Even though the mobile advertising space is already crowded, India-based startup SilverPush sees an opportunity to help advertisers deliver targeted mobile ads and link users across the mobile Web and app environment.
The 1-year-old company has set its sights on the US market and has already received acquisition offers, according to co-founders Alex Modon and Mudit Seth. AdExchanger spoke with Modon and Seth about the company’s plans for pursuing US marketers and its road map.
AdExchanger: What problem does SilverPush solve?
ALEX MODON: The question we started with was how to retarget people across the mobile Web and apps. We built a fingerprinting solution that looks at the data users generate on the mobile Web to figure out if that’s the same user doing similar things on an app through ad requests. That technology then grew into lookalike ad targeting.
What we’re also doing now is taking a lot of first-party data from various data partners and building out personas for each device. We have two different types of data. We have the first-party data that we’re collecting from our relationships with ad exchanges and ad networks to enable our targeting capabilities. The second part is working with advertisers specifically on their data.
AM: We’re looking at first-party data rather than just a plethora of third-party sources. In addition to device IDs and cookies that are in a generic “bucket,” clients are also giving us data from their audiences as well. We’re able to take those parameters that an advertiser knows to be true about their audience and who their most valuable customers are and compare it with our database of over 200 million unique device personas.
From there we deliver the client’s ad to the targeted audience through RTB exchanges. Over the past six months, we’ve already received four acquisition offers but we turned them down because of the growth opportunities that we see coming.
Who are your customers and how many do you have?
MUDIT SETH: We have about 30 clients, which includes agencies like GroupM and brands like Samsung, Domino’s and Airtel. Besides India, we’re also working with companies in Singapore, Germany, the Philippines, Argentina and Brazil. We want to be in the US as well because its mobile market is more mature. People in the US understand retargeting, lookalike audiences and mobile marketing and they are more willing to experiment.
How do you address concerns about consumer privacy and convince clients that their data is safe?
AM: We keep our clients’ data separate of course from what we are collecting on the database side and the data that we work with is anonymized. We don’t see specific names or PIIs, for example, only numbers.
What’s on your road map for this coming year?
AM: As we go deeper into the US market, we want to make sure we’re meeting the needs of clients who want a managed solution and those who want a self-serve option. One of the differences between the Southeast Asia market and the US is a demand in the US for self-serve platforms so this is something we’re working on right now.
Where are you in terms of revenue and your employee headcount?
MS: Right now we have seven employees and in mid-February we’ll be closing a seed round, but we’re not ready to announce that number yet. We have also been included in the accelerator program 500 Startups and are backed by GSF India.
