A week ago I attended an event in New York City at which Comscore unveiled its new Validated GRP(TM) tool that rates the effectiveness of digital ads. Validated GRP takes the rating standards advertisers apply to TV advertising (Gross Rating Points) and establishes a similar metric that will apply to digital advertising. For advertisers, this is a metric to judge online campaign effectiveness–to make an apples to apples comparison between the effectiveness of TV and the effectiveness of online display and video ads.

In the development of its Validated GRP tool, Comscore conducted a  major study on the quality of campaign delivery  that allowed it to investigate discrepancies between expectations and reality when it comes to ad delivery. The full study, the results of which will be released in March, included twelve major brands with household names like Ford, Sprint, Kimberly Clark, and Kellogg’s.

To conduct the study, Comscore used the AdXPose technology it acquired earlier last year. The AdXPose team tipped us off in advance because we were already partnered with them. We got a sneak preview of the study’s highlights, which we are now free to share here.

In December 2011, Comscore measured 2,975 placements on 380,898 site domains — totaling over 1.7 million impressions, all delivered in iframes.

The conclusion? Something we, as an ad server and a advertising technology partner for publishers, have already observed: many ads are served, but not seen. That’s because web pages are no longer mostly short pages with static user experiences; they’re long pages with dynamic usage. Many use the increasingly popular “infinite scroll”. By the time an ad at the top of the page is served, the reader may have already scrolled by. Yet many ads further down may be very visible to the user. In Comscore’s own words:

“It’s not just an ‘above the fold versus below the fold’ issue. Sometimes people scroll down quickly to get to the content they want, and miss home page ads. In those cases, the action might be below the fold. Compelling ads can work in both places – but only if they’re visible.” Comscore found that 24% of ads above the fold were not visible.

While this is not great news for the advertisers who paid for those campaigns, It is great to see Comscore measure this for advertisers. And it’s why we developed the InView slider formats. Web pages, like the Huffington Post and Daily Mail are getting longer. And they are increasingly optimized for tablets where users are quick to scroll and therefore quick to skip past the top of the page to get to the content they want to read.

Comscore’s findings become very important, especially as online advertising moves from simple banner display ads to on-page video. And I believe it will move to great video ads for cars, cosmetics and movies etc right on the page. Right now, we’re selling the InView Slider ad unit with great confidence that it works for advertisers wherever you place it. It only appears if the reader is going to see it. The InView slider gives publishers a way to boost revenue, and gives advertisers a great way to guarantee to catch scrolling readers.

We’re also launching an in page video ad that will appear when the viewer is guaranteed to see it.

The InView slider has been quickly adopted by publishers since the summer because all the revenue for the publisher is additional and yet there’s no additional work involved.

We look forward to Comscore publicly presenting the full results of its study in March, and of course we are proud to be their partner in making advertising on the web as good as the best advertising on national TV.

About ZEDO

ZEDO, Inc. is a digital ad solutions company that offers products and services for a publisher’s premium, self service, and remnant inventory. Products include ad network optimization, innovative rich media formats for publishers’ direct sales teams, full featured ad serving, behavioral targeting data built into the ad server, an exchange-like platform for publishers to sell behavioral and DMA targeted inventory at high CPMs (see: www.zedoadnetwork.com), a self service platform to allow advertisers to buy directly from a publisher, outsourced ad ops and more. These products are integrated into one technology platform for publishers to choose from, or use seamlessly together. ZEDO has been in the internet advertising industry for over 10 years, and is the most successful independent ad server in the US. The company provides innovative solutions that boost revenues for Internet publishers. ZEDO is headquartered in San Francisco and has four development centers in Russia and India.

Reach out to ZEDO at http://www.zedo.com, or follow the company on Facebook (http://www.facebook.com/ZEDOadsolutions) and Twitter (http://twitter.com/zedoinc).

Attracting more than 650,000 unique visitors monthly and delivering over 25 million impressions a month, South Asian Life claims the #1 spot for the largest ethnic site in Canada for the past ten years, with original daily coverage of politics, personalities, entertainment, fashion and food. The site is a resource for the hottest trends, breaking national and local news, TV show scoops, recipes and more. Inspired to highlight the latest on news and features, South Asian Life is the go-to guide for everything South Asian centric.

“We are excited to broaden our ethnic reach with South Asian Life, a site catered to the South Asian community, which is currently the fastest-growing minority population in Canada,” said Walder Amaya, Vice President, Canadian Operations, Gorilla Nation Media. “South Asian Life’s targeted reach to minorities and Gorilla Nation’s cache of brand advertisers makes this collaboration a significant venture for both companies, especially on the cultural front.”

“The South Asian community, including East Indians, Pakistanis, and Sri Lankans, has deep layers of cultural and physiographic roots. We have over 80+ writers, contributors, doctors, and editors churning out premium content that is relevant to their interests and lifestyle,” stated Raaj Kapur Brar, Founder/President and Editor-in-Chief, South Asian Life. “Gorilla Nation has a rich history of working with multicultural sites and creating innovative advertising campaigns, therefore we felt they were the best choice to better connect advertisers with our readers.

About Gorilla Nation:

Gorilla Nation is the world’s largest online branded sales company, exclusively representing the online branded ad inventory of over 500 premium content sites. GN is focused on selling site-specific, integrated media and promotional programs across its properties on behalf of Fortune 500 brand marketers – marrying message with media. Working closely with its web publisher partners, GN’s expertise within 30 select vertical markets provides advertising clients the ability to build high impact, rich media programs across one or more properties to provide superior audience reach, site-specific creative frequency, guaranteed media placements and integration of message to contextually relevant audiences. The company is committed to delivering integrated creative media programs, from concept through execution, and exceptional customer service. Founded in 2001, Gorilla Nation is headquartered in Los Angeles with offices in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Scottsdale, Toronto, London, Sydney and Melbourne.

NEW YORK – Vibrant (www.vibrantmedia.com), the global leader in contextual advertising, is reporting 51% Y-Y growth in Q2’10, and 45% Y-Y growth in H1’10. Categories which have shown particular strength globally during the first half of 2010 include Automotive (up 44% Y-Y), Business & Finance (up 63% Y-Y) and CPG (up 124% Y-Y). This continued growth follows on the heels of a record-setting year for Vibrant in 2009 as brands increasingly leverage in-text to deliver content-driven advertising.

Marketers like Microsoft, Unilever, Best Buy and Blackberry RIM are using Vibrant hyperlinks to bring real information to users within the context of a page, such as search results, video streams, recipes, Tweets, product reviews and geo-targeted listings. In addition, brands increasingly see Vibrant’s solutions as an extension of their keyword search strategy.

Says Co-Founder and CEO Doug Stevenson, “We continue to see growth due to Vibrant’s ability to bridge the gap between search and display, helping advertisers cut through the online brand clutter to deliver a useful experience to over 170 million users. At the same time, Vibrant helps its network of more than 4,500 publishers monetize their pages while delivering real information to their readers.”

According to a recent Morgan Stanley report on internet trends, the percentage of time consumers spend online is more than double the equivalent ad spend, leaving a $50 billion global opportunity for online advertising. As marketers shift dollars from traditional ad channels, advertisers see the value in leveraging Vibrant’s growing online platform and premium publisher network to drive performance and user engagement.

Vibrant’s revenue growth has fueled investment in its technology, product and sales teams, increasing headcount 29% to 230 employees with offices now in 11 cities, New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Boston, Detroit, Chicago, London, Paris, Hamburg, Dusseldorf and Munich.

About Vibrant

Vibrant is a world leader in contextual technology aligning billions of words across the Internet with relevant video, information, tools, and advertising. With over 4,500 premium publishers, reaching more than 170 million unique users per month (comScore, May 2010), Vibrant gives top brand marketers the opportunity to deliver highly targeted advertisements within premium Web content and offers publishers premium editorial tools to re-circulate users throughout their websites. Vibrant works with top brand advertisers such as Microsoft, Unilever, Warner Bros and AT&T. The company was founded in 2000 and has offices in London, New York, Boston, Detroit, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Paris, Hamburg, Munich and Dusseldorf. Vibrant’s rapid growth has been recognized by the Inc. 500 and Deloitte Fast 50 lists. For more information, visit: www.vibrantmedia.com or www.hyperlinkevolved.com or www.facebook.com/vibrantmedia or http://twitter.com/vibrantmedia.

By accurately calculating a price floor, based on 28 market conditions and inventory indicators, Zoox Analytics helps managers maintain pricing discipline. The results are significant. RSG has seen a 4-5 percent lift opportunity based on tests done using Zoox Analytics with some of the largest digital publishers in the industry.

Says Sriram Subramanian, head of RSG Media’s Analytics & Optimization group, “Often sales reps just want to close a deal and accept a price that is too low. There’s not only the direct cost of lower prices, there’s also the opportunity cost.”

In addition to pricing deals, the new Zoox™ Analytics decision support system enables Pricing and Inventory (P&I) teams to answer questions such as:

- How much inventory do I have for a DMA? How much targeted to adult males?
- Do I make more money selling individual units or packages?
- Are my packages giving valuable inventory away for cheap?
- Should I give in to the client’s quote? Or will I be able to get a higher price later?
- When the market’s moving, how can I tell immediately?

These questions are difficult to address thanks in part to the tremendous growth of online advertising and the accompanying innovation in ad formats, targeting and packaging. With Zoox Analytics, RSG Media has taken a unique approach to solving these problems. Zoox uses advanced mathematical models to predict inventory availability and recommend dynamic pricing that helps publishers maximize their return on inventory. Experts at RSG Media Research Lab monitor the models and make adjustments as necessary to keep them in tune with changing market trends.

This approach has been made possible through a combination of RSG Media’s years of experience in the media domain building sales systems and revenue management solutions for the top 20 media companies.

Adds Subramanian, “Our solutions based on rigorous mathematical models help provide decision support in critical areas of estimating available inventory to sell, price suggestion and identifying lost revenues due to mis-pricing. Instead of offering a one-size-fits-all, we start any engagement with an understanding of specific business requirements and issues that we use to fine-tune our models. Using the client’s data, we demonstrate a clear value proposition with a provable return on investment.”

For more information on Zoox™, go to http://www.rsgmedia.com/products/zoox%E2%84%A2-digital-media-tools/zoox%E2%84%A2-digital-media-tools.aspx

About RSG Media Systems

RSG Media Systems (www.rsgmedia.com) creates software products to manage and monetize media properties. The company’s products include: RightsLogic®, an enterprise rights and royalty management solution; Planit™ an ad sales proposal management system; AdVant™, optimizing ad sales revenue software designed to assist media companies in maximizing revenue, and Zoox™ digital ad sales software for pricing, inventory, and analytics groups. RSG Media Systems also designs strategies and implements custom technology solutions to meet its clients’ needs. Established in 1985, the company is headquartered in New York City.

Used By Major Internet Publishers Such as Time, Inc. and CBS, AdPortal Web-Enables the Packaging of Premium Advertising Solutions to Manage Advertising Sales to Agencies, Demand-Side Platforms, Direct, and Self-Serve for Local Ads

Silicon Valley, California and New York, New York – Glam Media, Inc. (www.GlamMedia.com), the number one vertical media company for women online and one of the top display global media web properties, announced that it is going to acquire AdPortal (www.Adportal.net), a leading publisher advertising-technology startup based in San Francisco and New York, and also announced the launch of “GlamAdapt for Publishers,” a fully automated publisher-side platform for seamlessly packaging digital advertising solutions across multiple ad sales channels-Agencies, Demand-Side Platforms, Direct, and Self-Serve for Local Advertisers and Resellers-designed for super premium brand advertising.

“Glam Media’s heart and soul is about publishers and professional social media content,” said Samir Arora, chairman and CEO of Glam Media. “With the acquisition of AdPortal, we are launching ‘GlamAdapt for Publishers,’ a one-stop solution to web-enable all digital inventory for existing and emerging demand sales channels. AdPortal will bring one of the most advanced technology products to the recently announced next generation GlamAdapt Platform designed for Brand Advertising.”

GlamAdapt for Publishers (GFP) helps publishers sell more of their valuable premium inventory through the creation, marketing, and measuring of high impact sales packages across multiple demand channels. Publishers can take advantage of GlamAdapt’s creative, targeting, network management, and measurement services to deliver comprehensive brand solutions for advertisers. Leveraging GlamAdapt’s open “Advertising Apps Platform,” GFP comes with built-in support for leading third-party data, measurement, and creative providers. Publishers also gain access to sales management and efficiency tools that can create client-ready media plans in a matter of minutes. This combination provides greater access to brand dollars-enabling publishers to drive higher value deals with more efficient sales forces.

“Our goal with AdPortal has always been to empower publishers to make the most use of their premium inventory, while making it easy for advertisers to get their message in front of the people they want to target,” said Robert Tas, CEO and Founder of AdPortal, a former SVP of Media & Technology at 24/7 and one of the founders of Tacoda. “We are thrilled to be a part of Glam Media and integrate AdPortal into GlamAdapt, now a full alternative ad-tech platform for premium brand advertising.”

Tas will be joining Glam Media as Vice President of GlamAdapt Platform.

“Linden Lab has had success with AdPortal, allowing us to drive greater value for our premium inventory,” said Robin Ducot, VP of Web Development at Linden Lab. “We are pleased that AdPortal is becoming part of GlamAdapt, and look forward to working with Glam Media to drive innovation around audience packages, brand-focused analytics, and advanced ad formats.”

Glam is also announcing today GlamAdapt is now running at scale delivering 100% of Glam’s premium business, with over 1,500 publishers and 500 brand advertisers running over 1,000 campaigns since launch worldwide.

AdPortal is a Silicon Valley venture-funded spinoff of Sportgenic, with investors including top-tier VC firms SoftTechVC and Greycroft Partners, key Silicon Valley startup investors and a list of premium publishers. AdPortal’s San Francisco-based employees will join the Glam Media ad products team in Silicon Valley.

About Glam Media
Glam Media is the pioneer of vertical media that connects the world’s top brand advertisers with targeted vertical audiences online. Glam invented the first commercial Blog Network in 2005 to harness the power of Social Media for Brands. Since then, it has exploded to a reach of 85 million unique monthly visitors in the US and 164 million users globally.

Glam Media is the #1 comScore Community web property targeting Women, the #8 publisher in all online Display and a Top 10 Adweek Display Ad Publisher. Recently, Glam Media was named the world’s most innovative media company by Fast Company Magazine. Glam Media has more than 1,500 publishers organized in vertical networks: Glam.com for Women, Brash.com for Men and Tinker.com for real-time Social Media.

Glam Media is headquartered in New York City, New York and Silicon Valley, California, with other US offices in Chicago and Los Angeles, and internationally in London, Munich, Hamburg, Berlin, Tokyo and Paris.

NEW YORK – Kantar Video, a division of WPP’s insight information and consultancy network, Kantar, announced the first in a series of partnerships to bring best-of-breed technology to the Kantar Videolytics™ platform. As part of the relationship, Kantar Video announced that Anvato is providing both video syndication and tracking technology. Track, one of the Videolytics™ offerings, leverages Anvato’s technology to power Kantar’s proprietary Signature audio and video content and advertising identification offering. Agencies, brands, publishers and content owners can now receive more accurate performance, effectiveness, verification, safety, reach and user engagement metrics no matter where and when video content and ads appear.

Kantar Track is a product that delivers a true breakthrough in video tracking and analytics by following online video even when they are modified by users and distributed beyond controlled syndication. The Anvato technology, often used to enforce copyright infringement, combines audio and visual pattern recognition to provide a robust fingerprint for identifying and tracking online video.

“As long as a human being can tell it’s the same video, the Kantar Track technology, powered by Anvato’s Perceptual Signature, will be able to track it.”, stated Alper Turgut, co-founder and CEO of Anvato. “We are pleased to help power the Kantar Videolytics™ platform, which is poised to revolutionize online and mobile video syndication, measurement and optimization.”

“Anvato has demonstrated its skill at developing effective solutions to some of online and mobile video’s biggest challenges and delivers complex solutions at scale,” commented Bill Lederer, CEO of Kantar Video, and added: “Innovative, adaptable, and dependable, Anvato is a valued partner.”

The Kantar Videolytics™ online and mobile video platform is currently in private beta with several major brands, agencies and media companies.

About Anvato

Anvato is the first company that effectively applies cutting-edge computer machine vision to video content protection, syndication and contextual advertising. Anvato enables video publishers to manage, syndicate, track and monetize their content while enabling advertisers to deliver targeted messages and engage users by leveraging video context. Anvato’s patent-pending technology, Perceptual Signature, uses machine vision to extract knowledge about objects, scenes and visual cues from videos. Learn more at www.anvato.com.

About Kantar Video

Kantar Video is the New York-based business unit of Kantar, a division of WPP, the world’s leading media and marketing services company, built to accelerate global online, mobile, and multi-channel video innovation. At general release, its comprehensive Kantar Videolytics™ online and mobile video advertising and program platform will offer content identity, syndication, tracking, measurement, analytics, and optimization for marketers and their agencies, media companies, and content creators and distributors. Kantar Videolytics™ is specifically designed for on-demand ease of use and efficient workflow and analysis to promote better decision-making. Learn more at www.kantarvideo.com.

