Chango Gets Funds For Programmatic; Facebook's Ad Choices

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Chango And Cash

Chango, the self-described, programmatic marketing platform has raised $12 million to help build out its retargeting system. In addition to ramping up its technology, the company is looking to hire at least 50 new engineers and sales people. “Our clients are among the most progressive advertisers and agencies in online retail and we’re achieving a 90% renewal rate,” claims Chris Sukornyk, Chango’s founder & CEO. Read the release.

Facebook Ad Choices

Ad Age’s Jason Del Rey covers Facebook’s decision to not use the Ad Choices icon favored by the Digital Advertising Alliance on its site’s ads. Del Rey explains, “Users can generally opt out through the DAA’s icon in two or three steps, but on Facebook, they might need to take at least four actions to opt out of behavioral targeting.” Retargeted ads through Facebook Exchange also come under scrutiny. Read more.

Real-Time ‘Showrooming’

It’s a real-time war when it comes to the battle between brick-and-mortar retailers and their online competitors. The WSJ details some of the showrooming-related shenanigans over the past week, “When Target advertised plans to sell a $400 Dyson Ball vacuum cleaner for $269, Best Buy responded by cutting its online price for the vacuum by $80, to $300. Best Buy wasn’t immune. When the electronics retailer published a circular advertising it would sell a $1,500 Nikon camera for $1,000, Amazon.com followed up Thanksgiving morning by cutting its price for the same camera to $997.” Read more (subscription). Imagine all that data hooked up to a retargeting campaign. A big data mess.

Bad Views

Marco Bertozzi, executive managing Director, EMEA, at Publicis’ Vivaki Nerve Center, is one who takes a dim view of the viewable impressions quest. “Viewability is a classic example where we are setting a bar so high vs the other the channels because we can…I would ask that we take some time to establish some very clear guidelines and transitions and not go in like a bull in a china shop just so we can show off at the next pitch. Lets do things right, for the good of the industry, not just the next sell,” he writes on his personal blog. Read more.

NSFW, But Safe For Ads

“Adult ad network” ExoClick is boasting that it has reached an “all-time traffic record” to hit more than 2 billion ad impressions a day on both web and mobile devices. The company doesn’t divulge what that means in terms of actual dollars, but nevertheless, it’s bragging that it’s the biggest adult ad network (as opposed to… ?). “”We are very proud of this new record and it’s only thanks to our talented team and all the clients that trust in our company,” says CEO Benjamin Fonzé. Read the release.

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Daily News Roundup

Anthropic’s Vending Machine Goes Rogue; OpenAI Won’t Take Its Medicine

Wilson Slaps Programmatic

Venture guy Fred Wilson writes about the sudden absence of ads on his popular AVC blog, and explains the reason is Federated Media’s decision to get out of direct sold premium ads altogether (AdExchanger story) and go all-in with its Lijit programmatic ad platform. Wilson says, “I could keep running the programmatic ad units that have been on display here as of late, but I find that uninteresting to me and likely to all of you too. Instead, I want to explore more conversational marketing oriented (ie native) advertising here on AVC.“ Read more.

Foursquare Pushback

We’re hearing more tales fundraising turbulence, as companies struggle to get new rounds at high valuations. The latest story is on Foursquare, which the Wall Street Journal reports is expected to take just $2 million in revenue this year. Not only that, monthly users are apparently 8 million, despite 25 million registrations. “Potential investors aren’t convinced the company is moving quickly enough to make money and are concerned that the use of its free service…is starting to slow, the people said.” Read more.

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