Q1 Audience Insights; Gaming The Bake-Off

Here is today’s AdExchanger.com news roundup. Want it by email? Sign up here.

$egmenting Audience

Real-time bidding company Turn has released a new report showing that costs for display advertising, video ads and other rich media are increasing, while those for mobile and social ads have fallen, according to TechCrunch’s Anthony Ha. Noting a Turn audience segment called the “digital elite,” Ha writes, “Turn says it’s the report’s ‘biggest discovery’ – a particularly desirable audience that includes 2 percent of consumers. They see 24 times more ads than the average consumer, and advertisers pay eCPMs that are 85 percent higher than average to reach this audience.” Read more about the “elite” and get the report here (Pay with PII and first born).

Shady Business

Relying on the advertising industry’s version of a “bake-off” — pitting vendors against each other to find the best one — carries several pitfalls, reports AdAge’s Jason Del Ray. Marketers or agencies should be on the lookout for “loopholes that allow firms to game them,” Del Ray writes. One example is the vendor that slashes its profits in the trial to get a prospective client’s business. “The problem here is obvious,” Del Ray notes. “Once they win the business, they will need to make a profit and will have to change tactics to do so.” Read more.

People, Come Together

Brands, publishers and ad platforms need to stop talking at cross purposes, John Battelle writes for AdAge. The core problems he raises are familiar: disagreement over what to measure, an unwillingness to “get to know the other side,” the role publisher context should play in the media plan, incompatible incentives. Battelle calls for “a longer-term vision than the next click, the last attribution, the successful exit or the highest CPM.” Read more.

Hearst’s PubMatic, Programmatic Tour

The Hearst/PubMatic media tour, covered two weeks ago in Adweek, gets its turn in Digiday. The tour offers an under-the-hood look at the partnership’s private exchange, which was rolled out last June, to see how much more valuable inventory can be plugged into the Audience Exchange — as the Hearst/PubMatic system is called — without cannibalizing the publisher’s direct sales. “Programmatic creates a platform that allows us to do more with our marketing partners, not less,” CRO Kristine Welker told Digiday’s Josh Sternberg. Read more.

The Ultimate Disconnect

About three years ago, Google engineer Brian Kennish had a change of heart over helping the search giant collect user data. Kennish formed Disconnect.me to block Facebook from using “Likes” and other tools to suck up member data. Disconnect.me is now expanding its anti-Facebook data collection system to cover platforms run by Twitter, Yahoo! and his former employer Google. In an interview, Kennish tells paidContent’s Jeff John Roberts, “The company is at work on tools to limit the spread of data from mobile devices” and create education around privacy issues. Read more.

RTB Charts

eMarketer brings its graphic design skills to real-time bidding (RTB) courtesy of new video ad data from Forrester and video ad exchange SpotXchange. A sample observation from the report: “In 2012 the number of video ad impressions bought via RTB exchanges doubled year over year; this year, the number of video impressions will top 100 billion.” See charts.

Mobile RTB Ecosystem

Former Admeld mobile exec and current Googler Marc Theerman revisits his mobile ad ecosystem map, originally posted on AdExchanger back in 2010. In his personal blog, Theerman exhibits the latest map update and says that RTB will win in mobile for two reasons: “24 months from now, the majority of all impressions will come from mobile operating systems. RTB is the only efficient way to match buyers to sellers in this exponentially growing universe.” Read the second reason.

Children’s Privacy Timeout

The Interactive Advertising Bureau has filed a request with the FTC to delay implementation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by six months, arguing that the guidelines, which cover a range of activities by websites aimed at kids, are incredibly complex and difficult to implement easily. “It’s a complete makeover and that will take time,” Mike Zaneis, the IAB’s SVP and General Counsel, told Adweek’s Katy Bachman. Read more.

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