Vocus and Cision, leading global providers of PR tech software being brought together by private equity firm GTCR, will acquire Visible Technologies. Visible is a worldwide market leader in social media listening and analytics, insights and engagement.

Visible has a deep base of customer relationships with Fortune 1000 companies and agencies around the globe that leverage Visible’s advanced social media insights to design and measure comprehensive marketing and communication strategies. Forrester Research, Inc. has named Visible as a Leader in The Forrester Wave™: Enterprise Listening Platforms, Q1 2014 report, citing it among vendors with “advanced data processing capabilities, user-friendly dashboards and strong integration and partnership plans.”

“Social media is by far the fastest-growing segment of the $2.2 billion global market for public relations software,” said Chris Porter, associate analyst at Burton-Taylor International Consulting LLC. “Visible has long featured as one of the leading players in this area, and it makes excellent sense for Vocus and Cision to be investing here.”

The Visible Intelligence (VI) enterprise social media intelligence platform provides three core capabilities: social media monitoring, enriched data analytics and insights, and customer engagement. Among its significant industry differentiators, the software provides multiple configurable dashboards and unlimited, fine-grain segmentation, on-demand search and analytics that help marketing and PR professionals track brand buzz, competitors, industry issues, market events, consumer sentiment and trending topics in real-time across the wide breadth of global social networks.

What makes Visible unique, stated a release, is the expert analysis and insights provided by its Insights Services team coupled with the VI technology. This research and consulting arm of the company works to derive context and meaning from social data to help customers make informed business decisions. The combination of Visible’s technology, capabilities and people will add a premium layer of high touch, high interaction client service and insights to the powerful product suite and services delivered through the combined company of Cision and Vocus.

“We’re building the ultimate PR tool, and Visible Technologies is a key element,” said Peter Granat,  chief executive officer of Vocus, which is based in Beltsville, MD. “Using PR to drive strategic business value requires an ability to uncover and leverage meaningful brand insights. Adding the Visible team and technology allows us to more effectively measure social impact and turn those insights into action. As this acquisition shows, we are committed to continued investment in and enhancing our platform, content tools and analysts to move the PR and marketing communication industry forward.”

Recently, Blue Canyon Holdings, an affiliate of leading private equity firm GTCR, announced its intent to form a premier global public relations cloud company by bringing together industry leaders Cision and Vocus, which is a Capitol Communicator sponsor.