Creating happy, loyal customers takes more than just a stellar product and 24/7 customer support. The best brands go the extra mile to surprise and delight their customers with stand-out gifts that allow them to show off their pride, become more invested in the community and connect with other users.

After starting out three years ago as a small satellite event during Dreamforce, the Ops-Stars Conference has quickly grown to attract more than 1,500 attendees, 40 sessions and 26 sponsors. Hosted by LeanData, the event has become the lead forum for B2B executives who are either in an Ops role, looking to hire Ops roles, or those simply looking to optimize how the role functions within their organization.

Most analysts generally agree that consolidation is inevitable in the martech sector. So, there was little surprise when Leadspace and Radius announced plans to merge back in April. What was interesting, however, was how the companies would integrate to become one, given that they had somewhat similar product offerings but different structures.

Bigtincan, a sales enablement platform, unveiled a new SaaS solution for Salesforce that aims to use data science and AI to improve content recommendations and strategies for Salesforce users. The announcement was made at Dreamforce, which is taking place September 25-28 in San Francisco.

Demandbase, an ABM platform, announced an expanded partnership with Salesforce Pardot at Dreamforce 2018. The new product integration aims to provide B2B marketers with a more efficient ABM experience by allowing them to access Demandbase’s anonymous website engagement and intent data within Salesforce Pardot and Sales Cloud.

I attended Dreamforce last week, Salesforce’s annual marketer takeover of the city of San Francisco, and I know two things:

Just one month removed from being a Titanium sponsor of Salesforce’s Dreamforce event, a check of the Salesforce AppExchange shows that Marketo’s listing is no longer on the public portion of the site.

Several Marketo partners who did not want to be identified also confirmed that Marketo will not be invited to participate in Dreamforce next year.

At Dreamforce, Salesforce debuted its revamped marketing hub — now dubbed Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud — as part of its Salesforce1 platform, a new set of technologies designed to deliver and integrate mobile versions of Salesforce-based applications.

The Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud is designed to integrate apps for email, mobile, social, web and marketing automation, into a single location. The marketing cloud also is designed to provide a consolidated view of every customer, help manage the customer journey and optimize content for every device.

Analysts who spoke with Demand Gen Report had mixed reactions to the new marketing cloud. Some pointed to a greater separation of B2B and B2C marketing tactics, while others saw it as bringing the two marketing disciplines closer together.

At Dreamforce this week, Salesforce debuted its revamped marketing hub — now dubbed Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud — as part of its Salesforce1 platform. The Salesforce ExactTarget Marketing Cloud is designed to integrate apps for email, mobile, social, web and marketing automation, into a single location.

The marketing cloud also is designed to provide a consolidated view of every customer, help manage the customer journey and optimize content for every device.