Senior Editor
James covers the intersection of commerce, media and advertising technology.
AUTHOR ARCHIVE FOR:
James Hercher
Articles By James
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How Heineken Sees Marketers Flexing The Power Of The Purse
According to a study conducted by the ANA and White Ops in December, 83-89% of agencies and media vendors see fighting ad fraud as a requirement, but only 26-28% actually have the tools in place to accomplish those goals. The latter may look like a discouraging figure, but Heineken senior media director Ron Amram sees […]
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Purch Lands $135 Million To Fund A Shopping Spree
Commerce-focused publisher Purch has raised a big $135 million round, money it aims to spend on potential media acquisitions outside its established B2C and B2B tech verticals. Some of the money will also support an ad tech expansion, including heightened analytics capabilities. “Investors don’t like money in the bank,” said CEO Greg Mason. “We want to […]
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Why Brick-And-Mortar Is The Next Great Data Reservoir
Retailers might look like they’re under siege, according to Gartner VP and analyst Andrew Frank, but they’re actually sitting on a pile of “underleveraged data.” Unfortunately, much of this data isn’t digestible by marketing technologists. In February, The University of Minnesota published a report demonstrating the causal relationship between search engine advertising and local in-store […]
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Ad Blocking Set To Decimate Mobile? Not So Fast
A series of developments over the past week have given rise to a narrative that mobile ad blocking represents a large new threat to publisher revenues. Two mobile ad-blocking products had their debut: one from category leader Eyeo, which produces the Adblock Plus (ABP) software, and another from Shine, an Israeli company with a cybersecurity […]
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Not Always About The Money: Overstock Builds Products To Drive Loyalty, Not Revenue
Most people think of Overstock.com solely as a discount ecommerce retailer, which is no surprise considering the company ranks No. 31 in Internet Retailer’s recent list of the nation’s biggest e-tailers. But Overstock also features a range of services beyond ecommerce that aren’t intended to be revenue generators, but are instead designed to turn general […]
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Centro Lands $30 Million Series B Funding Round
Centro, which sells media management software, revealed $30 million in Series B funding on Wednesday. Neuberger Berman Private Equity Funds is the sole investor in this round, joining FTV Capital, which led a $22.5 million Series A round in 2010. Founded in 2001, Centro initially focused on automating the guaranteed aspects of digital advertising, such […]
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BidSwitch Feature Aims To Open Up Native Supply
BidSwitch on Monday announced a feature for its API that will incorporate the OpenRTB2.3 standards, opening up new sources of native supply and, according to BidSwitch GM Bob Walczak, “[enabling] a much higher degree of innovation and efficiency in the native market.” BidSwitch’s value proposition is its ability to integrate once and then connect with […]
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Demanding More From DSPs And Publishers On Native Adoption
Even as marketers increasingly see native programmatic as a part of the core digital arsenal – alongside video, display and mobile – industry leaders like Sharethrough have encountered a lag in adoption from major DSPs. Part of the problem is that the existence of technology solutions hasn’t had a chance to sink in with brands […]
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Why Verizon Shouldn’t Sell The Huffington Post Unit – And Why It Should
As the media and tech worlds absorb news of Verizon’s planned acquisition of AOL, the largest unanswered question revolves around the fate of The Huffington Post Media Group, a unit that includes the eponymous publication as well as TechCrunch, Engadget and others. While Re/code’s Kara Swisher reported “advanced discussions” for AOL to sell its flagship media […]
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Breaking Through The Attribution Canopy
One year after the acquisitions of Adometry and Convertro by Google and AOL respectively, new breeds of attribution vendors are surfacing from periods of R&D hibernation, and they’re aiming to capitalize on what they and other observers see as openings in the market. The optimism comes from the belief that advertisers won’t pay for attribution […]