About KANTAR

Kantar is one of the world’s largest insight, information and consultancy networks. By uniting the diverse talents of its 13 specialist companies, the group aims to become the pre-eminent provider of compelling and inspirational insights for the global business community. Its 26,500 employees work across 95 countries and across the whole spectrum of research and consultancy disciplines, enabling the group to offer clients business insights at each and every point of the consumer cycle. The group’s services are employed by over half of the Fortune Top 500 companies. For further information, please visit us at www.kantar.com.

About WPP

WPP is the world’s largest communications services group. Through its operating companies, the Group provides a comprehensive range of advertising and marketing services including advertising; media investment management; information, insight and consultancy; public relations and public affairs; branding and identity; healthcare communications; direct, digital, promotion and relationship marketing and specialist communications. The company employs 145,000 people (including associates) in 2,400 offices in 107 countries. For more information, visit www.wpp.com.

Paid Content is Gaining Ground: One Fifth of Journalists Confirm Publications Are Researching Paid Content Models Including Apps and Micropayments

SAN FRANCISCO – Journalists today have greater demands than ever on their time; have less scope to research stories; and work in an environment of continued uncertainty, according to a study published today by the Oriella PR Network. For all these challenges, however, the third annual Digital Journalism Study finds journalists positive about the impacts of digital and social media on their reporting, and overall job satisfaction remains overwhelmingly high.

The study polled 774 journalists in 21 countries, including the U.S., the U.K., Brazil and Germany, and found that:

- Nearly half of the respondents (46 percent) to this year’s study said they are expected to produce more content than before
- One in three (30 percent) are working longer hours
- However, nearly half (46 percent) said their work has improved as a result of digital and social media – an increase from 39 percent in 2009
- Just 17 percent said their job satisfaction had declined as a result

At the same time, the study uncovered growing uncertainty over the future of ‘offline’ media, such as print, TV and radio, including:

- Forty percent of the respondents expect advertising revenues to fall by more than a tenth
- Over half of the respondents expressed the belief that their publications’ current offline formats may fold at some point in the future (2009 figure: 32 percent)
- However, 40 percent – and more than half of those polled in the U.S., the U.K., Spain, Brazil and Eastern Europe – believed that the transition to new media would create new opportunities.

In response, growing numbers of publications are researching, or have implemented paid-content strategies. Nearly one respondent in four (22 percent) said their publication is researching or has launched smart phone apps in order to deliver paid-content to mobile users and 16 percent are researching paid-content for iPads and e-readers. Twenty-five percent said their publication is considering flat-rate subscriptions and nearly a third (30 percent) only offer online content to existing print subscribers.

The study also demonstrates the extent to which digital and social media – i.e. blogs, Twitter and audio/visual content – have embedded themselves in newsrooms. Fewer than 15 percent of the journalists surveyed said their publications support no social or digital media at all – down from nearly a quarter two years ago. Meanwhile, adoption of blogs and Twitter has continued to grow, with 47 percent saying their publications have journalist-authored blogs, and 40 percent saying their publications use Twitter.

Shannon Latta, co-head of the Oriella PR Network and partner at Horn Group, said: “Our third annual study shows how widely digital and social media have embedded themselves into media organisations. While there is still a lot of experimentation going on, it is clear that publications see the greatest opportunities in their digital operations – not just in terms of offering new platforms for publishing content, but also in terms of making that content pay.”

“As these changes play out in newsrooms, communicators should expect journalists to become more demanding: their content needs to be high quality to attract the revenues media bosses expect. Brand communicators must make sure their public relations is coordinated across both social and conventional media, and addresses the basic requirements of news-gathering: strong news hooks, timely and compelling comment, and excellent, relevant visuals.”

About the 2010 Digital Journalism Study

The third annual Oriella Digital Journalism Study was compiled in May and June 2010, using an online survey of 774 journalists from broadcast, national, regional and trade media across Belgium, Brazil, Eastern Europe, Germany, Italy, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, The U.K. and The U.S. This year includes journalists from Brazil, Eastern Europe and the U.S. for the first time. The full report can be downloaded from: www.orielladigitaljournalism.com (registration required).

About the Oriella PR Network

The Oriella PR Network is an alliance of 17 communications agencies in 20 countries around the world. Our partnership of independent agencies was built upon a set of global best practices and close working relationships not offered by others of its kind. The network was founded by Brands2Life and Horn Group with the support of agencies around the world with whom they have worked successfully on client projects – in some cases for many years. Oriella partners exist in major and secondary markets throughout The Americas, Europe and Asia/Pacific.

For further information:

Website: www.oriellaprnetwork.com

Blog: www.oriellaprnetwork.com/blog

Twitter: twitter.com/oriellanetwork

NEW YORK – Crystal Semantics, a leading innovator in the field of semantic advertising, announced that it will license its semantic advertising technology to ad agencies, publishers, ad networks, ad exchanges and demand-side platforms.

First to market with a semantic advertising solution in 2004 and acquired by ad pepper media in 2006, Crystal Semantics has been driving the development of ad pepper media’s iSense Network, the world’s first brand safe semantic ad network. The network opened a new ad targeting category beyond that of contextual and behavioral targeting. The technology currently manages campaigns with billions of impressions for some of the world’s most well-known brands.

Previously only available to ad pepper media, Crystal Semantics will now license its patented Sense Engine™ (semantic classification) and SiteScreen™ ASP (semantic brand protection technology) to ad agencies, publishers, networks, ad exchanges and demand side platforms.

In contrast to other solutions that conduct simple keyword analysis, only scan top-level domains or make reference to databases of so-called “safe sites” Crystal Semantics carries out real-time page-level semantic analysis of each and every webpage. This method provides superior, precise and powerful ad targeting and brand protection functionality for marketers.

“We decided to change the focus of Crystal Semantics based upon market demand for our technology solutions and the resulting licensing opportunities,” said Ian Saunders, Managing Director, Crystal Semantics. “Leveraging our core competency as a technology company, which is supported by a leading international ad network, Crystal Semantics can now provide leading-edge semantic classification and brand protection solutions backed by relevant knowledge and experience.”

Saunders added, “The drive towards automation in online media requires greater intelligence about audience and the context in which that audience has been identified. Crystal Semantics is uniquely placed to meet the needs of agencies and advertisers, buy and sell-side platforms, ad serving providers, marketplaces and publishers.”

“We recognized the market’s need for superior forms of content analysis and brand protection technology and have decided to make the most of the opportunity by leveraging Crystal Semantics’ technology beyond the confines of the ad pepper media network,” said Ulrich Schmidt, Chairman and CEO for ad pepper media. “This move opens up tremendous opportunities for potential partners to dramatically increase their relevancy targeting, brand protection and behavioral profile enrichment capabilities through the deployment of Crystal’s market-leading semantic advertising technologies.”

Crystal Semantics’ patented semantic technology is the result of more than 10 years of development and is the brain child of Professor David Crystal OBE, one of the world’s leading linguists. The result of his work enables the Sense Engine to relate web content to its proprietary ontology and classify any webpage into one of more than 3,500 categories in any of nine languages. In addition, SiteScreen ASP enables the identification of potentially objectionable content in 18 core categories and the blocking of potentially brand damaging ad impressions, prior to delivery.

About Crystal Semantics

Crystal Semantics is a leading innovator in the field of semantic advertising. The company developed Sense Engine delivers significantly more accurate and powerful analysis of the context of webpages. By applying human “senses” and concepts that current algorithms, semantic systems and other statistical techniques cannot match, Sense Engine™ uniquely uses human linguistic intuition, tapping into the semantic relationships between words and the contexts in which they occur. This has resulted in the development of a comprehensive and proprietary ontology which is leveraged to provide a detailed and granular classification of webpage content. The Crystal Semantics suite of products includes SiteScreen™ ASP – a page level brand protection solution, enabling controversial content to be identified and for ad impressions to be suppressed from appearing alongside such content.

Based in London, Crystal Semantics is a wholly-owned subsidiary of the ad pepper media group and was founded in 2001 by Ian Saunders and Professor David Crystal, a world authority in linguistics.

For more information on the company, please visit http://www.crystalsemantics.com

About ad pepper media

ad pepper media is one of the leading independent international online advertising marketers, ad networks, and digital marketing technology solution provider. With 15 branches throughout the U.S. and Europe, ad pepper media manages campaigns for thousands of national and international advertising clients in more than 50 countries worldwide. ad pepper media successfully sets itself apart with investment in the development of an extensive range of efficient proprietary marketing solutions such as the SiteScreen and iSense Networks, as well as in the areas of lead generation, affiliate marketing and ad serving. For more information on the company, group companies and solutions, please visit http://www.adpepper.us.

BURLINGTON, Mass. – Burst Media, a leading provider of online advertising services, announced the signing of the Seed Corn Advertising Network as a new client of its adConductor™ ad management technology and services. The Seed Corn Advertising Network (SCA Network) has recently formed a premier vertical content network, serving more than 3,400 specialty-content web sites, organized in more than 400 channels. adConductor will provide ad serving and ad management support across this network.

The Seed Corn Advertising Network offers brand advertisers an efficient way to reach audiences online, and offers web publishers the opportunity to monetize their ad inventory with high quality targeted advertising. adConductor will allow The SCA Network to coordinate in a single system the various aspects of ad sales, delivery and campaign management. It will also allow the network to target and optimize ad campaigns to its highly engaged visitors without advertising waste.

“We are looking forward to launching “SCA Networks” – our premium ad network utilizing Burst Media’s Industry leading adConductor ad management and technology platform,” said Andrew Stern, President of Seed Corn Advertising. “In a survey of over 7 different solutions, the adConductor platform stood out as the most innovative and scalable system on the market today. With this move, we now have the ability to offer many new services and technologies to our clients such as full transparency, access to an exchange, re-targeting, network forecasting, custom RFP building tools and industry leading optimization strategies. We hope that this improved technology and more robust platform will help our network grow to the next level and are ready to offer the full suite of products to our base of over 300 advertisers.”

adConductor helps leading online companies deliver the advertising they sell on behalf of their publishers through a rich suite of targeting, campaign management, campaign reporting and billing tools. adConductor is one of the largest independent vendors of ad management technology, serving billions of ads every month on behalf of thousands of websites, ad networks, and other online publishing entities.

“There is an ongoing transformation of the advertising space and sophisticated vertical networks like the ones built by Seed Corn Advertising are taking part in the evolutionary process,” said Sean Keaveny, SVP of adConductor. “Advertising is finally moving toward the content-rich collection of sites that consumers visit and use. Advertisers who capitalize on the opportunities provided with this new approach will break through media clutter and reach the most interested consumers for their offer.”

About Seed Corn Advertising

Founded in 2002, Seed Corn Advertising, Inc (www.seedcornadv.com) is an online ad network and agency delivering over 3 billion impressions per month across its search and display networks. With over 300 advertisers and over 6,000 sites and 200 publishers in its network, Seed Corn Advertising has a robust and International reach and is highly regarded as one of the few one-stop-shops for online companies looking to reach active and qualified consumers at an affordable price. Seed Corn Advertising operates out of Studio City, California. For more information, visit www.seedcornadv.com or call 818-760-3999.

About Burst Media

An online media and technology company founded in 1995, Burst Media (www.BurstMedia.com) is a leading provider of advertising representation, services and technology to independent Web Publishers. Burst Media enables advertisers to reach finely segmented, engaged consumers as they visit Burst’s extensive number of interest-based sub-channels. Through its Burst Network and Burst Direct units, the company represents one of the broadest and deepest offerings of interest-based websites online. The company’s Giant Realm unit represents some of the leading gaming sites that attract males age 18-34. Burst also markets its ad management platform, adConductor™, which empowers content websites, online ad networks, and web portals to manage the complete process of ad sales and service. Burst Media is headquartered in Burlington, Massachusetts, with offices throughout the United States and in London, UK. For more information, visit www.BurstMedia.com or call 781.272.5544.

RALEIGH, N.C. – aiMatch announced the launch of the company and limited availability of its online advertising technology platform. Founded by a team of online advertising technology experts who have been entrenched in the industry since its inception, aiMatch is dedicated to putting advertising intelligence (ai) in the hands of online publishers, helping them create new and better defined audiences, create new revenue opportunities, and maximize the value of their advertising inventory.

aiMatch founders Jeff Wood, Guy Taylor and Ryan Treichler have more than 40 years of combined experience in the online advertising industry and have spent more than 10 years working together at Microsoft, aQuantive, Accipiter and Engage. The team has already established a global foundation with the addition of industry expert Steve Perks who leads the company’s efforts in EMEA.

Through their collective experience, the aiMatch team has played pivotal roles in solving the most complex challenges facing the online advertising industry. The team understands online advertising from all angles, creating a more holistic view of the opportunities and unique challenges publishers face. They have addressed the needs of local markets while implementing online advertising innovations in over 26 countries across six continents.

“While so many solution providers have been focused on helping publishers monetize remnant inventory, we recognized that publishers invest heavily in their content and need new tools to increase the value of their direct sold products,” explained Jeff Wood, aiMatch CEO. “That is why we are dedicated to offering solutions that leverage advertising intelligence to maximize their return on that investment.”

aiMatch also announced limited availability of its online advertising platform, currently open to early adopters, with full availability scheduled for June 2010. aiMatch has created a single, comprehensive solution for publishers to create, forecast, deliver and analyze online advertising products. The approach puts data in the hands of publishers for their benefit. The aiMatch solution is an open, extensible platform that can communicate with value-add systems for aggregating data into one actionable view, making it easy for customers to tailor to their specific needs.

aiMatch delivers advanced advertising intelligence tools to help customers manage and analyze data, and to make “intelligent” decisions based on that data. aiMatch overcomes the limitations of traditional ad serving solutions by enabling the analysis of unlimited amounts of data, ranging from the very simple to the extremely complex, and making that data actionable.

About aiMatch

At aiMatch we understand that premium, guaranteed inventory is a publisher’s primary online advertising asset. That is why the aiMatch solution is focused on publishers; to maximize and extend the value of that premium asset. We are not a Media Network or a “bolt-on” product. We leverage Advertising Intelligence to improve sales performance and drive revenue.

aiMatch equips publishers with multiple tools in a single solution to help them make intelligent decisions. We solve the complexity of business intelligence, forecasting, simulation and delivery with unprecedented and scalable capabilities that match the best use of a publisher’s online advertising inventory.

aiMatch connects insight to action, enabling users to view and interact with data in the “big picture” – to be proactive and effective in inventory placement, packaging and pricing. For more information, visit www.aimatch.com.

SALT LAKE CITY – Advertisers never have to pay for view-through again. mediaFORGE (www.mediaforge.com) announced its new engagement-based platform for retargeting, allowing the abandonment of view-through attribution. The technology measures engagement and subsequent post-engagement conversions as a new metric for attributing success. For ROI-driven advertisers, mediaFORGE’s interactive ad units allow personalized content delivery with ads designed, built and optimized for engagement.

“We’re excited to introduce a performance-based retargeting model that doesn’t require paying for view-through conversions,” said Tony Zito, President of mediaFORGE. “Experts agree that retargeting is the most underutilized tool for online marketers, and we’re helping change that notion. With this new platform, marketers and advertisers can employ the best aspects of retargeted advertising immediately, without having to pay for view-through, making for 100 percent attributable and transparent ROI.”

Traditional retargeting models are based on a view-through model. A view-through is when a customer is served an ad, and although initially takes no immediate action, they later return and make a purchase. Any advertiser who has invested in a performance-based display ad campaign has likely paid according to this view-through model.

With the mediaFORGE platform, advertisers are only charged for conversions when their customers actually engage with the ad, by mousing over it, interacting with it or by clicking through the ad to make a purchase.

“The absolute best metric of an ad’s influence on a purchase is ad engagement,” stated Zito. “If a user engages with an interactive ad, advertisers are assured that the ad impression was actually viewed – and subsequent revenue is directly attributable to the corresponding campaign. By measuring engagement and post-engagement conversions, advertisers can completely abandon the archaic and flawed model of view-through as their default attribution methodology.”

About mediaFORGE

mediaFORGE is defining and driving the market for retargeting/remarketing, a dynamic technology that can boost ad response by up to 400 percent. As the leading provider of dynamic ads, mediaFORGE has pioneered a new approach to retargeted advertising with a model that stresses personalization and customer engagement. Unlike other providers, mediaFORGE eliminates the view-through model, charging advertisers only for conversions by customers who have truly engaged.

With mediaFORGE, online marketers can employ the best aspects of retargeted advertising immediately, making it one of the most compelling and efficient paths to increased ROI. For more information, visit www.mediaforge.com.

