Facebook: Messaging as the new paradigm in business-to-consumer communication; $25/share of upside
After several presentations at Advertising Week in which Facebook Messenger was discussed, Aegis noted Messenger, and messaging as a whole, was said to be the new paradigm with which companies can communicate and interact with their consumers. David Marcus, VP of Messaging Products at Facebook illustrated this buy going back in time to 1860, when the pony express was the primary means by which businesses reached consumers. That evolved to the railway mail service (1869), to the telephone (1876), telemarketing campaigns (1950), 1-800 numbers (1967), email (1971 - first email sent), the Web (1991), text messaging (1992) to short code (2003 - enabled businesses to send urgent messages to customers). In each instance of this evolution, the method of business-to-consumer interaction was profoundly changed. Today, and for the foreseeable future, the FB reps believe that messaging is evolving as the primary way in which consumers and businesses will interact with product sales, customer service, and customer support. Messenger is already seeing heavy B2C use within the travel, beauty, and e-commerce verticals; Buy, $200 tgt.