Apple CEO Tim Cook might have called iAd a “very small part” of the company’s business in the past, but Apple is starting to take programmatic seriously and the partners are piling up. Following Wednesday’s announcement of Rubicon partnering with iAd on the demand side, seven more names are officially on the list: Tapsense, The Trade Desk, […]
Drawbridge sees itself as the democratizer of cross-device identity. “We’re the folks that provide cross-device connectivity for inventory that isn’t on Facebook and we do it without PII,” said Nimeshh Patel, Drawbridge’s VP of Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Headquartered in San Mateo, Calif., Drawbridge – whose technology analyzes various non-personally identifiable data points, […]
Apple’s iAd inventory will be available programmatically through open exchanges. Rubicon Project is one of “several advertising technology companies” that will be selling the inventory, according to a press release. MediaMath is among the other partners, according to an AdExchanger source. iAd hasn’t been a star for Apple so far. “This partnership means that Apple […]
App developers are test-obsessed. They don’t spend a dime without knowing how it’ll turn out. That could be part of the reason why they haven’t done much spending on in-app mobile YouTube pre-roll. Until recently, Google Analytics provided developers with feedback on things like rate of install, AdWords performance, how often an app is opened, […]
Popular messenger app Kik, which hosts a colossal 185 million users, revealed it had snapped up GIF messaging firm Relay on Wednesday for an undisclosed sum. Additionally, the company secured a $38.3 million round of Series C funding, which it will use to invest in new-product development and expand its engineering and business-development teams. Relay […]
Adobe’s having a good couple of months. Following Forrester’s high ranking of Adobe’s enterprise marketing suite last month, the software company unveiled a series of mobile enhancements to the Adobe Marketing Cloud on Tuesday. Adobe customers can now tap into in-app messaging capabilities and send personalized follow-up emails and other messages based on a consumer’s […]
At Pandora, the watchword is “engagement.” “At a certain point, it’s not how many people you bring to your product, it’s about how much engagement you see, and for us, engagement means time spent,” said Heidi Browning, SVP of strategic solutions at Pandora. The same sentiment was expressed by Pandora CEO Brian McAndrews during the […]
Engagement metrics are all well and good, but before someone can be engaged by an ad, that person has to be able to see it. And with more time and money shifting over to mobile, the viewability debate is heating up there. “Viewability is the first step towards engagement, and we’re starting at the front […]
On election night, ABC News wanted to engage users with breaking news via its app, but it didn’t want to overwhelm them. Among its updates, ABC News wanted to point users to video content. For the ABC News mobile app, pre-roll video ads drive the most revenue. Thanks to ABC Unified, which sells TV and […]
Online sales during China’s annual discount event topped $9 billion this year, once again thrusting the country into the spotlight as a commerce powerhouse, and not by a little bit. Singles Day, which was originally created in the late ’90s by a group of Chinese college students celebrating their singleton status, falls on Nov. 11 […]
The mobile value proposition of a company like Facebook or Google is fairly straightforward: Download the free app and it’ll let you converse with your friends or give you directions to help you get where you’re going. In return, you allow yourself to be tracked for advertising purposes. “For carriers, the story is not as […]
Like last quarter, Millennial Media’s revenue is up – and profits are down. The mobile ad tech platform, which has been vocal about it’s desire to expand its programmatic capabilities, is clearly still in a period of transition. Though Millennial Media clocked a 24.4% YoY increase in revenue in Q3 2014 to $69.8 million, the […]
Kik, a messaging app geared toward millennials , is diving deeper into native advertising with a feature, released Thursday, dubbed Keywords. The app, which originated in 2009 and has about 150 million users, first brought brands into the fold in August, with the launch of Promoted Chats. “The concept with Promoted Chats was to give […]
However one feels about the merits of FarmVille, it’s undeniable that the game’s creators know a thing or two about app monetization. To that end, Red Hot Labs – a game dev startup founded by the team that created back-in-the-day blockbusters FarmVille and CityVille – released Toro on Wednesday, a new tool aimed at helping […]
Sometimes, a standalone app might be more trouble than it’s worth – especially if we’re talking about a branded game as part of a single activation. For WWE Studios, a subsidiary of World Wrestling Entertainment that focuses on film development and production, that proved to be the case for “Road to Wrestlemania,” its first-ever mobile […]
