Yahoo Ad Plans Of Yore; OwnerIQ's Branded Ad Network

Here’s today’s AdExchanger.com news round-up… Want it by email? Sign-up here.

The AppNexus-Yahoo Deal That Wasn’t

AppNexus nearly landed a big deal with Yahoo in the months prior to Marissa Mayer’s arrival as CEO, reports Business Insider. “The plan under consideration was for Yahoo to take a large stake in…AppNexus, and then hand over its advertising inventory to AppNexus for optimization,” Nicholas Carlson writes. In other words, very similar to the big AppNexus/Microsoft investment in 2011. There’s no mention of what role if any Right Media would play, nor is it clear how close talks came to reality before interim CEO Ross Levinsohn had to clean out his desk. Yahoo ad platforms guy Scott Burke was apparently against the idea, preferring to acquire and combine smaller companies. More

Blue Skies for BlueKai?

Do pure play Data Management Platforms have a future distinct from buying platforms? One of the biggest standalones, BlueKai, is enjoying a wave of publicity and revenue that may augur a strong future for indie data marketplaces. In the latest such piece, CEO Omar Tawakol tells AdWeek, “We don’t make money off running your ads…We have no execution [platform], but we plug into every execution platform.” Its revenue reportedly doubled this year to a $50 million run rate. Read more.

Programmatic Premium, a la GroupM

GroupM COO John Montgomery talks with Digiday about, among other things, the automation of “tier two” and “tier three” inventory. Tier three is run of the mill non-guaranteed inventory. He says, “Tier two is the interesting crossover, where we can start to use technology for premium inventory. Programmatic doesn’t have to mean long tail. That’s the interesting part where we’re starting to see technology take over. We’re a long way away from using tech to replace people, but we’re certainly using it to manage complexities, and that makes it less expensive.” More.

Retargeting Intent

Ad platform OwnerIQ is adding to its owned-and-operated “ownership media” strategy and creating a broader, “branded” ad network business according to Joe Mandese of MediaPost. Owner IQ CEO Jay Habegger tells Mandese, “We believe that brands can be media companies and aggregate audiences in the same way that publishers do.” In effect, online grocer Peapod will now let OwnerIQ pixel its users to understand their shopping habits and, in turn, OwnerIQ will sell targeted media addressing those users across exchange-like inventory sources, which could also include OwnerIQ’s own sites. Peapod presumably gets a rev share on the data and media. This B2C strategy echoes B2B data and media company Bizo. Read the release. It’s also a retargeting-focused “take” on media channels available in eCommerce to which Triad Retail Media, Longboard Media (now Bazaarvoice), Rich Relevance have been drawn – let alone Amazon.com!

Incenting The User

Adweek’s Mike Shields writes that Aol is incentivizing users to watch videos. He writes, “The company’s budding syndication arm, AOL On, distributes content to Swagbucks, a rewards site where users earn points that can be redeemed for gift cards and coupons ($1 off Tombstone Pizza, $15 off at the Gap).” Read more. Here’s a nutty idea from AdExchanger – you could be paid to watch videos with Aol.. and then you could take those Swagbucks and potentially pay SpotXchange to SkipIt -or skip video ads. I love the ad economy!

Digital-First

In a think piece on Ad Age, digital strategist Ana Andjelic sees digital-first companies taking the strategy lead over traditional companies and identifies Airbnb, Amazon and Visa as businesses with the right idea. She concludes, “As digital-first companies grow and move up the value chain, their definitions of quality and value become the norm. With no barriers of entry left, big companies have no choice but adopt them.” Read more.

Stockpiling Engineers

Will Yahoo!’s Marissa Mayer decide to buy a big ‘ol ad tech startup or will she keep stock piling talent from smaller companies to build “stuff.” Yesterday, Yahoo seemed to tilt toward the latter for a day as it acquired a 5 person video chat startup called OnTheAir. TechCrunch says they’re all Stanford grads. Read more. Sounds very similar to Yahoo!’s Stamped purchase.

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