Interactive Media Awards Bestows Highest Honor To Clickable’s Pro Online Advertising Management Solution
NEW YORK – Clickable, the platform that makes online advertising Simple, Instant and Profitable™, announced that the Interactive Media Awards (IMA) has selected Clickable’s Pro advertising management solution as winner of the IMA Best in Class award for Computer Software. According to IMA, the Best in Class award is its highest honor, representing the very best in interactive planning, execution and overall professionalism.
“Clickable is like having a trusted advisor by your side ensuring success.””The IMA Awards are important because they recognize the most beautiful Web sites and interactive experiences,” said Clickable co-founder and CEO David S. Kidder. “As a Best in Class award winner, Clickable joins the ranks of other leaders in interactive development, including Facebook, IBM, Blip.TV, Cisco, Electronic Arts, GE, National Geographic, Philips and SAP, among other IMA winners. This award reflects Clickable’s dedication to helping businesses survive and thrive by simplifying online advertising success.”
In order to win the IMA Best in Class award, entries have to successfully pass through a comprehensive judging process and achieve high marks in each of five criteria: design; content; feature functionality; usability and standards compliance; and cross-browser compatibility. According to the IMA, this is an achievement only a fraction of sites in the IMA competition earn each year.
For more information about the IMAs, visit www.interactivemediaawards.com.
About Clickable Pro
Clickable Pro is an online solution that makes online advertising Simple, Instant and Profitable™. It begins with a simple dashboard that empowers marketers to manage online advertising with transformational return on investment. Clickable Pro activates instantly with an intuitive experience that makes it easy to manage performance across all major advertising networks, like Google, Yahoo and Microsoft. Clickable’s ActEngine delivers critical quantitative and qualitative recommendations to maximize profitability. Clickable Conversion Tracking, bulk keyword editing and elegant reporting enable advertising professionals to achieve their goals in less time.
Clickable Pro is complemented by Clickable Assist, a managed service for marketers and agencies that delivers just the right amount of assistance to maximize online advertising success. It is a simple, affordable solution for launching and re-launching online PPC campaigns, ongoing advice or full-service management. Clickable Assist offers tiers of expert help to match marketers’ needs.
About Clickable
Clickable is a platform that makes online advertising Simple, Instant and Profitable™. It empowers beginners through professionals to maximize their advertising investment. Clickable makes you more efficient, effective, and confident. That’s why customers often say: “Clickable is like having a trusted advisor by your side ensuring success.” To learn more, visit www.Clickable.com.

InsightExpress found mobile campaign norms were 4.5 to 5 times higher than online norms against measures of unaided awareness, aided awareness, ad awareness, message association, brand favorability and purchase intent. “Online campaigns continue to offer exceptional reach, flexibility and variety,” said Joy Liuzzo, Senior Director of Marketing & Mobile Research at InsightExpress. “However, the high levels of engagement, the explosion in technical capabilities, low levels of clutter and the novelty of mobile advertising all likely contribute to increased brand impact.”

A comparison of three different mobile media types (Mobile Internet, SMS and Mobile video) revealed that Mobile Internet is the current powerhouse. Mobile Internet campaigns resulted in increases of 9 percentage points for unaided awareness, 9 percentage points for aided awareness and 24 percentage points for ad awareness. SMS is also effective at increasing upper level purchase funnel metrics such as awareness measures. SMS campaigns generated increases of 5 percentage points for unaided awareness, 10 percentage points for aided awareness and 18 percentage points for ad awareness.

Mobile video is still emerging, but shows campaign impact on par with SMS across most key brand metrics. This channel drove especially strong results against brand favorability. With an increase of 13 percentage points, compared to 12 percentage points for Mobile Internet and 7 percentage points for SMS, mobile video is demonstrating promise as a way to move the important brand favorability measure.

The analysis next examined mobile brand metric norms by vertical (CPG, Entertainment, Automotive, Travel, Technology and Retail) to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the campaigns. Once again comparing mobile norms to online norms:

Mobile CPG Purchase Intent effect is 3 times higher than online CPG Purchase Intent
Mobile Entertainment Purchase Intent effect is 4 times higher than online Entertainment Intent
Mobile Travel Purchase Intent effect is 5 times higher than online Travel Purchase Intent
Mobile Technology Purchase Intent effect is 7 times higher than online Technology Purchase Intent
Mobile Automotive Purchase Intent effect is 4 times higher than online Automotive Purchase Intent
Mobile Retail Purchase Intent effect is 8 times higher than online Retail Purchase Intent
“Our research gives advertisers across a wide range of verticals yet another reason to be incredibly excited about mobile today,” added Liuzzo. “The impact that mobile campaigns have on key brand metrics proves that mobile continues to move quickly from supporting player to co-starring role in the digital advertising universe.”

About InsightExpress

InsightExpress is a leading provider of high-quality, digital marketing research and plays a preeminent role in the measurement of advertising effectiveness across online, mobile and other media. Through its patented technologies, proprietary solutions, world-class expertise and time-tested research principles, InsightExpress transforms the way advertisers, agencies, publishers and researchers optimize their marketing activities. InsightExpress is headquartered in Stamford, CT, with offices in San Francisco, New York, and Los Angeles. For more information, visit www.insightexpress.com or call 203-406-3233.

SAN FRANCISCO – VideoEgg, the engagement ad network, announced that it reached profitability in June 2009 with 100 percent year-over-year global sales growth and 2009 global revenues exceeding $25 million. 2009 represented a year of business maturation for VideoEgg as the company solidified operations across nine markets and four countries, expanded product offerings to more holistically meet the needs of brand advertisers and grew its network to reach more than 100 million consumers monthly. Today, VideoEgg works with more than 90 percent of the biggest digital advertisers in North America 1.

VideoEgg’s revenue growth is directly linked to its ability to anticipate and address the challenges faced by brands in today’s shifting media landscape. Historically, online advertising delivered brand messages with short, static images and success was measured by clicks and page views. As the industry evolved, time- and audience-based models emerged as a more effective way to reach consumers and bring value to non-traditional media environments. As a result, advertisers have moved beyond solely buying impressions and now demand customized ad solutions that deliver attention.

“We’ve always focused on solving the challenges brand advertisers face—whether it be helping them reach their audiences despite media fragmentation or simplifying their media buy,” said Matt Sanchez, CEO of VideoEgg. “VideoEgg’s growth is indicative of the company’s ability to consistently deliver the right mix of creative services, ad products and research to meet advertisers’ needs. As we move into 2010, we believe our distinctive solution set will continue to drive company growth and profitability.”

VideoEgg’s 2009 growth milestones include:

Seven consecutive months of profitability
100 percent year-over-year global sales growth
Global revenues exceeding $25 million
Successful operations in nine markets, include three international offices
Reaching 100 million global uniques across its network
Delivering one billion impressions per month
Attracting many of the nation’s largest brands including Unilever, Nissan and Microsoft

Brand Performance and Services Offering Fills Industry Void

Designed from the ground up to deliver engagement, VideoEgg is the only company that provides brands with an integrated network, services and technology solution that goes far beyond traditional ad network models and picks up where agencies leave off. By productizing an approach that was once incredibly labor intensive into something more manageable, VideoEgg is giving brand advertisers more of what they need – creative, custom media solutions, research and insight and brand safety – to make the digital medium more scalable and sustainable.

More than just an ad network, VideoEgg’s engagement network includes:

VE Solutions: Makes the technology work harder

Strategic solutions: Media and creative specialists develop powerful, custom brand solutions.
Creative studio: Designers and technologists develop data-driven ad experiences.
Research: Analytics experts provide insight into brand metrics and creative optimization.
“100% Happy”: Customer service promise guarantees advertisers’ satisfaction.

VE PeopleNetworks: Custom audience networks tuned to specific marketing objectives

Data-driven audience targeting: VideoEgg partners with data providers like Quantcast, Targus and Excelate to increase the efficiency of campaigns across its broad network.
Engagement and time are valued above impressions: Optimized with AttentionRank, the entire network is structured around a time-based performance model.
Designed for advertisers: With more than 400 quality online partners, VideoEgg creates highly customized and data-rich brand networks to meet advertisers’ precise needs. In addition, a strong combination of people and technology ensures environments are safe for brands.

VE Brand Platform: Immersive ad experiences that scale

Opt-in and opt-out: Unique and complementary advertising products—engagement, mobile and interstitial—run across any display ad space or within a mobile environment.
VideoEgg ToGo: Allows advertising creative on the VideoEgg network to run on any site within a broader media buy at no additional cost.
Designed for engagement: Pricing is triggered only when brands know they have users’ attention.
“VideoEgg has managed to stay one step ahead in a fiercely competitive market by delivering what brands demand today—a unique brand performance offering and superior services that make campaign execution easy, fast and effective,” said Heidi Browning, Global Digital Officer, Universal McCann. “With its ability to bridge services, technology and media, VideoEgg has simplified a complex process to make digital more manageable and scalable for brands.”

View some of VideoEgg’s work with brand advertisers at www.videoegg.com.

About VideoEgg, Inc.

VideoEgg, an engagement network that helps brands get the most out of digital advertising, is the only company that provides brands an integrated network, services and technology solution that takes the complexity out of online brand advertising. Designed for engagement, the company gives brand advertisers more of what they need – industry-leading research and insight, innovative ad products, advanced targeting data, sales and packaging, and guaranteed brand safety – to make the digital medium more accountable, scalable and sustainable. With successful operations in nine markets, including three international offices, VideoEgg’s engagement network reaches 100 million global uniques across quality online and mobile environments, delivering one billion impressions per month for many of the world’s largest brands.

Founded in 2005 and based in San Francisco, with offices across North America, in the UK and Australia, the company is privately held and backed by August Capital, First Round Capital, Maveron, WPP and Focus Ventures. For more information on VideoEgg, please visit http://www.videoegg.com.

Follow VideoEgg on Twitter: http://twitter.com/videoegg.

AdFrames and VideoEgg are trademarks, servicemarks or registered trademarks in the United States and other countries. All other brands, names, or trademarks mentioned in this document are the property of their respective owners.

1 “Global Marketers 2009.” Advertising Age. Crain Communications, 30 Nov. 2009.

Search Engine Strategies London 2010
LONDON – Search Engine Strategies (SES) announced the newcomer programme for the 2010 SES London Conference & Expo. The programme has been designed specifically for people with a fundamental knowledge of online marketing and advertising.

Matt McGowan, Vice President and Publisher for Incisive Media’s Interactive Marketing Group, including Search Engine Strategies, Search Engine Watch and the ClickZ Network, said,

“The percentage of first-time attendees at SES expos throughout the world has grown significantly. These are people with a very basic understanding of search engine marketing (SEM) including pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and search engine optimization (SEO)). Our research has shown that the global increase in online marketing activity is proportionate to the number of newcomers attending the expos. Businesses are expanding their online marketing teams. They are using SES as a platform for improving the skills of their experienced staff, as well as encouraging newcomers to explore the processes and apply them to their business marketing strategy. This schedule will enable delegates new to online to select the right session and maximize their time at SES London.”

The beginner’s schedule for SES London (16th-18th February 2010) includes the following tracks:

Day 1

Introduction To Search Engine Marketing
This session will provide a clear and concise overview of the key concepts involved in search engine marketing.

SEO 101
Learn what’s available in this session that is especially geared toward beginners, with details on programs from major providers and advice on how to succeed.

Day 2

Successful Information Architecture
This session will provide a fresh look at how to successfully architect your site for search engines and how specific page elements and design technologies may impact your ability to gain good organic listings.

Paid Search 101
Paid Search is one of the quickest and most efficient ways to gain visibility on the search engines. This informative session will familiarize attendees with the key players and cover a variety of paid search advertising topics including writing effective ad copy, creating targeted landing pages and auditing paid listings.

Developing Great Content
Without meaningful content and compelling copy, your website is not grabbing the attention it deserves. In this session, we’ll explore a diverse range of Web content development strategies along with innovative techniques for dramatically boosting the visibility and interactive appeal of your site.

Further details of these sessions, including keynote presentations and the full programme can be found at http://www.SearchEngineStrategies.com/london. More advanced marketers can attend sessions on search advertising tools, web analytics and advanced paid search tactics.

SES London is the leading UK event for education in interactive marketing. The SES Conference & Expo is designed to ensure that delegates are given the skills and knowledge to help them maximize search marketing for their business. It also provides a forum for delegates to communicate with the search engines themselves as well as connect with collegues and friends.

SES London will feature sessions that will help marketers at all levels of understanding to maximize success online – whether they are new to online marketing or have advanced skills and experience. Intermediate workshops and panel debates cover key applications such as video, podcasts and blogs as well as design and writing for search engines. More advanced marketers can attend sessions on search advertising tools, web analytics and advanced paid search tactics.

All sessions are uniquely ranked according to content and degree of understanding, making SES a crucial event for anyone interested in search marketing.

About SES
Incisive Media’s Search Engine Strategies is a leading global conference and training series focused on search engine optimization and search engine marketing. Other Incisive resources for interactive marketers include the ClickZ network for digital marketing news, information, commentary, advice, opinion and research and Search Engine Watch which provides news and information about search, analysis of the search engine industry and tools for improving search marketing effectiveness.

Incisive Media is a leading global provider of specialized business news and information, in print, in person and online. The company’s principal markets include financial services, legal services, commercial real estate, marketing services and risk management. Incisive Media’s market-leading brands include Accountancy Age, Computing, Investment Week, Legal Week, Post, Risk, and Search Engine Strategies. For more information, visit www.incisivemedia.com.

NEW YORK – Undertone™ Networks, an online advertising network, announced it experienced a year of strong growth through solid revenue gains and its best fiscal quarter to date. The company also boasted 90 percent customer satisfaction on its latest customer survey. In 2009, Undertone also celebrated the one-year anniversary of its Quality Guarantee and the launch of U360 AudiencePlus™, which enables publishers to leverage the Undertone network to drive additional revenue from their advertisers.

Undertone’s fourth quarter of 2009 is the company’s best to date. Overall, Undertone experienced strong growth over 2008 with company revenue up by more than 40 percent in the fourth quarter alone. This accelerating growth has been enhanced by both the performance of the company’s new advertising platform, introduced in July, and the benefits of the improving economy. In addition to its financial record, the company also experienced a number of milestones, including the first anniversary of its Quality Guarantee, its money-back assurance that advertisers working with Undertone will only see their ads on the Web’s best sites – which remains unchallenged and unmatched.

“This was a pivotal year for Undertone and we achieved many of the goals we set, including significant financial growth,” said Mike Cassidy, CEO, Undertone Networks. “With quality inventory, products and people, we offer brands the best that online ad networks have to offer. Not all ad networks were created equal, and this year we’ve proven what makes us different. In 2010, we intend to show the market what makes us the best.”

Other company highlights for 2009 include:

• Client Success: Long John Silver’s was honored with an OMMA Member’s Choice Award for Best Integrated Online Marketing Campaign for its “Throw Boring Overboard” online and mobile campaign launched with Undertone and Empower MediaMarketing.
• Product Innovation: Undertone launched a new advertising platform designed to improve campaign efficiency and operational performance for marketers and agencies. The company also launched U360 AudiencePlus™, a solution that enables publishers to leverage the quality, reach, scale and technology of the Undertone network to drive additional revenue from their advertisers.
• Company Recognition: For the second year in a row Undertone was named to the Crain’s New York “Best Places to Work” list – moving up the list this year and increasing recognition for its employee retention rate, competitive salaries and unparalleled training programs.

About Undertone Networks

Undertone Networks, an online advertising network, provides advertisers with quality placements on the Web’s best sites. The company carefully selects its media partners and hand-purchases all its inventory, delivering above-the-fold visibility and brand protection for marketers who care where and when their ads run online. The Undertone approach ensures that media buyers and the advertisers they serve can drive successful brand awareness and direct response initiatives with a comprehensive blend of high-impact ad formats, rich media, targeting capabilities and personalized service. The company is based in New York, with fully staffed offices in major U.S. markets. For more information, visit www.undertone.com.

BURLINGAME, Calif. – Brightkite, the Social Discovery Network, has launched the first national augmented reality advertising solution. Brightkite’s users have been able to access its augmented reality (AR) service since August through the company’s partnership with Layar. Until now, users of the service could only see their friends’ posts and photos at places around them. With the launch of a new local advertising solution, they can now also see special offers in nearby stores.

“This initiative pioneers the latest in advertising – combining mobile phones, location awareness and augmented reality. This is truly a groundbreaking media campaign about which we, as well as our users, are very excited.”

Using the Brightkite service, users can look at the world around them through their phone’s camera to see real-time digital information on top of real-world locations. As the camera is turned in different directions, the graphics change to accommodate the lens’ movements and the user sees all their friends’ Brightkite data revealed around them. New partnerships with retailers, bars, restaurants and other businesses will allow Brightkite users to not only see Brightkite data but also nearby stores and local offers exclusive to each location. This is the first time AR has been used for an advertising campaign in the U.S.

“Augmented reality is one of the hottest new tools out there and it’s no surprise that the first campaign to use it is one of the nation’s largest consumer electronics retailers,” said Brady Becker, founder of Brightkite. “This initiative pioneers the latest in advertising – combining mobile phones, location awareness and augmented reality. This is truly a groundbreaking media campaign about which we, as well as our users, are very excited.”

For the Brightkite users, this novel ad format not only shows them offers that are both relevant to them, but also nearby. For the retailer, the campaign allows them to break through the clutter of holiday advertising campaigns and reach their shoppers directly on their phones as they navigate through their neighborhoods and go about their daily lives.

This AR campaign is running on the Brightkite service through the end of December and is available for both Android and iPhone devices.

