Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign-up here.
Search Algo Drama
When Google updated its search algorithm (the update is called “Farmer”) to take the air out of so-called content farms, content machine sites across the Web shuddered. Just a few days later, Search Engine Land’s Danny Sullivan looks at some of the winners and losers with the help of a search engine analytics from Sistrix. See the Sistrix rankings here of those who got hit. Sullivan writes, “If you were expecting these figures to show Demand Media’s eHow site to have been harmed — surprise! (…) the biggest “content farm” type brand that seems to have suffered are Associated Content. Read more.
More Private Exchange Buzz
The private exchange buzz continues as The New York Times’ Tanzina Vega looks at the trend among large publishers such as CBS Interactive and Forbes who are seeking a controlled, transparent way to sell non-guaranteed inventory. Forbes CRO Kevin Gentzel tells Vega, “There is significant value in branded data. A Forbes in-market car buyer has more value that just an in-market car buyer.” Read more. AdMeld’s Jason Kelly declares, “Agencies are investing in technology. Publishers are now investing in technology. Publishers are looking to own the relationship with their clients.”
Algo Change Good For Exchange?
On ClickZ, editor Zach Rodgers suggests that the update to the search algo may in fact help Google’s display strategy via exchanges. If search traffic is now going to better sites -with exchange inventory-, brand advertisers may be more apt to bid as Rodgers writes, “An overall uptick in quality would be a significant development for brand advertisers, many of which have withheld dollars from ad exchanges because of quality and adjacency concerns.” Read more.
The Wall Street Journal’s What They Know series continues in article penned by Scott Thurm who looks at the continued funding of tech companies in online behavioral advertising in spite of “concerns about privacy and potential government restrictions.” Randall Glein of VC DFJ Growth Fund tells Thurm, “‘It is not affecting our desire to be active investors’ in online advertising.” Read more.
Big Ads And Huff Po
Ad Age’s Edmund Lee says that Huffington Post will be getting Project Devil’s “big ads” soon as Aol plans on incorporating technology such as that from its recent Pictela acquisition. Huff Po spokespeople check-in to say that the new strategy is not set in stone as the deal between Aol and Huff Po needs to close first. Lee adds more details on Aol’s Project Devil for publishers: “(…) at least the concept of replacing the typical two ads on a page for one, bigger, more magazine-like ad for ad rates in the range of $35 per thousand viewers, three to four times that of a typical banner ad.” Read more.
Balancing Transparency
Nilesh Zacharias, Director of Platform Policy at Yahoo!’s Right Media Exchange speaks for the Right Media Exchange in company blog post called, “Transparency vs. Control: Restoring the Balance.” Zacharias says that buyers and sellers – BOTH of them – need to provide transparency in the non-guaranteed, “secondary” market. Yet, the company realizes concerns such as publisher channel conflict are real and RMX is “working on new ways to enable the safe, trusted buying without full transparency.” Read it.
Get Your EBIF
Data-driven television has plenty of its own fancy set of acronyms and it’s hoped by at lease some cable operators that EBIF (or Enhanced TV Binary Interchange Format) will be something you’ll hear more about in the future. MediaPost’s David Goetzl writes, Time Warner Cable and Comcast “are deploying the EBIF technology that propels interactive advertising at a rapid clip.” Read more about data driving TV.
489 Comments
CEO Scott Meyer of Evidon (was Better Advertising) has reviewed the recent submission of comments – 489 strong according to Meyer – to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission in regards to online behavioral advertising regulation. And, Meyer’s ears are ringing! He writes, “There’s so much noise in the space, with bills, reports, press, beta products and companies making what at times seem like irrational moves to us…” Read more. And, see Evidon’s own comments submitted to the FTC (PDF).
Dave Morgan’s TV Network
Simulmedia’s Dave Morgan is featured in an Ad Age article by Michael Learmonth. Describing Simulmedia’s data-driven model, Learmonth writes, “Actually, it’s an audience network if you’re splitting hairs. Mr. Morgan takes this data, finds fans of specific shows, or types of shows or actors, like Westerns, animation, Julia Roberts or Will Ferrell, combines that with the age and gender information already available from sources like Nielsen, and packages TV spots that over-index a target audience to TV advertisers.”
“Like” Adding “Share”
Mashable’s Vadim Lavrusik reports that Facebook’s “Like” button is taking on another duty. He writes, “Now after hitting the Like button, a full story with a headline, blurb and thumbnail will be posted to your profile wall. You’ll also be given an option to comment on the story link. Previously, only a link to the story would appear in the recent activity, often going unnoticed by users.” Read more.
New Website
Advertising Age has re-designed its online presence as editor Abbey Klaassen says, “Our end goal: to make it easier for you to find content on the site.” See it now.
But Wait. There’s More!
- Let’s Talk Display Strategy – Efficient Frontier blog
- Digging Around in Personal Analytics – Hill Holliday
