Digital marketing startup launches with Xero partnership

New Zealand software startup Boma Marketing has created an application which takes the guesswork out of digital marketing by allowing business owners to easily create and distribute their marketing messages without the need for creative or marketing skills.

Former Saatchi CEO Ian Christie founded Boma with fellow Kiwis former Olympian Anna Lawrence and Charles Clark after seeing a gap in the market for a product giving small businesses access to technology previously the preserve of large marketing teams with big budgets.

Xero saw the benefit Boma could bring to its clients and asked Christie and his team to develop a bespoke model for them.

Anna Curzon, Xero chief partner officer says, "With this new partnership, it's never been easier for accountants and bookkeepers to advise and educate their small business clients with highly relevant, timely, and thoughtful information and videos.

"With Boma, Xero accounting and bookkeeping partners are now able to reach their new and existing clients through social media and email, efficiently and at scale, with personalised Xero content to help them build even stronger relationships with their clients."

As Christie explains, "When accountants and book-keepers are connected to Xero, Boma unlocks a library of purpose-built marketing content, designed and delivered by Xero. Boma will save Xero's partners time by providing content for them they can personalise and redistribute easily".

"Digital marketing requires very specific skill sets which many businesses don't have, as well as being expensive, hard to measure and analyse. We identified the need for a cost-effective, cloud-based, marketing solution which enables eCommerce and digital marketing to work together," Christie says.

Co-founder, former Olympian and Black Sticks Hockey captain Anna Lawrence says many businesses are challenged by digital marketing.

"They know they need to do it, but either don't have the time or they often don't know what's working and what's not. Boma makes it easy to create, distribute and analyse multi-channel marketing campaigns which can only help businesses grow and save time," Lawrence says.

Boma is excited to launch with Xero at the Xerocon events in Melbourne (September), London (October) and Austin, Texas (December) this year.

Boma will be rolled out to businesses of all sizes, globally, during that time.

Callaghan Innovation supported Boma with R-D funding, which spokesman Hemi Rolleston says recognised both the company's potential and its fit with Callaghan Innovation's mission to help connect businesses to the networks, capability and funding they need to make their ideas happen.

"Today's announcement is a good example of how local talent like Boma, with a little help, can develop a next-generation product and take it to the world. New Zealand is becoming recognised as a great laboratory for innovation," says Rolleston, Callaghan Innovation sectors general manager.