Mobile ad targeting start-up PlaceIQ is prepping to enter its next phase – or as Nadya Kohl, the company’s new SVP of business development, says, it’s about to enter adolescence. This is where Kohl – who started the job on October 20 and who previously drove global strategy and business development for Experian Marketing Services […]
Pandora’s Q3 mobile ad revenue had president and CEO Brian McAndrews singing from the rooftops – but the singing stopped when he got to the verse about monthly active users (MAUs). Total revenue for the quarter clocked in at nearly $240 million, a 42% YoY increase. A whopping $188 million of that sum is mobile ad […]
Here’s a potential new acronym for you: MOOH – that’s to say, mobile out-of-home. Digital OOH programmatic player Vistar Media launched an extension of its cross-screen offering Wednesday via a partnership with AirSage, a little-known Atlanta-based company that collects data on consumer location and population movement. AirSage captures and analyzes in the neighborhood of 15 […]
You’re walking down the shoe aisle of your favorite department store. You’re browsing. You’re probably thinking to yourself, “Do I really need another pair of shoes?” Your phone buzzes. You take it out of your pocket to find a push notification from a shoe brand with a discount offer. It’s a brand you like. You […]
When Apple CEO Tim Cook took the stage in Cupertino last month and unveiled Apple Pay, it was game on for many in the mobile payments industry. While Apple’s embrace of mobile payments doesn’t mean retailers immediately need to outfit every point-of-sale system with an NFC reader, megacompanies like Disney, Macy’s, Panera, Sephora, Starbucks, Walgreens […]
In the two years since GPS solutions provider Telenav acquired hyperlocal ad platform Thinknear, there’s been minimal technology integration between the two companies. But that’s all part of the strategic plan, Telenav vet Loren Hillberg told AdExchanger. Hillberg, who most recently served as VP and general counsel at Telenav, a public company, announced Tuesday that […]
Mobile app analytics just got a bit meatier with the release of expanded functionality within Adobe Marketing Cloud’s Analytics application. The product includes enhanced support for beacons, app acquisition analytics, customer lifetime value (LTV) reports and what Adobe is referring to as retention analysis – the ability to track and understand how newly acquired customers […]
National Public Radio (NPR) faces a common audio app-publisher predicament – capturing the time and attention of ultra-mobile listeners. About 78% of ads and content promos are served while an app is running in the background and the screen is dark, which makes it challenging for advertisers to know if their ads were seen, said […]
In a reprise of their recent startup adventure, former Sociomantic CEO and Admeld exec Jason Kelly will become “President of the Company’s Managed Media” as Millennial CEO Michael Barrett looks to re-create the programmatic magic of his Admeld days which led to an eventual acquisition by Google. From today’s release (see it): “Reporting to CEO and President Michael Barrett, Kelly will […]
Google’s betting the industry needs a hand making ads workable across devices. On Monday, it unwrapped two mobile display formats and a handful of desktop tools that aim to help advertisers optimize ads across multiple screens. Google will release the tools piecemeal over the coming months across the Google Display Network, the AdMob Network and […]
Mobile analytics and marketing platform Upsight (formerly Kontagent/PlayHaven) is divesting itself of the mobile ad network side of its business in the name of neutrality and simplification. Upsight – which got into a little hot water with Facebook earlier this year for failing to honor certain policies around data retention and disclosure – is selling the […]
Mobile ad platform Millennial Media is buying up mobile exchange Nexage and the message to agencies seems fairly clear: We want to be your everything. Announced Tuesday, the $107.5 million deal, a mixture of cash and stock, is expected to close in Q4. The tech integration will start in earnest in the new year. With […]
A chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Put another way, mobile links that don’t link directly to specific in-app content are pretty weak. Deep-linking tech provider Branch Metrics revealed it’s received $3 million in seed funding Tuesday led by New Enterprise Associates, the majority of which it plans to use to build […]
Millennial Media needed a good story around programmatic, and now it has one. The publicly traded mobile ad tech platform has signed an agreement to buy mobile exchange player Nexage for $107.5 million in cash and stock. The deal enhances Millennial’s credentials as an independent programmatic platform connecting advertisers with mobile supply sources, including app […]
Marketers generally react to Yo, the one-touch messaging app, with bemused dismissal. Its sole function lets users ping each other with a single “Yo,” the simplicity of which has sparked no shortage of skepticism. But no one took Snapchat seriously when it surfaced, and the ephemeral photo messaging platform is now valued at a behemoth […]
