Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign-up here.
RTB’ing The Background
Everything will be biddable. Perhaps Gourmet Ads, which has been “busy” with its real-time bidding strategy, is proof. The vertical ad network has introduced real-time bidding of its background skins through its private exchange enabled by AppNexus. Read the blog post. Also, in addressing potential buyers such as agency trading desks, demand-side platforms and the like, the company provides a template for differentiation which many publishers might want to use: “Buy on Brand Safe Inventory (Our content only features cooking and recipe websites); Inventory Includes Above the Fold Impressions; Market Rate Floor Prices with no minimum spend; (…) Ad Sizes include 300×250, 160×600, 728×90.” Read more.
Audience Patent
Former Yahoo! exec and current Inadco exec Dave Zinman announces on his personal blog, “I’m a proud papa and need to share that the United States Patent and Trademark Office just issued Patent #8,234,166. Thanks go to Bob Filice, my co-inventor, who in point of fact did most of the work to file this patent, and to Yahoo!, for believing in this enough to invest the legal cycles necessary to get this across the finish line. For their efforts, they now own the patent for ‘Automated user segment selection for delivery of online advertisements’!” Read a bit more. And, see the patent on the USPTO website. There are no patent attorneys at AdExchanger, but after reviewing the “abstract,” and like many patents related to ad tech, this patent looks like it could affect all the audience targeting tech companies in the ad ecosystem if it was enforced.
More Patent Play
On Friday, Apple won its patent liability lawsuit against Samsung and was awarded, initially, $1 billion by a California jury But, the final result is still a long ways off as judicial reviews and appeals begin to pop up. Read more. U.C. Berkeley professor Robert Merges observes in the NY Times, “It’s not good news for Google. Apple’s real target is the Android ecosystem, the Android world, everything having to do with Androids. That’s really what they are targeting here.” Read Bloomberg News summary, too.
About.com Bought By IAC
A NY Times Company press release made it official Sunday: “The New York Times Company has entered into an agreement to sell its About Group, which includes the Web sites of About.com, ConsumerSearch.com and CalorieCount.com, to IAC for $300 million in cash. The all cash transaction is expected to close in the next several weeks. The Company intends to use the proceeds for general corporate purposes.” Read more on the NY Times Media Decoder blog. In the end, there was no Answers for About.com. [rim shot]
Planning Display
Why not call a spade, a spade? Or a display, a display? That’s what Google appears to be doing as DoubleClick Ad Planner, which aggregates display ad audience data across Google’s display ad network, will henceforth (Sept. 5) be known as the “Google Display Network Ad Planner.” Google is continuing to align its products. Product manager Vincent Lacey says in announcing the change on the Inside AdWords blog, “In order to maintain the highest level of quality planning data and to invest in new functionality, we will also need to discontinue some existing features. You will start to see, for example, that certain filters and demographic data will no longer be available in Ad Planner.” Read more.
The Running of the FBX
TechCrunch’s John Constine echoes the AdExchanger article from 8/16, which confirmed the Facebook Exchange partner increase to 14 total partners (DSPs buying Facebook display). Constine says that retargeted ads are running and “one source close to Exchange tells me ‘initial results are good, they’re going very, very well.'” Read more.
In fact, you can test this for yourself, go to our Yahoo retargeter story from June. TellApart is a Facebook Exchange partner, so click TellApart’s Online Shoes screenshot to scoop up a cookie. Ok, now go to Facebook. Wait a minute or two, say the words “there’s no business like the retargeting business,” refresh your Facebook timeline and you should see an OnlineShoes ad in the right column
Ad Network Conspiracy
Stéphane Pere, VP at Ideas People Media, part of Economist Group, takes ad networks to task in a Digiday think piece titled, “The Ad Network Transparency Conspiracy.” He writes, “Another common misleading practice looks like this: An ad network sells an audience to an agency at a $9 CPM. The network then buys a very small portion of the inventory on premium publications at $40 CPM and a large portion of the inventory on the long tail at $2 CPM. The real eCPM of the campaign for the ad network is then $2.50, and the context is far from the agency’s idea of premium. Yet the marketers receive a collection of golden screenshots, showing ads on relevant publisher sites, implying their campaign hit the target audience and editorial context.” Read more.
Google, The Content Co.
On Marketing Land, Danny Sullivan examines the transformation of Google to a content company. He writes, “How did we get from Google being a search engine that pointed to things, like travel guides or gift cards sold by other companies, to being a content company? It’s a position that more than ever before makes it hard for Google to assure other companies that it won’t play favorites with its search listings.” Read this argument.
Infographic Monday
It’s the new role of Chief Marketing Technology Officer (CMTO) – in infographic format on the BlueKai blog. See it now!
Privacy
- What you need to know about Twitter’s do-not-track feature – iMedia Connection
But Wait. There’s More!
- 4A’s Agency Labor Billing Rate Survey Is Tip of Iceberg – Ad Age
- Kindle Fire Loses Momentum in Web Usage Despite Sales Increase – Chitka blog
- PulsePoint and SymphonyIRI to Help CPG Marketers Plan, Buy and Measure Offline Sales Impact from Online Channels – press release
- YouTube Explains, Again, Why It’s Okay That Its iPhone App Is Going Away – AllThingsD