About Brightkite

Things are happening, right here, right now. Use Brightkite to meet people around you, keep up with your friends, explore and discover new places. Brightkite is the real time social discovery network. More than 2 million people use Brightkite’s free service every month, which is available to anyone, anywhere, worldwide. All you need is a mobile phone or Web browser to bring your friends together in the real world, wherever you may be.

The award-winning company is headquartered in Burlingame, California. To learn more about using your phone as a social discovery tool, visit us at www.brightkite.com

Run Campaigns for Online Education, Insurance, and Financial Services Products

NEW YORK – AdSide, a premium pay-per-click ad network, announced that more ad agencies and advertisers have partnered with AdSide to buy cost-per-click text ads across premium content sites.

AdSide™ consists solely of pre-screened content websites, providing advertisers with a reliable source of quality traffic. In addition, the network’s patent-pending Two-Step Click™ model gauges user interest, ensuring advertisers pay only for twice-qualified clicks, and for leads that are likelier to convert.

AdSide’s category-targeting capabilities allow advertisers to extend their reach within chosen demographic groups, beyond what is accessible through traditional keyword targeting, also ensuring that ad messages are placed next to appropriate content. The network’s real time transparent reports enable advertisers to optimize campaigns, opt-out of lower performing sites, and guarantee appropriate ad placement.

“AdSide provides media agencies with a powerful combination of reach, targeting and appropriate placements on brand name sites,” said Gina Napolitano, Account Director at Firstand10, a digital ad agency. She adds, “It helped us run successful campaigns for our insurance and online education clients, delivering precise audience reach and higher-than-average conversion rates. It’s an extremely efficient platform for large performance advertisers.”

“AdSide has created a high-quality content network focused on pay-per-click text ads,” said David Rodnitzky, founder of PPC Associates and of ad-tech’s Content Revenue Strategies conference. “The network has advanced the model of contextual targeting into a platform that enables effective and precise ad placement selection.”

“AdSide’s Two-Step Click model increased the volume of qualified traffic to our site, as well as the average user engagement time, beyond what we have seen from other networks,” said Andrea Crocker, president and co-founder of Point of Return, a non profit organization.

“AdSide provides us with conversion success where other networks had failed,” said Tessa Ohlendorf, of Online Media Management, an interactive agency which represents financial services, online education and pharmaceuticals clients. “The network’s transparent category-targeting model allows us to know where our ads are showing, providing us with full control over ad placement.”

“We are excited to be working with these cutting-edge advertisers and agencies,” said AdSide chief executive officer, Oded Itzhak. “Advertising effectiveness on quality content sites is inevitably higher than on long tail or unvetted sites. The added ability to easily pinpoint audiences and optimize campaigns reflects our commitment to create a quality advertising environment.”

About AdSide

AdSide (www.adside.com) is a premium pay-per-click ad network, serving tier-1 content publishers, advertisers and media agencies. We offer a better, simpler platform that delivers highly targeted text ads within a controlled environment of quality content sites. AdSide is owned and operated by DOCLIX, a provider of advanced performance advertising solutions. DOCLIX is a member of the IAB and the Click Quality Council. We are headquartered in New York City. For more information, contact us at info@adside.com.

WASHINGTON – Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO) released a beta version of a new consumer tool called Ad Interest Manager, which takes transparency in online advertising to a new level for building user trust. Ad Interest Manager http://privacy.yahoo.com/aim is a central place where Yahoo! visitors can see a concise summary of their online activity and make easy, constructive choices about their exposure to interest-based advertising served from the Yahoo! Ad Network.

“Ads tailored to users’ interests make online experiences more compelling and user-focused, and the new tool Yahoo! is launching today will provide transparency into how Yahoo!’s interest-based advertising works,” said Yahoo! Vice President of Policy and Head of Privacy, Anne Toth. “Yahoo! is committed to providing consumers with increased transparency and control when they are online. Ad Interest Manager will show users what interests we think they have, and also let them edit and change those interests to reflect the most up-to-date information.” Anne Toth also pointed out: “Importantly, users who don’t want interest-based ads can turn them off completely.”

Yahoo!’s new Ad Interest Manager tool:

* Provides a central point where Yahoo! visitors can assert even greater control over their online experience.
* Gives visitors an unparalleled view into the information used to deliver interest-based advertising.
* Shows the visitor both Yahoo!’s educated guesses about their interests and a summary of observations, along with other information they have provided.
* Provides a list of specific interest categories that Yahoo! has placed a user into and lets people turn those categories off.
* Allows people who don’t want to see interest-based ads to turn them off entirely.

“Yahoo! has long provided its users with products and services for free, thanks to a business model based almost entirely on advertising, and we’ve found that consumers are more likely to click on advertising that speaks directly to them and their interests,” said Yahoo! Vice President and General Manager of Display Advertising, David Zinman. “With the introduction of Ad Interest Manager, users can not only get a better understanding of how the process works, but they can also communicate better with Yahoo! and our advertisers about what most interests them.”

Yahoo!’s Ad Interest Manager is currently available in beta in the U.S. and will soon be made available to UK and European users. Planned future enhancements to the Ad Interest Manager will also let users add categories of interest that Yahoo! may have missed.

To see what the new Ad Interest Manager looks like and how it works, please visit http://privacy.yahoo.com/aim.

Yahoo! was one of the first companies to implement a layered privacy center http://info.yahoo.com/privacy/us/yahoo/details.html model more than eight years ago, which provides people with a central place to understand and control their privacy online, as well as their options when it comes to the use of personal data. This information is coupled with our industry-leading data-retention policy http://ycorpblog.com/2008/12/17/your-data-goes-incognito/, which anonymizes most Web log data within 90 days. The policy also strives to ensure that Yahoo! retains data only long enough to serve the business and create the highest-quality user experiences, while simultaneously maintaining the ability to fight fraud, secure systems, and meet legal obligations.

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! attracts hundreds of millions of users every month through its innovative technology and engaging content and services, making it one of the most trafficked Internet destinations and a world-class online media company. Yahoo!’s vision is to be the center of people’s online lives by delivering personally relevant, meaningful Internet experiences. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. For more information, visit http://pressroom.yahoo.com or the company’s blog, Yodel Anecdotal http://yodel.yahoo.com.

AUSTIN, Texas – Click Forensics, Inc., the industry leader in audience verification and traffic quality improvement for the online advertising community, announced that local search giant GenieKnowsMedia.com as well as several other ad networks and publishers have selected the Click Forensics platform to improve the performance of campaigns for advertiser clients. In addition to GenieKnowsMedia.com, Adfirmative, Avalanche Search Media, Juggle, Moxy Media, Traffic Engine, and TruSearch are the latest companies to standardize on the Click Forensics platform for online traffic quality improvement and audience verification.

“After carefully evaluating the available solutions in the market, we found the Click Forensics platform to be the most effective, scalable and accurate for verifying and ensuring the quality of traffic we deliver to online advertisers,” said John Manning, senior vice president of GenieKnowsMedia.com. “We look forward to working closely with Click Forensics to improve the performance and bottom line results of our advertisers’ campaigns.”

The Click Forensics online audience verification and traffic quality management platform allows ad networks, advertisers, agencies and publishers to protect themselves against bad online traffic sources, while targeting and delivering traffic sources that are more likely to convert into sales. The Click Forensics platform measures and analyzes each individual ad visitor to determine its value and likely conversion rate. The platform can also be tuned to block certain types of online traffic that deliver poor ROI.

“The market opportunities are abundant for ad networks that consistently deliver high quality audiences,” said Julio Vaca, VP of Operations at Avalanche Search Media. “In just a short period of time, Click Forensics has helped us to improve our traffic quality by 10-20 percent. It’s a testament to the sophisticated technology and data that Click Forensics provides to its ad network partners. It more than pays for itself.”

The power of the Click Forensics online audience verification and traffic quality management platform is derived from monitoring online media traffic across over 300 ad networks as well as billions of clicks from top search engines, content aggregators, leading publishers and advertiser web sites – providing the most complete and holistic view of search and online advertising traffic quality. Combining more than three years of online advertising data and patent-pending heuristics to measure and score traffic quality in real-time, the best and worst sources are flagged so advertisers, publishers, content aggregators and ad networks can select only the kind of traffic they want in order to improve the overall performance of online campaigns.

“We’re honored to help GenieKnowsMedia.com and our other new customers verify the quality of their online audiences so they can deliver better traffic to advertiser clients and trading partners,” said Paul Pellman, CEO of Click Forensics, Inc. “Each day more ad networks, agencies and publishers like them recognize the power and results that the Click Forensics platform can offer.”

For more information on Click Forensics and its offerings, visit www.clickforensics.com. Follow us on Twitter: @ClickForensics.

About GenieKnows

GenieKnowsMedia.com (a division of IT Interactive Services Inc.) connects search technology, community and content by developing niche-specific portals tailored for distinct searching communities, delivering a focused, useful and rewarding search experience. GenieKnowsMedia.com also empowers a broad distribution network for advertisers, helping businesses connect with consumers and grow their bottom line by conveying meaningful, revenue-generating search results.

About Click Forensics, Inc.

Click Forensics is the industry leader in audience verification and traffic quality improvement for the online advertising community. Click Forensics provides audience verification and traffic quality management solutions for leading online advertisers, publishers and ad networks, including companies such as Yahoo!, Progressive Insurance, GenieKnowsMedia.com, Experian, Nextag, Moxy Media, Turn, Traffic Engine, Vegas.com and many others. The company also publishes data on online advertising audience quality, including the Click Fraud Index®, the top independent source of industry click fraud data. Click Forensics is headquartered in Austin, Texas, and is privately held with funding from Sierra Ventures, Austin Ventures, Shasta Ventures and Stanford University. More information on Click Forensics and its offerings is available at www.ClickForensics.com.

NEW YORK – To set the stage for greater innovation and creativity in online advertising, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the release of the “Ad Unit Guidelines 2009 Update.” For the first time, creative agencies lent their insights to the annual ad unit recommendations, joining the media agencies and publishers who have customarily been a part of the process. The news was announced at the IAB’s annual Ad Ops Summit in New York City.

Including creative professionals in the process of updating ad unit guidelines is a key aspect of the IAB’s Reimagining Interactive Advertising initiative, which brings together leaders from creative agencies, media agencies, and publishers to discuss next steps in the creative evolution of digital marketing. The resulting joint publisher-agency working group, the Reimagining Interactive Advertising Task Force, took on as its first order of business updating the criteria for standard ad units by looking at industry-wide impression count reports, ad unit availability, agency-side effectiveness reviews and creative preferences. With the new criteria, it made recommendations on the current list of eighteen standard ad units, including:

In order to be considered a standard, an ad unit must be commonly bought and offered throughout the marketplace; only seven of the eighteen ad units currently on the list meet the new criteria.
Ad units will not be removed from the standard list in 2009, but must meet the criteria by the end of 2010
In 2010 the Reimagining Interactive Advertising Task Force will release “Rising Stars,” the first list of ad units to be identified by the task force using qualitative criteria of perceived effectiveness and creative preference to encourage innovation and creativity in online advertising. “Rising Stars” may ultimately become standard ad units if and when they meet the quantitative requirements for adoption and marketplace impressions.

“By bringing agencies into the process of developing standard ad units, we have taken a step towards improving the creative output and branding potential for interactive media,” said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the IAB. “Our next order of business is to drive towards adoption of revised standards that we believe will spur increased investment in interactive advertising—we’ve already proven that there is no medium more accountable—now we have to bring all of its capabilities together to tell great stories to consumers—that’s what advertising is all about.”

“Being a part of this process gave voice to the creative challenges that agencies faced with the existing standards, ad units, and technologies, and I believe we’ve found a solid way forward in overcoming those challenges,” said Jim Russell, Partner, EVP, Director of Digital Strategy, McKinney. “Our goal was to simplify the existing list and I think we’ve developed a long-term strategy for doing this on behalf of the industry.”

To review IAB Ad Unit Guidelines Update 2009, please go to http://www.iab.net/adunit

About the IAB’s Reimagining Interactive Advertising Taskforce:

The Reimagining Interactive Advertising Taskforce was formed to represent the entire interactive ecosystem. Members from creative and media agencies, publishers, networks, and vendors meet to discuss creativity, strategic marketing, media planning and buying, and publisher insights and challenges. Their goal is to create solutions that allow the ecosystem to further harness the power of digital media.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 375 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

Online Video Advertising Networks 2007 – 2010: Emerging and Surging

This report analyzes video inventory and gross media spend in both up-and-coming and established avail verticals, including in-banner, remnant/3rd party pre-roll, video overlays, video search and podcasting.

Each video advertising network vertical is thoroughly analyzed by total inventory (exclusive, non-exclusive, monthly and annually), business models, sell-out percentages, CPMs for each avail format, gross ad billings and total revenues by network.

In-banner video networks led by Eyewonder, Pointroll, Eyeblaster and Google’s DoubleClick are inventory, media spend and revenue generating juggernauts of the video advertising group, combining for over $1.5 billion in 2008 gross billings (video units only), forecast at $1.8 billion in ’09.

3rd party video networks representing premium pre-roll inventory aligned with major branded content include BBE, Brightroll, Tremor Media, YuMe Networks, Internet Broadcasting and Worldnow are forecast to contribute another $223 million to gross media spend during 2009, over 24% of all pre-roll media buys across an extremely competitive and rapidly-evolving sales landscape.

Overlay network inventory reached 19.8 billion total units in 2008, forecast to increase 70% in 2009. Participation revenue flowing back to networks like VideoEgg, Adapt.TV and ScanScout is expected to climb 100% in aggregate.

To order this report:

Online Video Advertising Networks 2007 – 2010: Emerging and Surging

Search Engine Strategies Berlin 2009

BERLIN – Incisive Media and BBP announced the schedule for this year’s SES Berlin Conference & Expo which has been designed specifically for people with a fundamental knowledge of online marketing and advertising. The announcement follows the rise in the number of newcomers to Search Engine Strategies Events in the last year.

Matt McGowan, Vice President and Publisher for Incisive Media’s Interactive Marketing Group, including Search Engine Strategies, Search Engine Watch and the ClickZ Network, said:

“We have seen a significant increase in the number of first-time attendees at recent SES conferences with a very basic understanding of search engine marketing (SEM), pay-per-click (PPC) advertising and search engine optimization (SEO). The global increase in online marketing activity has encouraged more companies to send their people to explore the processes and apply them to their business marketing strategy. As SES covers all areas from beginners to advanced, with multiple tracks, we have created a fundamental schedule which makes it easy for newcomers to select the right session and maximize their time at SES Berlin.”

The fundamental’s schedule for SES Berlin (24th-25th November 2009) is outlined as follows:

Day 1

• Introduction To Search Engine Marketing
This session will provide a clear and concise overview of the key concepts involved in search engine marketing.
• Successful site architecture
This session will provide a fresh look at how to successfully architect your site for search engines and how specific page elements and design technologies may impact your ability to gain good organic listings.
• Search Advertising 101
Learn what’s available in this session that is especially geared toward beginners, with details on programs from major providers and advice on how to succeed.
• Keywords & Content: Search Marketing Foundations
Learn how to target the right terms in your paid and organic search marketing, and where your keywords should be used.
• Link Strategies 2009
This session will explore everything from white hat to greyish and black hat link building techniques thanks to a top panel of top link building experts.

Day 2

• SEO Mythbusters
Our panel of experts debunks common misperceptions and misleading practices about SEO.
• Extreme makeover – live site clinic
This interactive session takes volunteers from the audience and examines their websites live delivering general feedback about improvements necessary to gain more traffic from search engines.
• Turning the Social Web into ROI
This session will take a look at the marketing opportunities available through social media and how best to begin building an overall strategy.
• SEO expert Q&A
Join us for a no-holds-barred interactive session in which veteran search engine marketers disclose some of their favorite search engine optimization and marketing tips, tricks, and secrets.
Further details of these sessions can be found at http://www.SearchEngineStrategies.com/berlin. More advanced marketers can attend sessions on search advertising tools, web analytics and advanced paid search tactics.

SES Berlin will be held at the Crowne Plaza Berlin City Centre on 24-25 November 2009. Organised and hosted by Thomas Bindl, one of Europe’s leading authorities on search, SES Berlin Conference & Expo will teach delegates everything they need to know to help them maximize search engine marketing and optimization for their business and provide a forum for delegates to communicate with the search engines themselves.

Register early and save money. For more information about Search Engine Strategies Conference & Expo 2009 visit http://www.SearchEngineStrategies.com/berlin

About BBP
BBP is a European multimedia company with a strong focus on online marketing, e-commerce and customer contact. These topics are presented in trade magazines, newsletters and websites as well as events and awards. Both the events and the magazines are leaders in their respective fields. The events attract over 15.000 visitors every year and the publications inform well over 100.000 professionals every month.

About SES
Incisive Media’s Search Engine Strategies is a leading global conference and training series focused on search engine optimization and search engine marketing. Other Incisive resources for interactive marketers include the ClickZ network for digital marketing news, information, commentary, advice, opinion and research and Search Engine Watch which provides news and information about search, analysis of the search engine industry and tools for improving search marketing effectiveness.

Incisive Media is a leading global provider of specialized business news and information, in print, in person and online. The company’s principal markets include financial services, legal services, commercial real estate, marketing services and risk management. Incisive Media’s market-leading brands include Accountancy Age, Computing, Investment Week, Legal Week, Post, Risk, and Search Engine Strategies. For more information, visit www.incisivemedia.com.

