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 Programmatic Is Bringing Back B2B
Many industry analysts expect B2B media marketing budgets to finally reach pre-recession levels by the end of 2015, following a drop-off in 2009 that removed almost one out of every $5 spent on B2B outlets. And those revenue streams are migrating to programmatic technology and new native strategies to develop brand awareness. One of the […]
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Shopper Behavior Begins In-Store – But Brick-And-Mortars Need Tech To Harness It
A few years ago, industry observers wondered if retailers would survive in the face of ecommerce competition. Now it’s become apparent that brick-and-mortar companies have not only weathered the storm, they’ve emerged as a kind technology platform for vendors to build on. But despite numerous startups catering to retailers, there aren’t any major players like […]
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Why Live Nation Thinks Programmatic Can Take Over The Concert And Festival Scene
A year after embracing programmatic technology, Live Nation is planning another major expansion of its ad tech capabilities, this time by connecting its many online and offline properties into a holistic marketing platform. With its “Fan Connect programmatic platform,” the entertainment company is continuing its evolution into a “digital publisher” – not in the sense […]
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Site Redesigns Feed Native Opportunities
The IAB’s native advertising working group is building out recommendations that specifically address the promulgation of feeds. The group, which developed the OpenRTB 2.3 native formats, is narrowing recommendations into three categories: social feeds, news feeds and product feeds. Its focus on feeds indicates an ongoing trend in which traditional website layout, which has tended […]
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The Message Is Clear: Emoji Are Here To Stay
Messaging apps now attract just as many users as social media platforms. The combined users of Viber, WeChat, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger now outrank Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram, according to recent BI Intelligence research. But marketers have struggled to tap into that audience. Emojis might be a brand’s way in. “Emojis have become for […]
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Yieldify Picks Up $11.5 Million In Funding To Convert Online Window Shoppers
Yieldify is trying to solve what CEO and co-founder Jay Radia calls “a trillion-dollar problem” – which is part of why the company has been able to attract such big-name investors. The London-based startup announced an $11.5 million Series A funding round on Thursday led by Google Ventures and SoftBank Capital. At the moment, conversions on […]
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For Global Advertisers, All Roads Lead To Mobile
IPG’s MAGNA GLOBAL and Publicis Groupe’s ZenithOptimedia released global advertising forecasts Monday, both noting that, in very distinct ways, mobile propels the world’s advertising industry. MAGNA predicted mobile will go from 30% of all digital advertising to 55% by 2019, with a 53% increase this year – crossing the symbolic $50 billion mark. ZenithOptimedia similarly […]
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Why Cyber Security Experts Are Taking Aim At Sourced Traffic
The mistaken belief that there’s an infinite supply of targetable inventory on the Internet keeps fraud viable. That’s a key takeaway from a presentation last Thursday by Videology and White Ops at Videology’s New York City office, following a partnership between the two companies in May. “Online ad spending spikes up in November and December,” […]
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Affiliate Linking And Data Collection: When Revenue Isn’t The Value
While affiliate marketing is hardly new – perhaps you’ve heard of Google and Amazon – for some publishers its real value comes from the data and optimization it enables, as opposed to the incremental revenue it generates. At least, this is what Alicia Navarro, CEO and co-founder of content monetization company Skimlinks, was led to […]
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How The Slow-Rolling HTML5 Is Outpacing Flash
Steve Jobs’ notorious open letter “Thoughts on Flash,” published in 2010, was considered the final nail in the coffin for its status as the go-to software for web and mobile development. But like the Internet’s most powerful zombie, Flash has continued to play a prominent role for developers and ad builders. HTML5, the solution listed […]
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Political Ad Tech Is Growing Up, And Growing Claws
In the insulated world of political tech, market forces are insignificant compared to the capricious political winds. Imagine, for instance, if Pepsi had to let go of a significant chunk of its engineering talent if it was outsold by Coke at the end of a four-year period. This is a practical concern for political tech […]
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How Ecommerce Bazaars Are Supporting Traditional Businesses
Macy’s, Walmart, Best Buy: all brick-and-mortar giants looking to go multichannel. But what about the smaller shop owners that don’t have the resources to invest in and maintain digital presences? Many young ecommerce providers are aggregating small businesses into a single, online bazaar. If you’re an independent retailer, these service providers can give you the […]
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One Year After Acquisitions, Attribution Gets A Second Wind
As more brands introduce attribution technology – or push their agencies to do the same – basic models and applications on the vendor side are expanding. Initial players in the space, such as Adometry and Visual IQ, still focus on enterprise clients. Meanwhile, a newer breed of attribution tech is aiming more for a white-label […]
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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 […]
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Google Declares War On Toolbar Ad Injectors
Google on Wednesday released research conducted in partnership with teams at UC Berkeley, UC Santa Barbara and other institutions that details the harm ad injections from toolbars create for consumers, publishers and advertisers. Google and its university partners identified millions of cases of ad injections by tracking the pipeline of users who have foreign software […]
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Publishers Push Into Commerce
The recent announcement from Condé Nast that Style.com, once the digital home of Vogue, will be relaunched as a pure ecommerce destination is yet another sign of the blurred lines between publishing and ecommerce. Many editorial outlets seek to tap their valuable readership beyond advertising. Monocle, which has had ecommerce offerings since its 2007 founding […]
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Blazing The Out-Of-Home Trail
When digital jukebox maker TouchTunes rolled out Attract Media (“a digital-out-of-home activation platform”) last week, the focus was predominantly on direct sales. Michael Coppola, the company’s VP of media and advertising, pointed out that while the capabilities exist for automated ad serving, “We expect a vast majority of the advertising to remain direct … with a […]
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Google Reports $17.3B In Q1 Revenue, 12% YoY Growth
Google’s Q1 2015 earnings report continued a trend that’s more than three years old: declining CPC value, offset by the rising number of total paid clicks. The number of users clicking on a Google ad was up 13% year over year, though analysts were expecting that number to be slightly higher. Google CFO Patrick Pichette, who […]
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Advanced Attribution: How IHG Became An Early Adopter
Marketers are seizing upon advanced attribution models as a way to rationalize their data and divvy up credit. InterContinental Hotels Group (IHG), one of the world’s largest hoteliers, is an ideal example of where and how advanced attribution methods are taking hold. David Schmitt, director of interactive marketing operations and analytics for IHG, recently partnered […]
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DC Ad Budgets: A Tempting Carrot But A Harsh Stick
In 2012, Barack Obama’s and Mitt Romney’s campaigns spent almost $80 million combined on online advertisements leading up to the election. And that total was in turn dwarfed by the amount that was channeled through digital by super PACs, whose expenditures are more difficult to track with precision. While those fundraising totals may have bowled […]
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Luxury Heritage Brands De-age With Digital
Luxury brands used to benefit from their heritage. But nowadays “you have to reach an audience that may not have inherited that sense of legacy,” said Moet Hennessy digital director Jessica Holthaus at a Tuesday panel hosted by German publisher Axel Springer, WatchTime magazine and Martini Media. Holthaus said online video is a crucial part […]