements to maintain Google Premier Partner status each year are rigorous, and Chair 10 has been a continuous Google Premier Partner since the program’s inception.
Like SmartBug, Chair 10’s customer base consists of long-term customers who use its services on a recurring monthly basis. Chair 10’s dedicated team provides its customers with stability and predictability in the client relationship, leading to better performance and higher customer satisfaction. Chair 10’s performance and ability to drive customer revenue have earned it “preferred vendor status” among many of its franchise network customers. In addition, Chair 10’s deep experience with franchises and multi-location businesses will add tremendous expertise and scale to SmartBug’s senior living, healthcare and higher education practice areas.
“Chair 10 has been successfully crafting digital strategies for its clients for almost two decades, and we are excited to add that remarkable depth of experience to SmartBug’s paid media and SEO team,” said SmartBug CEO Jen Spencer. “Combined with our technology partnerships with HubSpot, Klaviyo, and Google, this acquisition strengthens our position as a full service digital agency that provides end-to-end digital solutions for both B2B and B2C companies.”
Chair 10 was founded in 2006 and is led by President and CEO Mark Kelly. Kelly will join the SmartBug executive team as a Vice President, reporting directly to Spencer, and will lead the paid media and local SEO lines of business for all of SmartBug Media, including Chair 10.
“Our team has together built one of the premier performance digital marketing agencies in North America,” said Kelly, “and we’re very excited to take the next step in our evolution and combine our strengths with SmartBug’s. The strategic fit between Chair 10 and SmartBug is undeniable and will enable us to bring our clients a broader array of digital marketing services that many of them desire.”
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