NEW YORK – Lotame released results from a sustained program led by Harmelin Media for the Ford Dealer Association in and around the Philadelphia metropolitan area. The program was designed to maximize increases in click throughs, actions and intent to buy.

According to Executive Vice President of Harmelin Media Scott Davis, Lotame has consistently delivered a higher click yield and action yield than any other online advertising option, including ad networks targeted to the local market and automotive interest as well as other behavioral targeting systems. Click yield and action yield are determined by success in creating click throughs and defined actions after users have engaged with an ad, usually by selecting a local dealer.

“Early in our history, we identified local advertising to likely buyers as a particular strength of our platform, and it is very satisfying to see that capability create results for Ford and Harmelin,” said Andy Monfried, CEO of Lotame.

“Lotame has improved our metrics, and has continually worked with us to provide even better results for Ford, either through improved targeting or serving the best creative for the situation,” said Davis. “For example, we noticed that many times people acted on our ads after they had seen them a few times. Working with Lotame, we were able to serve a lower cost ad the first couple times we reached a new person in our target audience, switching to the more interactive ad when it was most likely to create the highest return. Our cost for conversion has benefited greatly.”

From January through July, Lotame delivered better performance than other advertising vehicles in key metrics including:
Lotame beat the average click through rate by nearly 15 percent
Lotame outperformed in click yield (clicks/interactions) by 88 percent
Lotame delivered a 216 percent improvement over the average action yield (actions/interactions)

During this campaign, users who had seen the Lotame-delivered ads indicated they were 20 percent more likely to buy a Ford over the next six months than a control group that had not seen the ads.

About Lotame

Lotame provides a platform for easily building and addressing customizable consumer audiences based on social activity in addition to implied or stated interests. Lotame has specifically designed its patented Crowd Control platform to take full advantage of the unique attributes of social data, using participation and user generated content as a foundation for improved campaign performance. Lotame is a member of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). Please visit www.lotame.com for more information.

The campaign, titled “Back to Work“, is aimed at recruiting and HR professionals who, after a long and slow summer, are starting to look for fresh talent in areas such as Online Advertising, Online Marketing, Advertising Operations, Media Management, Digital Media.

“Back to Work” leverages the highly targeted user base of AdOperationsOnline.com and its network of sites in order to provide recruiters with quality candidates at the lowest possible costs.

From September 9th until October 15th 2009, all recruiters using “back2work” discount code when booking a job listing through AdOperationsOnline.com’s job board will be able to avail of a 25% discount, gaining access to:

- the whole user base and visitors of the AdOperationsOnline.com network (the http://www.AdOperationsOnline.com portal, the job board at http://Jobs.AdOperationsOnline.com, the social network at http://www.AdOpsClub.com);

- additional coverage through AdOperationsOnline.com’s social media channels such as Twitter (@adoperations, with over 7,400 followers) and FaceBook;

- ultimately, the whole Simply Hired network of over 80 million job seekers.

A quick refresher on how the AdOperationsOnline.com job board works:

- all job listings are valid for 30 days from the day of purchase;

- current price per 30 days listing is $49 – use the “back2work” code for a 25% discount;

- once the job listing is created, recruiters will be able to receive candidates applications, monitor the listing’s performance, and edit the listing at any time. To create a job listing, go to http://jobs.adoperationsonline.com/a/jbb/post-job .

Further discounts are available for agencies and employers who wish to advertise 5 job openings or more. To avail of these discounts, or to request a custom offer, please use the contact form at http://www.adoperationsonline.com/contact-adoperationsonlinecom/ .

About AdOperationsOnline.com
AdOperationsOnline.com (http://www.AdOperationsOnline.com) is the online home for Ad Operations professionals worldwide. With daily news, insights, comments, how-to’s and other resources, it has quickly established itself as a reference point for Online Advertising and Digital Media matters. The extended AdOperationsOnline.com network covers a social network (http://www.AdOpsClub.com), a job board (http://Jobs.AdOperationsOnline.com) and a premium advertising industry directory (http://www.AdFocusmedia.com).

About RightFit Media
RightFit Media (http://www.RightFitMedia.com) is a digital media consulting agency, specialized in Online Marketing & Advertising, with focus in Ad Operations, Site Monetization and Strategic Online Marketing Planning. Established in 2008 and based in Dublin, RightFit Media works with a wide variety of clients – online businesses of all sizes – to help them visualize and achieve their full online revenue potential. RightFit Media publishes www.AdOperationsOnline.com , the Ad Operations and Online Advertising portal.

MIDDLETOWN, Del. – eZanga Inc. (www.eZanga.com), a search engine and online advertising company, has incorporated display advertising into its Search Engine Marketing (SEM) capabilities, to further the reach of SEM campaigns the company runs for its clients.

Through eZanga Display, advertisers can run online display ads across a network of popular Web sites, targeting specific audiences based on geographical location, demographics and interests. The service also has remarketing capabilities that retarget visitors through display ads. For example, if a user clicks on an advertiser’s Web site from a paid listing secured through an eZanga SEM campaign, and then they leave the site, display ads for it will appear when that user visits one of the many publishers affiliated with eZanga Display. The display ads increase the chance that the user will visit the site again.

eZanga provides its eZanga Display customers with reports that detail budget used, number of impressions the campaign has secured, cost per thousand impressions (CPMs), number of unique visitors, and the geographical, contextual and demographic distribution of visitors.

“Research has shown that exposure to both search and display ads from the same advertiser results in a 22 percent increase for conversion rates over search alone,” said Richard K. Kahn, CEO of eZanga. “We launched eZanga Display in order to capitalize on both of these key Internet marketing channels to help our clients reach their bottom lines faster and more efficiently.”

About eZanga, Inc.:

Delaware-based eZanga (www.eZanga.com) provides online advertisers with local, regional and national advertising focused on generating high return on investment. eZanga offers SEM, PPC and contextual advertising solutions. eZanga also operates a search engine, which is powered by proprietary technologies that take advantage of Meta search by retrieving search results from multiple search engines and re-ranking and displaying the most relevant results without duplication. eZanga is an Inc. 500 company and was deemed Delaware’s fastest growing company by Inc. magazine in 2008 and 2009.

AUSTIN, Texas – Click Forensics, Inc., the industry leader in scoring, auditing and improving traffic quality for the online advertising community, entered into a click filtering and traffic quality scoring arrangement with Affinity, a fast-growing text-based advertising platform. Affinity will use Click Forensics services for all of its advertisers, publishers and partners. Affinity is the latest in a series of large online advertising networks adopting an independent 3rd party real-time click filtering platform to combat click fraud.

“We have now fortified our internal defense system with Click Forensics to provide advertisers better value for their advertising budgets. Advertisers are now confident that we will only charge them for clicks validated by an independent third-party source,” said Namit Merchant, President – Affinity. “We also benefit from their specialization as they aggregate data from multiple ad networks, which makes them an expert at the game.”

The Click Forensics traffic quality management platform allows ad networks, online advertisers, agencies and publishers to protect themselves against poor quality traffic, while targeting and delivering traffic sources that are more likely to convert into sales. For Affinity, Click Forensics will help better manage traffic from publishers by providing a score for every paid click, which indicates the likely conversion rate of traffic sources. Click Forensics will also allow Affinity to perform instantaneous filtering of invalid traffic and fraud, including publisher collusion fraud, which occurs when online publishers use rotating IP-addresses or botnets to click ads on their own sites in order to generate inflated commissions from unprotected ad networks.

“In addition to click filtering, the Click Forensics scoring technology will allow us to discount advertiser bid prices based on varying publisher quality levels. Advertisers will now have access to quality scores for each traffic source, resulting in more transparency and efficient spending of advertising dollars,” added Namit Merchant.

“Affinity has made traffic quality management a number one priority for its business, so they performed a careful evaluation of all available solutions,” said Steve O’Brien, vice president of marketing for Click Forensics. “As a result, we are excited to be selected by Affinity to help grow its business even faster and more profitably than ever before.”

The power of the Click Forensics traffic quality management platform is derived from monitoring online media traffic across over 300 ad networks as well as billions of clicks from top search engines, leading publishers and advertiser web sites – providing the most complete and holistic view of search and online advertising traffic quality. Combining more than three years of industry online advertising data and patent-pending heuristics to measure and score traffic quality in real-time, the best and worst traffic sources are flagged so advertisers, publishers and ad networks can select only the kind of traffic they want in order to improve the overall performance of online campaigns.

About Affinity

Affinity is a technology-driven online advertising company that provides high performance solutions for online publishers and advertisers. Affinity network of publishers consists of search engines, toolbars, domain parking sites, in-text ad units, contextual banners, comparison-shopping engines, local business sites, and other social media applications. Affinity’s flagship search monetization product delivers 10 billion ad impressions to 75,000+ advertisers, each month.

Affinity is an independently operated subsidiary of Hostway Corporation. Founded in 1998, Hostway is one of the world’s largest web hosting companies with a direct presence in 13 countries, 17 worldwide operation centers and more than 700 employees. Hostway provides web solutions to over 1.4 million web sites and 2 million customers worldwide. For more information about Affinity, visit www.affinity.com.

About Click Forensics, Inc.

Click Forensics is the industry leader in scoring, auditing and improving traffic quality for the online advertising community. Click Forensics provides traffic quality management solutions for leading online advertisers, publishers and ad networks, including companies such as Yahoo!, eBay, Progressive Insurance, Experian, Nextag, Infospace, Turn, Traffic Engine, Vegas.com and many others. The company also publishes the Click Fraud Index®, the top independent source of industry click fraud data. Click Forensics is headquartered in Austin, Texas, and is privately held with funding from Sierra Ventures, Austin Ventures, Shasta Ventures and Stanford University. More information on Click Forensics and its offerings is available at www.ClickForensics.com.

Click Forensics and Click Fraud Index are registered trademarks of Click Forensics, Inc. All other company and product names mentioned are used only for identification and may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.

NEW YORK – Fervent calls for a creative revolution in online advertising have galvanized the ecosystem. A driving force behind this relaying cry, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the prodigious cross-industry talent that will appear at its fifth annual MIXX Conference and Expo, September 21-22, in New York City.

The Official Interactive Event of Advertising Week, MIXX is the primary venue for elite advertising agencies, brand marketers and publishers responsible for transforming the consumer media experience. They will all address this year’s theme, “Fueling Interactive Advertising’s Creative Revolution.”

The star-studded lineup includes representation from venerable brands—AstraZeneca, AT&T, General Mills, Frito-Lay, Intuit and Procter & Gamble. Featured speakers include:
Chris Anderson – Author, Free: The Future of a Radical Price, and Editor-in-Chief, Wired Magazine
Tim Armstrong – Chairman & CEO, AOL
Nikesh Arora – President, Global Sales Operations and Business Development, Google
Colleen DeCourcy – Chief Digital Officer, TBWA Worldwide
Bob Greenberg – Chairman, CEO, Global Chief Creative Officer, R/GA
Ashton Kutcher – Co-Founder, Katalyst Media
Nick Law – EVP, Chief Creative Officer, North America, R/GA
David Moore – Chairman & Founder, 24/7 Real Media, and Chairman of the Board, IAB
Yusuf Mehdi – SVP, Online Audience Business Group, Microsoft Corporation
Elisa Steele – CMO, Yahoo!
Lucas Watson – Global Team Leader, Digital Business Strategy, P&G
Steve Wax – Managing Partner, Campfire

“By putting the creative revolution front and center at the MIXX conference, the most important industry gathering of interactive leaders, we showcase the simple fact that advertising is a conversation—a story told by creatives,” said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the IAB. “The best advertising is storytelling, and this year the media industry’s most gifted storytellers are on our stage to illuminate what really matters most in marketing—how to make an emotional connection that moves people.”

In addition to the main stage keynote speakers, MIXX 2009 will give its audience an enormous amount of content to choose from—workshops, panels, breakouts, industry forecasts and an exhibit hall filled with a wide breadth of companies showcasing innovative services and tools.

Adding texture and context to the two-day agenda, MIXX will feature three distinct tracks focused on creativity, innovation and impact—the main pillars of great advertising:
See how big brands like Betty Crocker, Crestor and Cheetos have overcome obstacles in social media to harness consumer engagement and achieve brand lift and sales
Listen in as five startups pitch a venture capitalist on why their company’s big idea could just be the next billion-dollar enterprise
Experience the augmented-reality advertising that is redefining interactive
Be an insider to the backroom debate on the future of television and online video
Watch leading solutions providers as they win over a major marketer on the power of mobile advertising

For a full list of speakers, the complete agenda and information on how to register, please visit www.mixx-expo.com.

The event takes place on September 21-22 at the Crowne Plaza Times Square and will culminate on the evening of September 23 with the 2009 MIXX Awards Gala hosted by Jim Breuer, Saturday Night Live comedian.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 375 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

One of the nation’s largest privately held dealer groups, MileOne Automotive represents 28 major automotive brands including Honda, Nissan, and Mercedes in 63 retail locations throughout the East Coast. In addition, MileOne Automotive manages collision-repair centers, and provides vehicle leasing and car rentals through its Allstate division.

Utilizing Specific Media’s proprietary targeted display and data technologies, MileOne will target automotive in-market shoppers across the Specific Media premium publisher network. Delivering the right message to the right customer at the right time, Specific Media will ensure that MileOne’s advertising dollars are spent talking to customers who are in-market for an automobile.

“With their vast experience in the automotive industry, Specific Media aligns perfectly with MileOne Automotive and we’re excited to partner with the organization to help us meet our online advertising goals and objectives,” said David Metter, CMO, MileOne Automotive. “MileOne is not new to online advertising, and Specific Media provides an efficient and effective solution that ensures our online advertising dollars continue to be well spent. They were an obvious choice as we looked to revamp our online efforts in order to reduce wasted impressions and maximize efficiency across our properties.”

“Automotive manufacturers and retailers worldwide are seeking new ways to cut through the clutter and enhance user engagement in order to drive sales growth in a very difficult auto market,” remarks Jon Schulz, SVP, Head of Global Automotive, Specific Media. “We’re thrilled to partner with MileOne Automotive as their exclusive online advertising partner.”

About MileOne Automotive

MileOne Automotive operates 63 retail automotive franchises representing 28 different brands and nine collision centers in Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia with a focus on the Baltimore-Washington, Hampton Roads/Virginia Beach and Wilkes-Barre/Scranton major metro areas. MileOne.com allows customers to research new, used and fuel-efficient luxury, import and domestic cars and trucks, send information about vehicles to mobile devices, schedule service appointments, buy parts and accessories, play automotive games, and download automotive wallpaper and mobile ring tones. For more information or to find a quality MileOne dealership near you, please visit (www.mileone.com).

About Specific Media (www.specificmedia.com)

Specific Media is uniquely positioned as the world’s largest independent media platform, solving the reach and data problems facing today’s advertisers. Specific Media enables advertisers to target consumers throughout North America and Western Europe based on demographics, behaviors, geographic locations and the contextual relevance of websites visited. Specific Media’s Premium Network reaches 160 million US consumers and 225 million consumers globally each month. With a relentless focus on delivering measurable, predictable results in a brand-friendly environment, Specific Media is defining tomorrow’s marketing standards, today.

Developed with the U.S. carriers, the “CSC Auditing and Monitoring Initiative” provides wireless operators with an ongoing and rigorous assessment of third-party content providers’ compliance with the CBP. By having a single set of CSC monitoring requirements, the compliance process is more transparent and valuable for all participants in the “ecosystem” – from content providers to consumers.

The addition of media monitoring has expanded the ability of the wireless industry’s “CSC Auditing and Monitoring Initiative” to provide greater consumer protection from entities that are non-compliant. The new process will capture the promotional campaign information that is offered in print, online, radio and television advertisements.

“With 92 percent of in-market advertising for common short codes occurring online, comScore’s unparalleled capabilities in tracking online advertisements are an integral part in helping WMC ensure it has robust coverage and capture of in-market advertising to perform this contract,” said Ian Matthews, WMC president and COO.

“We look forward to contributing to this development in the wireless industry,” said Serge Matta, senior vice president of comScore, Inc. “Given the breadth of comScore’s online data capture and WMC’s industry leading experience in monitoring CSCs, our two companies were a natural fit.  We are delighted to partner with WMC in this initiative and look forward to expanding our relationship and activity in the space.”

About Wireless Media Consulting (WMC)

Wireless Media Consulting (WMC) is the exclusive provider of in-market compliance monitoring to Tier 1 U.S. wireless carriers. Every month, WMC’s team of highly trained media analysts intercepts in market—as the consumer experiences them—more than 25,000 PSMS advertising campaigns and audits the associated creative for compliance with Mobile Marketing Association Consumer Best Practices and carrier-specific policies. Then, WMC reports its findings to carrier clients and assists with enforcing established standards. WMC media analysts also audit and report on SMS message flows generated during program opt-in and participation. In addition, WMC assists carriers with PSMS program preapproval services and industry consulting services.

About comScore
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) is a global leader in measuring the digital world and preferred source of digital marketing intelligence. For more information, please visit www.comscore.com/companyinfo.

