<p><img src="https://static1.businessinsider.com/image/5fcaa0f1b6a3a800199b6c62-1762/Screen Shot 2020-12-04 at 34536 PM.png" border="0" alt="Kevel CEO James Avery and VP of marketing Chris Shuptrine" data-mce-source="Kevel" data-mce-caption="Kevel CEO James Avery and VP of marketing Chris Shuptrine"></p><p></p><bi-shortcode id="summary-shortcode" data-type="summary-shortcode" class="mceNonEditable" contenteditable="false">Summary List Placement</bi-shortcode><p>Brands are increasingly becoming advertising platforms, giving rise to a cottage industry of adtech companies that help marketers build their own ad businesses.</p><p>One such firm is 9-year-old adtech firm Adzerk, which just raised $11 million and is rebranding as Kevel. The Series A round is led by Fulcrum Equity with Commerce Ventures, MathCapital and Food Retail Ventures also participating.</p><p>Retailers like <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/walgreens-launches-ad-business-to-compete-with-amazon-2020-12">Walgreens</a>, <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/inside-amazons-growing-ad-business-everything-we-know-2019-5">Walmart</a>, and <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/inside-instacarts-advertising-business-2020-2020-10">Instacart</a> have recently built ad businesses to make up for thin margins in retail. EMarketer reports that <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/2020-advertising-leaders-at-e-commerce-companies-like-amazon-cvs-2020-10">e-commerce advertising will be a $17 billion market</a> this year, but Kevel thinks there's an opportunity for other types of brands to build out advertising businesses.</p><p><em><strong>Read more: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/inside-instacarts-advertising-business-2020-2020-10">The playbook Instacart is using to build an advertising business, including offering grocery brands perks like shopper data</a></strong></em></p><p>Kevel is most known for selling ad-serving software that helped publishers compete with giants like Google.</p><p>Now the company is pivoting to licensing marketers an API so they can build ad products like sponsored listings and native ads that appear on brands' websites and appsso they don't have to hire engineers and advertising employees.</p><p>Kevel's clients include United Airlines, Strava, Edmunds, and Ticketmaster.</p><p>James Avery, founder and CEO of Kevel, said that Kevel wants to help big brands looking to replicate Facebook and Instagram's ad businesses that lean on performance marketing and first-party data. Brands are also investing more in first-party data to prepare for the phase-out of third-party cookies, he said.</p><p>"They need to protect the user data and user experience," he said. "It's a big opportunity if you do it right."</p><p>Strava doesn't sell ads but uses Kevel to promote its products in its app, said Mikko Westberg, CRM and marketing operations lead at Strava. For example, a user who downloads the app for free might see a message prompting them to sign up for a subscription or click to read a blog post.</p><p>It's gotten harder for adtech firms to raise funding, but Avery said that the growth in e-commerce and cookieless advertising and Kevel's profitability made it attractive to investors.</p><p>Philip Lewis, partner at Fulcrum Equity Partners, said that he was introduced to Avery about eight years ago but wasn't interested in investing at the time because the firm doesn't invest in traditional adtech. Last year, he reconnected with Avery and led the investment because he didn't view Kevel as an adtech company anymore.</p><p>"If this was just adtech, I'm not sure if we would have wanted to invest," he said. "This is core infrastructure technology."</p><p><a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/kevel-raises-11-million-help-build-in-house-ad-businesses-2020-12#comments">Join the conversation about this story »</a></p> <p>NOW WATCH: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.com/what-its-like-to-do-your-own-taxes-for-the-very-first-time-2018-2">July 15 is Tax Dayhere's what it's like to do your own taxes for the very first time</a></p>
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