Video Publishers Grab For Content; Users Prefer Banners Over Native

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Platforms Grab For Content

Without unique content, your fancy tech platform may not matter. On that note… Over the weekend, Reuters reported that YouTube was in talks with Hollywood and independent producers to fund premium content. If realized, the deals could graduate YouTube from a DIY platform for video streaming to one worthy of higher-priced advertising. Read more. Meanwhile, “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone announced a three-year deal that gives Hulu exclusive streaming rights to the show’s back catalogue. The $80 million deal is in line with attempts by other streaming services, such as Netflix and Amazon, to lock down premium content and ultimately draw in advertisers. Read on.

Oh My Gahd

According to a study by Contently, Internet users would rather see a banner ad than read a native content piece. [See related Charlton Heston “Omega Man” clip.] Contently surveyed 542 US Internet users aged 18-65, and found a fair amount of confusion and mistrust for native advertising. Only 48% of respondents believed “sponsored content” meant an advertiser paid for the article and had control over its content, whereas 52% said it meant something different. What’s more, 54% of online readers don’t trash sponsored content, and 59% of readers say a site loses credibility for running brand-sponsored content. Go here for the study.

Ecommerce Goes Native

“The last bastion of major web companies is now embracing native, and that group is the largest ecommerce companies in the world,” TripleLift’s co-founder and chief strategy officer, Ari Lewine, told Ad Age. The ad tech company has partnered with ecommerce reviews business Bazaarvoice, which also owns a media business courtesy of its purchase of Longboard Media in November 2012. The companies are working to launch native spots that run alongside retailer products. Former PubMatic exec Josh Wetzel, GM of Bazaarvoice Media, said brands across industries are “looking to shift away from traditional banner ads in favor of a more native look. … The idea is to influence the consumer when they have their wallet out.” Read on. And read about TripleLift’s ‘take’ on native advertising on AdExchanger from May.

Rebates Bolster Programmatic

The Wall Street Journal and Pivotal Research analyst Brian Wieser took another look at rebates and the agency model on Friday. A lack of agency-marketer trust around rebates may be a factor shifting marketers to in-house programmatic trading, according to The Wall Street Journal. Marketers claim rebates aren’t factored into their deals with media agencies and their trading desks. “If marketers don’t trust their agencies in this area to begin with, or if their procurement and finance teams have concerns about tracking rebates, this will be a factor that makes disintermediation more likely,” Wieser wrote in a research note on Friday, “especially as more and more digital media (and media, in general) is bought programmatically.” Read more (subscription). Related: rebates were mentioned as a possible concern in a 2011 study on agency trading desks commissioned by the Association of National Advertisers (ANA). Read that one.

In The Beginning

TubeMogul’s founders Brett Wilson and John Hughes discuss the early stages of their company and its “pivot” in 2010 in a profile piece on The FT. Wilson, the company’s CEO, explains the move to a video ad media buying platform and away from a pure analytics play, “We did not see the analytics as a major disruptive business and we wanted to build something really big,” Read it (subscription). Ripple dissolve:here’s the 2010 AdExchanger interview with Wilson discussing the changes.

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Salesforce.com Tucks In

Salesforce.com has struck a deal to buy RelateIQ for $390 million, says Re/code. CEO Steve Loughlin confirmed the acquisition in a blog post on Friday. RelateIQ’s platform uses algorithms to capture data from email, calendar and phone calls to provide users insights on real-time behaviors. Loughlin claimed the insights from his company’s product will lend new levels of intelligence across Salesforce’s marketing offerings. Read more.

Seriously Interactive

Adtile has surfaced with a new set of rich mobile ads that take user interaction to a whole new level. The California-based company says it used components of airplane and submarine physics to design HTML5 ads that connect to a smartphone’s GPS, gyroscope, motion coprocessor, compass and accelerometer (huh?). Simply put, the ads respond to motion, says CEO Nils Forsbolm, and are designed with localized geotargeting in mind. Read on at VentureBeat.

Organic Metrics

Twitter released a new analytics tool on Friday that aims to lend hard metrics to a tweet’s performance. Previously, the social media site offers advertisers certain data around sponsored tweets, such as impressions, replies and clicks. The new dashboard, extends organic Tweet analytics to include total impression, total engagements and engagement rates over a period of time (think Google Analytics’ interface). Go here for the blog post and read on at TechCrunch.

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