NEW YORK & SAN FRANCISCO – Lotame, a provider of data-driven techniques to improve the targeting, delivery and performance of online advertising, announced NaturalPath Media is now using Stadium, a platform enabling the creation of custom audiences for targeted online ad campaigns using anonymous social data. Stadium leverages Lotame’s groundbreaking Crowd Control targeting technology to give partners direct access to a wide range of tools for delivering, measuring and analyzing online ad campaigns.

Stadium is the first ad delivery platform, powered by social data, to be made openly available for use by any company looking to improve the precision and performance of online ads. Stadium is now available in versions designed for advertising agencies, publishers and networks.

“By taking proven targeting principles of audience development and applying them to what we can learn from social activity, online media networks can rise above the crowd and combine their extensive reach with pinpoint targeting and make their networks even more compelling to advertisers,” said Andy Monfried, CEO of Lotame.

Successful site representation firms like NaturalPath Media have combined sizable reach with well defined, highly desirable audience segmentation. Lotame’s Stadium offers networks the ability to directly connect advertisers to the audience on a “brand-to-person” basis rather than based on the overall audience composition.

“Our network has become the most effective means to reach audiences that care about sustainable and healthy living, and while we have concentrations of specific audiences driven by the individual voices of our publishers, there are opportunities for us to target beyond context to reach readers wherever they are in our network,” said David Phillips, CEO of NaturalPath Media. “For example, we may not be reaching the green mom who is reading about solar options for her home on one of our Eco-Tech sites. Stadium allows us to connect brands with audiences based on who they are rather than where they go online. It offers us a means to go beyond content and context, enabling ‘audience-based’ marketing.”

As social functionality and community behavior becomes more popular and more pervasive across the Web, anonymous information about user attributes and interests, stated and demonstrated through social behavior, becomes a valuable resource for improving campaign delivery and performance. For the last two years, Lotame has developed and refined its platform to collect, organize, analyze and use this information responsibly to eliminate waste from ad campaigns.

During the last two years, Lotame has served ads for campaigns supporting more than 100 brands, including leaders in consumer packaged goods, entertainment, financial services and telecommunications.

About Lotame

Since 2007, Lotame has improved the delivery and performance of online advertising through its unique data driven ad targeting platform. Lotame’s patented Crowd Control technology collects, organizes, and employs a rich array of anonymous data sources, including powerful new categories of social data reflecting consumer interests and behaviors within social networks. Crowd Control allows marketers and publishers to define and communicate with target users, forgoing dated targeting techniques based solely on page content. Lotame’s Ad Co-Op, a total solution for brand advertisers, addresses custom-designed consumer audiences. Lotame experts design audiences for Marketers using Crowd Control, manage ad delivery, and measure campaign effectiveness based on advanced tools that take advantage of vast amounts of data from a wide variety of sources. Lotame’s Stadium platform comes in three versions specially designed for agencies, publishers and ad networks, providing direct access to Crowd Control. Stadium enables companies to apply a wide variety of data to advertising decisions including anonymous user data, publisher statistics and third party data sources. Lotame is a member of the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI). Please visit www.lotame.com

About NaturalPath Media

With over 190 publishers and a combined unduplicated reach of over 12.4 million monthly unique visitors (comScore, potential reach), NaturalPath Media is the largest online media network for the sustainable, healthy and conscious living verticals. NaturalPath Media connects publishers, advertisers and audiences by selling customized brand advertising programs to companies that seek to engage highly influential green and healthy living consumers. NaturalPath Media’s content network is segmented into 9 primary channels, including Sustainability, Eco-Tech, Health & Wellness, Travel & Outdoors, Moms & Family, Home & Garden, Lifestyle, Eating Well and Business, representing premium publishers such as TriplePundit.com, ScientificAmerican.com, DrGreene.com, LowImpactLiving.com, Matador Network, EdibleCommunities.com, Wellness.com and GreenLivingIdeas.com. For more information about NaturalPath Media, please visit www.NaturalPathMedia.com.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. – Tumri, the leading provider of dynamic and intelligent display advertising solutions, today announced the hire of Jeff McCombs as chief financial officer. McCombs joins Tumri after serving as Senior Vice President of Business Operations at Yahoo! Inc. As CFO of Tumri, Jeff is responsible for managing all financial activities, including financial planning and analysis, accounting, investor relations and corporate development. He is also responsible for overseeing business development, human resources and legal.

“I’m very excited to be joining Tumri due to the company’s potential to fundamentally transform online display advertising. Tumri’s ability to deliver advertising experiences that users actually engage with and find relevant is truly compelling and win-win-win for the entire ecosystem of consumers, advertisers, and publishers,” said McCombs. “Display advertising represents almost half of online advertising, and, from direct experience, there are great opportunities for innovation. Tumri is delivering a powerful solution that will make display relevant again, perhaps even more so than search.”

“Jeff brings an incredible amount of expertise to the Tumri team, both in terms of corporate strategy and finance as well as the ever evolving online marketing industry,” said Calvin Lui, president and CEO, Tumri. “Jeff’s wide spectrum of experience will be instrumental in helping guide our explosive growth and will help solidify our innovation and leadership position. We are excited that Tumri’s transformative mission is attracting this high caliber of talent.”

Jeff previously served as Senior Vice President of Business Operations at Yahoo! Inc., where he helped drive business strategy and product prioritization, manage operations and improve the company’s overall performance. Prior to this role, he served as Chief of Staff to Yahoo!’s President, Sue Decker. Before joining Yahoo!, Jeff spent over a decade in investment banking, corporate development and private equity with such firms as Credit Suisse First Boston, Lehman Brothers and Shamrock Capital, Roy Disney’s private equity firm. Jeff holds a B.A. in economics-business from the University of California, Los Angeles.

About Tumri

Tumri is the leading provider of dynamic display advertising solutions. Based in Mountain View, CA, Tumri (www.tumri.com) has developed an innovative advertising platform that creates a highly dynamic and interactive advertising experience. The Tumri solution – the AdPod – enables advertisers to craft highly targeted marketing messages to consumers on-the-fly. The Tumri platform seamlessly deconstructs ad creatives into core sub-components, then enables advertisers to adjust each sub-component by targeting parameters or optimize by performance metrics. As a result, the Tumri platform delivers highly relevant advertising messages to consumers while lowering creative production costs and timelines. Additionally, Tumri’s patent-pending platform optimizes performance at a sub-ad component level and delivers unparalleled consumer insights through its proprietary reporting. Tumri was named a “One to Watch” company for Dealmaker Media’s 2007 Momentum Growth Conference and has been featured in The New York Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, and in BusinessWeek. Tumri is funded by the premier venture capital firms Accel Partners, Lehman Brothers Venture Partners, and Shasta Ventures. To learn more about Tumri visit www.tumri.com.

The study used McPheters & Company’s AdWorks™ methodology to provide comparable measures of ad effectiveness across multiple media, using 30-second TV ads, full-page 4-color magazine ads, and Internet banner ads in standard sizes. Additionally, eye-tracking software was used to determine whether – and under what circumstances – Internet ads were actually seen by respondents. The work was conducted in CBS Vision’s state-of-the-art Television City facilities at the MGM Grand in Las Vegas.

Matched groups of respondents were recruited to spend 30 minutes with a single medium in a laboratory setting. They either watched a choice of sit-coms, read a magazine they selected, or surfed the Internet at will. At the end of the period, they filled out similar online surveys that asked whether they recalled seeing 4 ads which appeared in the medium they consumed; in order to establish the level of over-claiming, which is known to vary by medium, they were also asked whether they recalled seeing 4 ads that had not appeared. These results were then used to calculate net recall or ad absorption for each medium.

Among the major findings were:

* Within a half hour, magazines effectively delivered more than twice the number of ad impressions as TV and more than 6 times those delivered online
* Though TV doesn’t deliver as many ads per half hour as do magazines, net recall of TV ads was almost twice that of magazine ads; magazines in turn had ad recall almost three times that of Internet banner ads
* 85% of Internet ads served appeared on-screen and could be identified by brand
* Among web users, 63% of banner ads were not seen. Respondents’ eyes passed over 37% of the Internet ads and stopped on slightly less than a third
* For Internet ads, almost all net recall could be attributed to ads that were seen
* Internet video ads appeared much less frequently than banner ads, and their exposure skewed heavily towards young men. When they did appear they were twice as likely to be seen as banner ads.

When study results were used in combination with other information on probability of exposure, a full-page 4-color magazine ad was determined to have 83% of the value of a 30-second television commercial, while a typical Internet banner ad has 16% of the value.

According to Scott McDonald, Senior Vice-President of Research for Condé Nast, “Because different media deliver ad impressions at vastly different rates, this study provides clear evidence that time spent with a medium does not translate into value for advertisers. It also indicates that magazine advertising is undervalued relative to its effectiveness.” Dave Poltrack, Chief Research Officer for CBS and President of CBS Vision, said “As more and more advertisers try to figure out how to communicate their story across media platforms, this form of experimental research will become an increasingly critical element in pre-campaign planning.”

“Our findings indicate that we need to learn more about how to engage Internet users with advertising content,” said Rebecca McPheters, CEO of McPheters & Company. “We look forward to expanding this work to look more closely at other forms of Internet advertising, as well as other media – such as cable, newspapers and radio, and specific types of programming or content. While the sample sizes were not significantly robust to release results for individual ad categories, the study suggests that there are real differences in performance that are worthy of further exploration,” she added.

About McPheters & Company

McPheters & Company specializes in strategic planning and research for brands and for companies in media-related fields, including media owners, advertisers, and ad agencies. The company develops business strategies to enhance both long- and short-term profitability. Much of its work is focused on enhancing and documenting the advertising value produced by media brands.

NEW YORK – As the online advertising community is calling for the implementation of more creative ads, Giant Realm, Inc. has announced a new eye-catching option for marketers. The online media company reaching millions of young men through its publisher group of top entertainment and gaming enthusiast communities unveiled the web’s largest Flash video overlay ad unit. Measuring 938 x 518, Giant Realm’s custom-designed placement consumes the screen while the video player is loading, creating a dramatic yet unobtrusive experience.

Once the overlay unit resolves and the requested content begins to play, a 300 x 250 companion unit appears beside the player and remains for the duration of the video. Both the custom-designed overlay and the branded companion units are clickable, driving qualified traffic to the advertiser’s site for more information about the product and/or for purchase.

The new video overlay ad unit has launched on numerous communities throughout the Giant Realm Publisher Group and the Giant Realm Platform, the company’s free social media platform, including www.Myndflame.com, www.GotGame.com, www.ScrewAttack.com, www.Starfeeder.com, and www.Noobflicks.com. Currently serving one million impressions per month, Giant Realm expects inventory to increase significantly as the unit is rolled out to more sites in the coming weeks.

James Green, CEO, Giant Realm, Inc., commented: “What’s important in advertising, and cannot be achieved with the standard banner, is to create something completely custom and engaging that allows a product’s message to be conveyed in its entirety. In this respect the Internet is only in its infancy as compared to traditional media and the powerful 30 second spot. However, an intrusive ad that stands between our vocal audience and its content won’t be accepted, either. Our video overlay unit gives advertisers a new opportunity to tell their brand’s story online to a captive audience without disrupting the user experience.”

Advertisers have been increasingly incorporating Giant Realm into their overall media buy due to its reach to this elusive male demographic as well as its ability to execute innovative and effective campaigns.

About Giant Realm, Inc:

Giant Realm, Inc. (www.GiantRealm.com, http://Corp.GiantRealm.com/) is a rapidly-growing online media company which helps marketers reach the male 18-34 demographic that has disappeared from the traditional media landscape and online portals. GiantRealm.com and its growing publisher group deliver authentic content and community for enthusiasts of entertainment platforms including video games, film/TV and humor. The New York-based company exclusively represents all websites that are part of the Giant Realm Publisher Group and allows its publishers to monetize 100% of their ad inventory. According to Google Analytics, Giant Realm currently reaches 36.5 million individuals worldwide every month. Giant Realm’s shareholders include SoftBank Capital, Comcast Interactive Capital, the William Morris Agency and the Edison Venture Fund.

BOSTON – According to Strategy Analytics Digital Media Strategies (DMS) research, the top 27 digital media companies in the world increased earnings by more than 20 percent, to $74 billion in 2008 up from $61.5 billion in 2007. Among the top five digital media companies in the world, Apple’s ‘Other Music Related Products and Services’ segment, which includes iTunes, was best- in-class – growing 32.7% in 2008, while Yahoo! grew the least with only 3.4% growth in 2008. This research also reveals that most of the companies focusing on consumer paid-for media, such as music and video downloads, are currently withstanding the economic downturn better than most of the companies focusing on online advertising.

“While growth in the digital media sector has been slowing as a result of the global economic downturn, the industry still grew a healthy 20.5% in 2008 and Strategy Analytics projects a further 7% – 9% growth in 2009,” said Jia Wu, Analyst at Strategy Analytics’ Digital Consumer Practice.

“The fact that, in 2008, most of the companies focusing on consumer paid-for media in the Strategy Analytics Digital Media Index performed much better than most of the companies focusing on online advertising, could be an early indicator that we are approaching a watershed moment in the nascent digital media market, and that more focus will be put on consumer paid-for online media in the difficult years ahead,” commented Martin Olausson, Director of Digital Media Research at Strategy Analytics.

About Strategy Analytics

Strategy Analytics, Inc. provides timely and actionable market intelligence focused on opportunities and disruptive forces in the areas of Automotive Electronics and Entertainment, Broadband Connected Home, Mobile & Wireless Intelligent Systems and Virtual Worlds. Headquartered in Boston, MA, with offices in the UK, France, Germany, Japan, S. Korea and China, Strategy Analytics works with clients through annual multi-client services, management team workshops and custom consulting engagements. For more information, please visit http://www.strategyanalytics.com/.

Leveraging data from Nielsen’s new NetEffects product, Specific Media Brand Awareness Reports enable advertisers to measure the impact of their campaigns among consumers across key attributes such as brand awareness, brand opinion, key messages, and the likeliness of online audiences to recommend a brand to others. Specific Media is able to evaluate a campaign’s effectiveness and share key insights with its advertisers within weeks of the campaign’s launch.

“Specific Media Brand Awareness Reports provide advertisers with a clear picture of their target audiences’ response to an ad campaign, including their ability to recall the ad, develop an opinion, and take action such as searching for more information, or recommending the brand to others,” said Daryl McNutt, vice president of client services, Specific Media. “By providing advertisers with actionable data and insights into brand perception, message decay rates and optimal impression frequencies, Specific Media helps its customers interpret their brand story, while enabling them to make adjustments and plan future campaigns more effectively.”

By applying the same principles it uses to research TV viewership, Nielsen collects data from panelists that have been exposed to the advertiser’s campaign, as well as from a control group. Nielsen panelists receive a customized survey within hours or days of a Specific Media campaign launch to track the number of ad exposures and ensure a representative control group.

Once the survey results are obtained, Specific Media experts analyze the responses and make the data actionable through a comprehensive report. Advertisers are then able to gauge whether their campaign aided product awareness, and if more consumers were favorable to the brand following the campaign. Specific Media Brand Awareness Reports also illustrate whether the campaign impacted site visitation, whether exposed consumers purchased or plan to purchase the product and whether the audience is more likely to try, continually use or recommend the product.

McNutt notes that Specific Media Brand Awareness Reports have been particularly useful to customers in the Consumer Packaged Goods industry, based in part on the broad number of consumer segments within the sector, and due to the use of diverse messaging to support a variety of brand and product categories.

About Specific Media (www.specificmedia.com)

Specific Media is uniquely positioned as the world’s largest independent media platform, solving the reach and data problems facing today’s advertisers. Specific Media enables advertisers to target consumers throughout North America and Western Europe based on demographics, behaviors, geographic locations and the contextual relevance of websites visited. Specific Media’s Premium Network reaches more than 150 million US consumers and 225 million consumers globally each month. With a relentless focus on delivering measurable, predictable results in a brand-friendly environment, Specific Media is defining tomorrow’s marketing standards, today.

- Google’s Head of North American Sales Moves to AOL

Tim Armstrong, Google’s now former head of sales for North America, and the developer behind Google’s AdSense and AdWords advertising products, is heading to AOL. As Brand Republic puts it, the move is caused by the “managerial shake-up” in Google. Armstrong will serve as chief executive at AOL and will be the driving force behind AOL’s presence in the online advertising arena.

- Razorfish Launches scatter|gather Blog

The new blog from Razorfish “covers the intersection of pop culture, consumer behavior & digital content”. Contributors are all practicing Content Strategists: Adam Gottlieb, Bob Maynard, Dawn Bovasso, Doug Bolin, Jared Keleher, Ruth Kaufman, Robert Stribley, Rachel Lovinger, Michael Barnwell, Matt Geraghty, Mary S. Butler, Lynn Leitte

Cascading pop-ups, malware ads infested with trojans and other nasties, adult ads, you name it – they’ve all been served yet again through RMX (Right Media Exchange) but clearly originating elsewhere. Just when I’ve escalated about 3 such reports to our ad optimizer, the following message arrived, from, you guessed, Vizi.

“Dear Publishers,

As you know there have been some problems on the RightMedia exchange that has affected Vizi and many other networks. We have been dealing with these issues and have been on the forefront of the fight against the misuse of the exchange. We have been working with both RightMedia/Yahoo and Federal Law Enforcement to catch these criminals!

We have taken some new policies that will make it harder for anyone to bring bad ads into our network. These changes will help ensure that less problems happen, and has also meant that we are banning approximately 25% of the possible revenue we can make. It was a hard decision – but the right thing to do.
However, yesterday while banning certain types of ads, I accidently made a mistake and put to to accept those type of ads. This has been fixed – and if any publisher was affected, please contact me personally.

Again, while these issues have not been caused by us, I want to extend a personal apology for not doing more initially to catch them and work harder to prevent them. My team is extremely amazing here at Vizi and they have been working extremely hard, day and night to make sure that all our clients and partner publishers are treated right. This is my personal responsibility and my fault – not them.
I hope you can continue to work with Vizi, and I thank you for the business and the relationship we have built.

Best,
Pesach Lattin
CEO, Vizi Inc”

Well, dear Vizi, this is simply not going to cut it, and the explanation would be hilarious if it wasn’t, in fact, quite tragic. You’ve had huge problems for quite some time – and had done pretty much nothing about it,while ignoring emails and reports of bad ads sent your way. Why would publishers still stick with an ad network that has a “proven record” of failures, one may wonder?

Claiming to “driving monetization with ads that reach the right audience“, here’s what the official announcement says:

“Over the next few months we’ll start offering interest-based advertising to a limited number of advertisers as part of a beta, and expand the offering later in 2009. Whether the advertiser’s goal is to drive brand awareness or increase responses to their ads, these capabilities can help expand the success of their campaigns and should increase your earnings as advertiser participation increases.”

All’s good and well, only, as with many other Google initiatives that fall into the gray area of privacy intrusion, this is an opt-out feature. That means that the aforementioned users will be subjected to behavioral targeting of the Google ads they may bump into any given site – and yes, I do realize the irony of having a certain ad slot right here – unless they proactively seek a way out of it.

Here’s how it works: “To develop interest categories, we’ll recognize the types of webpages users visit across the AdSense network. As an example, if they visit a number of sports pages, we’ll add them to the “sports enthusiast” interest category. You can visit the Help Center to learn more about how interest categories will be developed and your associated account settings. [...] by visiting the new Ads Preferences Manager, users can see what interest categories we think they fall into, or add and remove categories themselves. The Ads Preferences Manager can be found by clicking on most “Ads by Google” links you see on Google ads throughout the web.”

Going back a little while, do you remember the roll-out of the “web search history” across Google accounts? Again, this was an opt-out feature – that has, privacy wise, the same approach as the current rolling of behavioral targeting. One would hope that, having already opted out of it (“No, I most certainly don’t want you to observe and store the URLs I visit!“), common sense would prevent future invasions from happening. Clearly not the case: behavioral targeting is active even if you surf while logged into a Google account with web history deactivated.

While it’s quite obvious what drove this initiative to life in the first place, I really dislike the approach: nobody should be subjected to tracking and behavioral targeting unless they have specifically agreed to it! While you, readers, may be knowledgeable enough to avoid this and stay updated on the online ad industry news and practices, the average internet user is not. Considering the extremely wide reach of Google’s content network, one’s chances to come across sites carrying Google ads – and be tracked and targeted – are very, very high.

Google calls this “privacy innovations“. I call it “deception“. What do you call it?

*http://adsense.blogspot.com/2009/03/driving-monetization-with-ads-that.html

ORLANDO, Fla. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the release of the final version of its Audience Reach Measurement Guidelines at its Annual Leadership Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back, in Orlando, Florida. These guidelines provide clear, consistent definitions of key metrics and create a single standard for measuring Web audience sizes. The guidelines are the result of a major industry-wide initiative led by the IAB and included the participation of publishers, agencies and auditing organizations.

These new guidelines:

* Define key industry metrics such as unique users, unique cookies, unique browsers, visits and time spent.
* Establish a framework for all measurement providers to have their methodologies audited, providing greater certainty for the industry.
* Foster greater accuracy and reliability of all forms of online audience measurement, whether based on server data, online panels or user registration.

Marketers, agencies and online publishers rely on audience metrics reported by vendors that use a variety of methodologies. Transparency into these methodologies and clear definitions of commonly used terms are critical to the ongoing growth of interactive media as marketers increase their investment in interactive media.

“Establishing a broad industry consensus in favor of these guidelines is critical to ensuring that they gain traction in the marketplace,” said Joe Laszlo, Director of Research at the IAB. “As providers of measurement data adopt the guidelines, marketers can be increasingly confident they are planning their campaigns based on sound, reliable data.”

“Effective interactive advertising campaigns rely on accurate audience measurement,” said Kate Downey, director of audience analytics and insights, The Wall Street Journal Digital Network. “These guidelines provide accountability in audience measurement for marketers, agencies and other industry stakeholders.”

“By issuing these guidelines, the IAB has given measurement organizations across the industry a set of rigorous and consistent guidelines to help ensure standardized measurements of unique cookies, unique devices, or unique users,” said George Ivie, CEO and Executive Director of the Media Rating Council (MRC). “This is an important and commendable step towards full accountability.”

To review the complete guidelines, please go to www.iab.net/audiencemeasurement.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 400 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

ORLANDO, Fla. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and the American Association of Advertising Agencies(4A’s) announced agreement on actions that will reduce the costs and complexity of buying and selling interactive advertising. The announcement was made at the IAB’s Annual Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back.

The two industry associations joined forces to create the 4A’s/IAB Reinvention Task Force to focus on the following three areas:

* Standardization in business document formats. The recent E- Business Interactive Standards, a beta release of an XML-based solution for automating the transfer of business documents, standardizes order information including requests for proposals, insertion orders, and invoices between advertising agencies and media companies. Beta testing partners will be implementing and refining this solution throughout 2009. www.iab.net/ebiz
* Updating the 4A’s/IAB Standard Terms and Conditions. As interactive has grown and changed, so have the contractual requirements. The IAB and 4A’s are committed to updating the current standard Terms and Conditions language in 2009 to reflect the current operational and marketplace environment.
* Improving automated exchange of impression and other metric data for discrepancy resolution and billing. Solving the discrepancy problem is a top priority for both agencies and publishers, and a method for detecting discrepancies during a campaign is essential.

“The timing of these initiatives could not be more important for our industry,” said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the IAB. “We must re-double our focus on costs as we continue to revolutionize the business of marketing. These efforts will only enhance the value of interactive for all stakeholders and consumers.”

“At a time when agencies and media companies are evolving the nature of their relationships and their businesses, the Reinvention Task Force is a critical step in improving the most fundamental elements of how we operate,” said Nancy Hill, President and CEO of the 4A’s. “These solutions will help drive revenue and allow all partners to more effectively scale operations.”

Though publishers and agencies have been developing sophisticated media buying and selling tools for years in the interactive space, they have often been difficult to integrate. The E- Business Interactive Standards will provide immediate operational efficiencies, enable scalability for all partners, and, by eliminating a large part of multiple entry, will reduce communication errors between publishers and agencies.

“The collaboration between publishers and agencies on the Reinvention Task Force has enabled us to accelerate the process by which these standards are implemented across the digital ecosystem,” said Zack Rogers, VP of Revenue Operations, CBS Interactive and the Publisher Lead of the Reinvention Task Force.

“We are pleased at the progress we have made to date on the Reinvention initiative,” said David Cohen, Executive Vice President, US Director of Digital Communications for Universal McCann, Chairperson of the 4A’s Digital Marketing Committee, and the agency lead of the Reinvention Task Force. “Through an impression exchange solution and consistent nomenclature for RFPs, insertion orders and invoices we believe that we have taken an important first step towards achieving that goal. Our attention will now turn to widespread adoption of these standards and working through the next iteration of industry standard Terms & Conditions.”

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 375 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

About the 4A’s

The American Association of Advertising Agencies is the national trade association of the advertising agency business. The 1,196 member agency offices it serves in the United States employ 65,000 people, offer a wide range of marketing communications services, and place 80 percent of all national advertising. The management-oriented association helps its members build their businesses, and acts as the industry’s spokesman with government, media, and the public sector. For more information visit our Web site at www.aaaa.org.

ORLANDO, Fla. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced that it has launched task forces comprised of industry leaders to address two of the biggest issues facing the interactive advertising industry—data ownership and media contracts between buyers and sellers of interactive advertising. These task forces represent a cross section of interactive industry stakeholders from web publishers, portals, search engines and networks and exchanges. Their objective is to find answers to the issues of data ownership and to create a model contract that includes commonly used terms and conditions (Ts&Cs) that are mutually beneficial solutions for publishers, agencies and marketers, thereby improving relationships between the three groups, fostering business growth and facilitating industry partnerships. The announcement was made at the IAB’s Annual Leadership Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back, in Orlando, Florida.

“Our industry is absolutely committed to marshalling interactive media leadership to move forward on these important fronts,” said Randall Rothenberg, President & CEO of the IAB. “We recognize that our members have truly revolutionized marketing with their products and services, and they are the ones who will be most adept at driving the change needed for resolution.”

The Interactive Ts&Cs Task Force’s discussions with the 4A’s are slated to begin in March. The following IAB member companies will serve on this task force:
Cars.com
CBS Interactive
CNN.com
Disney Interactive Media Group
Facebook
Forbes.com
Fox Interactive Media
Google
Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia
Microsoft Advertising
NBC Universal
New York Times
Platform-A
Time Inc
Valueclick Media
Yahoo!, Inc

The IAB has long taken a leadership role in improving supply chain operations in an effort to reduce the complexities that marketers and agencies face when buying interactive advertising. One of the steps the IAB has taken was the formation with the 4A’s of the Interactive Reinvention Task Force in 2008, a collaborative publisher-agency effort that also announced today a set of ground-breaking agreements on voluntary business process standards which, if adopted by agencies and publishers, will significantly reduce cost and complexity in the planning and buying of interactive advertising. In addition, the newly created Networks and Exchanges Committee has taken on an initiative to define and map out the types of data that can be collected and developed by ad networks. The IAB also announced today the launch of the Data Task Force that will tackle the challenges associated with data ownership.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 400 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

NEW YORK – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the release of Click Measurement Guidelines, a document that will establish parameters for the accurate buying and selling of cost-per-click advertising, an important and growing category of interactive advertising. Marketers will now have a standard for consistently and reliably measuring their performance-based marketing efforts. The guidelines also provide a strong framework for filtering fraudulent clicks, giving buyers and sellers confidence that only legitimate clicks are being counted.

The Click Measurement Guidelines will:

* Provide a detailed definition of a “click” and outline standard methodologies by which clicks should be measured and counted, including the identification of invalid and/or fraudulent clicks.
* Define standard terms that will help streamline the buying and selling of click-based media.
* Increase transparency and consistency in click measurements for media companies, ad-serving organizations, advertisers, and third-party click auditors.

“These guidelines demonstrate our continued commitment to being the most accountable advertising medium and providing marketers with the highest possible level of transparency,” said Sherrill Mane, Senior Vice President, Industry Services of the IAB. “It is critical that the advertising industry agree upon the precise definition and measurement of a click and establish procedures for weeding out fraudulent clicks. The IAB is proud to have organized our members around this effort.”

The guidelines are the latest addition to the IAB’s ongoing work to harmonize interactive measurement. They complement IAB guidelines for general ad impressions, digital video commercials and audience reach measurement.

“I applaud the IAB for taking a leadership role in bringing the Click Measurement Guidelines to fruition,” said George Ivie, Executive Director and CEO, of the Media Rating Council (MRC). “The interactive industry has consistently met the marketplace need for increased reliability in measurement, and this is yet another example of how the IAB has mobilized its members on behalf of both agencies and marketers.”

“Helping the interactive industry define a click and the standard for measuring one has been an extraordinary effort on the part of the IAB and its members,” said Shuman Ghosemajumder, Business Product Manager for Trust & Safety, Google, and a leading member of the IAB’s Click Measurement Working Group. “It is an important step that continues to reinforce interactive media’s role as the most accountable and measurable form of advertising.”

“IAB’s guidelines will provide users, advertisers and partners with further confidence that the industry, including Yahoo!, is taking click fraud issues seriously,” said Reggie Davis, VP of Network Quality at Yahoo! “Yahoo! worked on the IAB’s Click Measurement Working Group to develop these guidelines for identifying and filtering potential invalid or fraudulent clicks as part of its commitment to a transparent process for the measurement of valid clicks.”

Members of the industry—advertising agencies, advertisers, online publishers and technology vendors—are encouraged to read the proposed guidelines and submit comments on the IAB site at: www.iab.net/clickmeasurementguidelines. After the comment period closes on Friday March 27, 2009, the feedback will be reviewed and the guidelines will be finalized and released.

About the IAB’s Click Measurement Working Group:

The Click Measurement Working Group includes representatives from 38 IAB member companies, including sellers, measurers, and auditors of online media. Initiated in late 2005, the working group, together with the Media Rating Council, has spent the last three years developing these important guidelines and achieving consensus around them.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 400 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

ORLANDO, Fla. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the winners of its 2008 Sales and Service Excellence Awards during its Annual Leadership Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back, in Orlando, Florida. The Sales Awards honor IAB members for outstanding performance and leadership in interactive advertising sales. IAB Service Excellence awards honor outstanding member contributions to IAB industry-related initiatives.

“These awards recognize individuals and organizations that exemplified outstanding leadership and performance over the past year and helped drive growth in our industry. Each of the winners made exceptional contributions to their organizations and to the interactive advertising industry as a whole,” said Sherrill Mane, SVP Industry Services for the IAB.

Sales Excellence Awards

The Sales Excellence Awards, given by the IAB and developed under the auspices of the IAB’s Sales Executive Council in conjunction with The Myers Annual Survey of Advertising Executives, honors outstanding interactive sales organizations and individual account executives. The survey has been asking marketers, agency planners and buyers to evaluate the performance of interactive sales organizations since 2004. The IAB Sales Excellence Awards are based on proprietary questions and analyses of Myers’ database.

2008 Sales Excellence Award Winners include:

* Long term Achievement: Washington Post Digital
* Most Innovative: Nickelodeon Online Sales
* Best Newcomer: Hulu
* Account Executive of the Year: Josh Thau, Microsoft Advertising
* Account Executive of the Year Finalists:
o Paul Chenier, IGN Entertainment
o Dan Bonert, Yahoo!
o Stacey Pear, Yahoo!

Service Excellence Awards

Across the IAB’s nearly 400 member companies, 14 IAB councils and committees, and dozens of working groups, hundreds of IAB members participate in shaping the interactive advertising business and driving educational outreach to the marketplace. The IAB Service Excellence Awards honor individual members who have demonstrated strong leadership and provided an exceptional contribution to one or more significant, completed IAB initiatives over the past year.

2008 Service Excellence Award Winners include:

* Lon Pilot, Senior Architect, Platform A; and Geoff Petkus, Senior Product Director, Operative, for their dedication and leadership during the development of the Interactive E-Business Standards.
* Steve Sullivan, Lead PM Data Integrity, Microsoft Advertising, for his contributions and support for numerous IAB Ad Operations Council initiatives throughout 2008 including the Impression Exchange solution.
* Zack Rogers, VP Revenue Operations, CBS Interactive, for his dedication to and leadership of the 4A’s/IAB Reinvention Task Force.
* Tim Avila, Marketing Director, Online Video Monetization, Yahoo!, for his dedication to and leadership of the Digital Video Ad Format Guidelines and the IAB Digital Video Committee.
* Mike Hurt, Senior Vice President, comScore, for his dedication to the Digital Video Committee while co-chair in 2008 and his contributions to the market-making IAB Digital Video Overview document.
* Christie Lay, Senior Credit Manager, Microsoft, for her dedication and leadership of the Revenue Cycle Best Practices Working Group and other important CFO Council initiatives.
* Leslie Dunlap, Senior Director, Government Relations. Yahoo!, and Lisa Anderson, VP Global Public Policy, Time Warner, for their service on the Public Policy Council and dedication and leadership in creating the IAB’s Privacy Principles.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 400 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

The UK Internet has been almost immune to budget cuts by advertisers and marketers. In 2008, it outpaced all other media channels in its rate of spending growth, and that pattern will continue. But 2009 will be a tough year, and even online advertising will take a hit.

The UK Online Ad Spending report looks at the factors that will impact, both positively and negatively, the future of Internet media in the UK as marketers tighten their belts.

Earlier this year, eMarketer estimated that spending on UK online advertising would reach £3.36 billion ($6.41 billion) in 2008 — a rise of 27.1%.

Then the economic crisis hit.

Several factors—including sky-high levels of consumer debt and a housing market in near-collapse after years of wildly inflated values—tipped the UK into its worst recession in decades.

The problems have spread to the Internet. eMarketer now projects that online advertising spending growth will drop to just 7.2% in 2009, less than one-half the May 2008 estimate.

Key questions the “UK Online Ad Spending” report answers:

* What do recent estimates say about UK online advertising spending in 2007 and 2008?
* How does the economic downturn affect prospects for UK online ad spending in 2009?
* Which online advertising formats are most vulnerable to budget cutbacks?
* Will spending on Internet campaigns keep rising, when other media show flat or negative growth?
* And many others

The UK Online Ad Spending report aggregates the latest data from international marketing and communications researchers with eMarketer analysis to provide the information you need to make smart, timely business decisions.

Key Topics Covered:

* Executive Summary
* UK Online Advertising Spending, 2007-2013 (billions of £ and % change)
* Key Questions
* The eMarketer View
* Key eMarketer Numbers -UK Online Advertising Spending
* Change in Advertising Media Usage this Year by Advertisers in Western Europe*, 2008 (% of respondents)
* Online Advertising Spending
* UK Online Advertising Spending, First half 2003-First half 2008 (% of total ad spending)
* UK Online Advertising Spending, 2007-2013 (billions and % change)
* Comparative Estimates: UK Online Advertising Spending, 2007-2009 (billions of £)
* Comparative Estimates: UK Online Advertising Spending Growth, 2007-2009 (% change)
* UK Online Advertising Revenue Growth, 2007-2013 (% change)
* UK Online Marketing Spending Growth, Q1 & Q2 2008 (% change*)
* Change in Online Advertising Spending this Year According to Advertisers in Western Europe*, 2008 (% of respondents)
* Online Advertising Spending Growth Among Advertisers in Western Europe*, 2008-2010 (% change)
* Impact of Online Advertising on Their Business According to Advertisers in Western Europe*, 2008 (% of respondents)
* Change in Marketing Spending in the Next 12 Months According to UK Companies, September-October 2008 (% of respondents)
* Marketing Segments on Which UK Companies Will Increase Spending in the Next 12 Months, September-October 2008 (% of respondents)
* Online Spending by Format
* UK Online Advertising Spending, by Format, First half 2008 (millions and % share)
* UK Online Advertising Growth, by Format, 2007 & 2008 (% change)
* Amount Search Engine Marketers* Worldwide** Spend on Paid Search Annually, February-March 2008 (% of respondents)
* Change* in Online Marketing Spending by Marketers** Worldwide***, by Tactic, February-March 2008 (% of respondents)
* Search Engines that Companies Pay to Advertise on According to Search Engine Marketing Agencies Worldwide*, 2007 & 2008 (% of respondents)
* UK Search Engine Advertising Spending, by Search Engine, Q2 2008 (% of total)
* Display
* Classified Advertising
* E-Mail Marketing
* Video Advertising
* Advertising on Social Networks
* The Internet and Other Media
* Conclusion
* Endnotes
* Related Information and Links

For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/9fba9b/uk_online_ad_spend

PALO ALTO, Calif. – PubMatic (www.pubmatic.com), an ad revenue optimization company that works with over 5,500 online publishers, announced the official launch of its highly anticipated Application Programming Interface (API). The API will increase revenue for both ad networks and PubMatic’s publisher clients by allowing an instant and transparent connection between them for single or multiple ad campaigns on demand. The official API launch comes after a successful closed beta period with multiple ad network partners.

Benefits for Ad Networks:

* Increased Reach: Access to over 125 million unique users and thousands of websites
* Improved Targeting: Ad networks can leverage expanded targeting options including geography, frequency, user re-targeting, ad tag type, and much more
* Campaign Control: Ad networks have total control over pricing and timing for campaigns

Benefits for Publishers:

* Increased Monetization: Allowing more ad networks to instantly access publisher inventory increases publisher ad rates and sell through rates
* Increased Visibility: Dozens of new ad networks can get instant and transparent access to publisher inventory
* Better User Experience: More premium campaigns and better targeting result in users seeing higher quality and more relevant advertising
* Zero Integration: PubMatic publishers have instant access to premium campaigns and ad networks via the API, with zero integration effort

“Efficiency is absolutely key to improving monetization in the online advertising ecosystem,” said PubMatic CEO, Rajeev Goel. “Our API was designed to seamlessly connect publishers and ad networks so they can have total control of their campaigns, which results in an easy, streamlined process that is financially beneficial to both parties. This is the future of online advertising.”

About PubMatic:

PubMatic is an Ad Revenue Optimization service. PubMatic provides more than 5,500 web publishers real-time ad optimization, which significantly increases revenue while simplifying ad network management. PubMatic works with hundreds of ad networks and has created thousands of new publisher/ad network relationships. PubMatic is venture backed by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Nexus India Capital, and Helion Ventures. Find out more at http://www.pubmatic.com.

ORLANDO, Fla. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the formation of an Advertising Agency Advisory Board comprised of 12 senior executives from the nation’s leading creative, digital and media agencies. The new board’s objective is to spark dialogue among agencies, publishers and marketers, and even between media agencies and creative agencies. The IAB also intends to use the board to infuse the agency point of view more fully in its guidelines work and to drive forward the importance of premium online experiences, with audience as the first priority. The IAB has also signaled its intention to recapture for online campaigns the emotionally resonant and culturally significant creativity that has long characterized great advertising in other media. The announcement was made at the IAB’s Annual Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back in Orlando, Florida.

2009 Ad Agency Advisory Board includes:

* Brad Brinegar, Chairman and CEO of McKinney, and Chair of the Agency Advisory Board
* Tom Bedecarré, CEO, AKQA
* Jeff Benjamin, Interactive Creative Director, Crispin Porter + Bogusky Advertising
* Alan Cohen, CEO of OMD USA, OMD Los Angeles.
* Colleen DeCourcy, Chief Digital Officer, TBWA Worldwide
* Brian DiLorenzo, Director of Integrated Production and Executive Director of Content, BBDO
* David Droga, Founder and Chairman, Droga5
* Sarah Fay, CEO, Carat North America
* Maria Luisa Francoli, Global CEO, MPG
* Jean-Philippe Maheu, Chief Digital Officer, Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide
* Benjamin Palmer, Co-Founder, CEO, Barbarian Group
* Steve Wax, Partner and Chief Narratologist and Co-Founder, Campfire

“This group represents a powerhouse of creative talent that will help lead the interactive industry to the next level by showing us how to harness the potential of the first truly interactive advertising medium—to engage consumers and build brands and communities in new and exciting ways,” said Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO of the IAB. “Our interest in forming this advisory board is to enhance the partnership opportunities with agencies that will hasten and smooth the ongoing digital transformation of the full media ecosystem. And a lot of that will happen through creativity, relationships, and implementation.” Rothenberg has been an outspoken advocate for deeper more collaborative relationships between agencies, publishers, marketers and technology. He recently wrote a “Creative Manifesto” on interactive advertising creativity where he named the four enemies of online branding and the new skill sets creative agencies today must possess to attract, engage, and influence consumers. The complete manifesto can be viewed in its entirety at http://www.randallrothenberg.com/2009/02/heartbeats-and-mouseclicks-manifesto-on.html.

“Interactive media opens new doors for creative expression. Unlike predecessor media, we can engage people in an ongoing dialogue that creates a bond between the consumer, the advertiser and the medium that brought them together. The goal of the Advertising Agency Advisory Board is to share the interactive insights and experience of the nation’s top creative agencies with the marketplace in order to maximize the interactive advertising experience for all participants,” said Brad Brinegar, Chairman and CEO of McKinney, and Chair of the Agency Advisory Board.

The group held its inaugural meeting in early February, and its creation was formally announced today at the IAB’s Annual Leadership Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: Brands Battle Back, in Orlando, Florida.

In the coming months, the board’s intention is to help find ways to arm agencies for more success with clients and to field qualitative studies that confirm and highlight case studies of successful agency-publisher collaboration.

In conjunction with the formation of the IAB Advertising Agency Advisory Board, the IAB announced its plans to debut the IAB Creative Agency Boot Camp next month For more information, please go to http://www.iab.net/events_training/690217.

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 400 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

WHAT: Leaders of the digital advertising world will gather at the premier interactive advertising newsmaking event of 2009 to grapple with the biggest issues facing the marketing-media value chain. At the top of the agenda: Controversial debate about how brands—agency brands, consumer brands and publisher brands—are battling back against commoditization in these challenging economic times.

Hear About:

* Marketing 2.0: The New Affiliates
* The Agency of the Future Just Happened. How’d They Do It?
* Recession 2.0: Where Are Advertisers Going? Where Are Investors Going?
* Makin’ Bacon: The Premium Inside the Pork Bellies
* Death of Display—Just Exaggerated Rumors?
* Just Publish and You’ll Perish: The New Imperative for Publishing Brands
* Debate!: Brand Marketers Don’t Need Agencies. Interactive Publishers Provide Everything They Need
* Yes, Social Media Can Brand: Discuss
* How Regulation Could Shut Down the Internet

From Experts Including:

* Randall Rothenberg, President and CEO, IAB
* Michael Mendenhall, SVP and CMO, Hewlett-Packard Company
* Wenda Harris Millard, President, Media and Co-CEO, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia and Chair, IAB Board of Directors
* Michael Roth, Chairman and CEO, Interpublic Group
* David Rosenblatt, President, Display Advertising, Google
* Scott Howe, Corporate VP, Advertiser & Publisher Solutions Group, Microsoft
* Joanne Bradford, SVP, U.S. Revenue and Market Development, Yahoo!
* Bob Carrigan, CEO, IDG Communications Worldwide
* Mark Mahaney, Director, Internet Sector, Citigroup Investment Research
* Sarah Chubb, President, CondeNet
* Jean-Philippe Maheu, Chief Digital Officer, Ogilvy North America

WHEN: February 22-24

WHERE: Orlando, FL

MORE: A year ago, commoditization was the hot topic at the inaugural offsite annual meeting of the IAB. A sell-out crowd of 400 top digital marketers, agencies and publishers discussed and argued about Chairperson Wenda Millard Harris’s now-famous admonition to the industry to avoid trading ad space like pork bellies.

How times have changed. This year, interactive advertising is the sole bright spot in the advertising world. Embattled marketers are reducing overall ad budgets, while shifting more advertising dollars to hard-working, measurable interactive advertising. A challenging economy has slowed the industry’s growth, but has created opportunities as brands, their agencies and publishers explore new ways to harness the power of interactive advertising to build brands and ROI.

Also front and center in 2009 is the continuing—and escalating—threat of regulation that would unnecessarily stunt the interactive industry’s ability to tailor advertising to consumers’ preferences. All this and more will be hot topics of conversation at IAB’s second annual meeting.

For a complete agenda of this newsmaking event, go to: www.iab.net

About the IAB:

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 375 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.

To suggest an addition, please leave a comment with the Twitter URL and I’ll review it as soon as possible.

365 Ad Solutions – http://twitter.com/365adsolutions
Ad-Village – http://twitter.com/advillage
Ad Age – http://twitter.com/adage
AdExchanger – http://twitter.com/adexchanger
Ad Communal – http://twitter.com/adcommunal
AdOperationsOnline.com – http://twitter.com/adoperations
AdRoll – http://twitter.com/AdRoll
Ad Sales Club – http://twitter.com/AdSalesClub
Adsimilis – http://twitter.com/adsimilis
ad:tech – http://twitter.com/adtech
AdFreak – http://twitter.com/adfreak
Adify – http://twitter.com/adify
Adify Media NYC – http://twitter.com/ADIFYMediaNYC
Adlogix – http://twitter.com/AllanAdlogix
admob – http://twitter.com/admob
AdMonsters – http://twitter.com/AdMonsters
AdOperationsOnline.com – http://twitter.com/AdOperations
AdTorque – http://twitter.com/adtorque
Advertising Nest – http://twitter.com/AdvertisingNest
Advertising Week – http://twitter.com/advertisingweek
Advertising Week DC – http://twitter.com/adwkdc
Advertising Zealot – http://twitter.com/adzeal
Andy Beal – http://twitter.com/andybeal
Azoogle Ads – http://twitter.com/AzAdsInfo
Brand Marketing – http://twitter.com/QuantumMethod
Brian Chappell – http://twitter.com/brianchappell
Burst Media – http://twitter.com/burstmedia
comScore, Inc. – http://twitter.com/comScore
CreativeZone by Eyeblaster – http://twitter.com/Creative_Zone
Dan Curran – http://twitter.com/ManVsAgency
Ed Lee – http://twitter.com/edlee
eXelate – http://twitter.com/exelate
Eyeblaster – http://twitter.com/eyeblaster
Frank Addante – http://twitter.com/FrankAddante
Gigya – http://twitter.com/Gigya
Gourmet Ads – http://twitter.com/gourmetads
IAB – http://twitter.com/iab
IAB UK – http://twitter.com/iabuk
Jascha Kaykas-Wolff, VP Webtrends – http://twitter.com/kaykas
Jason Calacanis – http://twitter.com/JasonCalacanis
Jeremiah – http://twitter.com/jowyang
Joelle Kaufman – http://twitter.com/adify
Kipp Bodnar – http://twitter.com/kbodnar32
Lee Odden – http://twitter.com/leeodden
Marissa Louie – http://twitter.com/malouie
NGAGE – http://twitter.com/ngagenow
Online Advertising – http://twitter.com/advertising
OpenX – http://twitter.com/openx
Panache – http://twitter.com/PanacheTech
Pete Cashmore – http://twitter.com/mashable
Rajeev Goel / PubMatic – http://twitter.com/PubMatic
Razorfish – http://twitter.com/Razorfish
Rubicon Project – http://twitter.com/rubiconproject
Salesforce.com – http://twitter.com/successforce
Sazbean Consulting – http://twitter.com/sazbean
Scott Hoffman – http://twitter.com/Lotame
shinyads – http://twitter.com/shinyads
SmartBrief on Social Media – http://twitter.com/SBoSM
Sometrics – http://twitter.com/sometrics
Tamar Weinberg – http://twitter.com/tamar
Todd Mintz – http://twitter.com/toddmintz
Tumri – http://twitter.com/tumri
VideoEgg - http://twitter.com/videoegg

DALLAS – On February 19, 2009, Christine Churchill and Shelley Ellis will be speaking to the members of the search marketing community of North Texas at the Renaissance Hotel in Richardson, Texas starting at 6:30 p.m.

Titled “Keyword Research – For Beginners to Experts” this 90 minute presentation will review the tools, tips and strategies for keyword usage within search marketing, online advertising and traditional media.

“Keyword research is not only an integral part of search marketing, it also has ramifications in other forms of marketing – both online and offline,” said Tony Wright, president of the DFW Search Engine Marketing Association. “Christine and Rhonda have put together an in-depth review of keyword research that will appeal to novices and experts alike.”

Christine Churchill is the President of KeyRelevance, a recognized expert in the field of Search Engine Marketing. She is a strong advocate for ethical search engine marketing, and was a member of the founding Board of Directors of the Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO). A frequent speaker at industry events and a prolific writer on search marketing, Christine currently serves as the Chairman of the Dallas-Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Association (DFWSEM).

Shelley Ellis is the owner of Shelley Ellis Consulting and is at the forefront of exploring the vast potential of using Google’s content network for tapping into online conversations to increase sales and boost profits for companies of any size. With over nine years of paid search experience across a variety of industries, Shelley is a pioneer and a recognized expert in advanced content targeting strategies. Shelley also serves on the board of the Dallas-Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Association (DFWSEM).

“As demand increases in 2009 for search marketing, keyword research will be at the forefront of every company’s marketing campaign,” says Tony Wright. “These two speakers are recognized experts in this field and bring a perspective on how to apply keyword research not only to search marketing, but to all forms of advertising and marketing,” adds Mr. Wright.

Cost for the meeting is $30 for non-DFWSEM members and $10 for DFWSEM members. Registration for both members and non-members can be made at http://dfwsem.memberlodge.org/. Corporate and individual memberships are also available there.

About the DFW Search Engine Marketing Association (DFWSEM)

The Dallas-Fort Worth Search Engine Marketing Organization (DFWSEM) is dedicated to education and promotion of the Dallas-Fort Worth search engine marketing industry, conversing various topics related to search engine optimization (SEO) and pay-per-click search (PPC), as well as other emerging media. The group meets monthly at the Renaissance Hotel in Richardson, Texas, and is open to anyone interested in search engine marketing, including in-house marketers, independent consultants, and agencies.

Initially founded in 2003, DFWSEM is the oldest and longest running local search engine marketing group/meetup in the country. Member agencies include DexterityMedia, Vizion Interactive, iCrossing, Range Online Media, Key Relevance, MarketNet, AffGoo, Creative Support, Did-it, SearchDex, WrightIMC, and Bridgepose. For more information, visit http://www.dfwsem.org.

DFWSEM is sponsored by Lead Maverick (http://www.leadmaverick.com).

Sponsoring DFWSEM

DFWSEM Association members cumulatively represent over $100,000,000 in annual search engine ad spend, and sponsorship is a great way to get your message in front of this group of decision makers and key influencers. To find out how to sponsor a monthly meeting or other opportunity, contact Tony Wright at tony.wright@wrightimc.com.

DFWSEM Speakers Bureau

Many members of DFWSEM are actively speaking at various interactive marketing conferences, including SMX, Search Engine Strategies, ad:tech, and WebmasterWorld, among many others. If you are looking for someone to speak about search engine marketing related topics, or would like to interview a member, feel free to contact the group for more information at 214.210.6793.

The DFWSEM Association welcomes requests to speak to the group at info@dfwsem.org.