Platforms

“Data Driven Thinking” is written by members of the media community and contains fresh ideas on the digital revolution in media. Today’s column is written by Ramsey McGrory, CEO at AddThis. The formula used to be simple: In order to drive a transaction, you needed a combination of compelling creative and a clear message delivered […]

Fashion retail chain Forever 21 is in the midst of an online marketing remake and mobile is a pillar of its strategy. Gerard Florendo, who joined Forever 21 as manager of online marketing and Web analytics in April, was tasked with deploying up-to-date tools and scaling their respective reach alongside the brand’s new head of […]

Mobile advertising is still emerging as a category but the vendor landscape is already crowded with platforms offering overlapping feature sets. As mobile ad networks, data management platforms, targeting firms and other technologies continue to pile up, drawing a clear line between these services and guarding against conflicts of interest is getting harder, according to […]

In Facebook’s last earnings call, Sheryl Sandberg surprised some by saying the Facebook Exchange “is actually a very small part of our business.” That may be changing, as the company pushes more ad space into its RTB marketplace — and there are signs mobile News Feed inventory is waiting in the programmatic wings. “We believe FBX […]

Twitter’s acquisition of mobile supply-side platform MoPub this week could pave the way for more activity and something close to standard business models in the nascent mobile exchange space. Established desktop exchange players like the Rubicon Project and PubMatic, which have expansive networks on the sell side, have struggled to retrofit their existing platforms to […]

Digital ad veteran Brian McAndrews has been named chairman, president and CEO of streaming music service  Pandora. He replaced Joe Kennedy, who announced his intention to retire in March. (Read the release.) McAndrews built one of the first digital agency networks at aQuantive, where beginning in 1999 he began rolling up firms including Razorfish, Avenue […]

Despite the recent flurry of mobile acquisitions, marketers are still somewhat in the dark when it comes to defining objectives for their mobile campaigns and deploying analytics tools to help them measure cross-channel reach, one study suggests. In a survey of agencies, vendors and 228 marketing professionals, the study by Forrester Research determined that 37% […]

Twitter’s acquisition of mobile ad exchange MoPub came within two weeks of its acquisition of social TV analytics Trendrr and the wide release of lead-generation cards. These staccato moves, according to one Twitter Ads API partner company, are exactly what Twitter needs to counter Facebook’s aggressive pipeline of ad products. “They’re doing a nice job […]

Scale continues to be one of the most challenging aspects of native advertising, and a growing number of companies are working to solve it. As advertisers look for solutions, a number of trends are beginning to emerge, according to a new report from the research firm Altimeter Group. “We’re seeing two fundamental ways that the […]

Twitter’s acquisition of mobile ad exchange MoPub adds a new layer to its strategy. In addition to selling native ad units, Twitter will become a seller of standardized mobile ads as well — perhaps with its own user data thrown into the mix. “Buying MoPub reclassifies Twitter beyond a social platform, or even a broadcast […]

Twitter has acquired MoPub, which provides ad management services to thousands of mobile publishers. The move gives Twitter considerable advertising reach in mobile, including real-time bidding inventory through MoPub’s Marketplace mobile ad exchange. Kevin Weil, Twitter’s VP of Product for Revenue, wrote in a blog post: “The two major trends in the ad world right […]

Independently owned-and-operated outdoor specialty retailer Rock/Creek  has realized early return as one of Twitter’s early beta advertisers. The brand was founded 25 years ago as a Chattanooga-based canoeing company. It operates five standalone stores in addition to an ecommerce platform, but has yet to mobile-optimize its site. Fifty-one percent of retailers cited this very optimization […]

Amobee, a mobile advertising company that was acquired by Singapore-based telecom SingTel last year, has bought Gradient X, a Los Angeles-based startup that offers a real-time bidding platform for mobile ads. Gradient X will provide Amobee with a real-time bidding functionality for various ad channels and formats, such as video and HTML5, as well as […]

AOL and Yahoo – so different, right? Well, not exactly, but they have less in common than they once did. Here’s a crackpot theory for you: The companies are taking different paths in preparation for an eventual megamerger of the sort that was discussed, and then scrapped, back in 2011. Now we’re deep in speculative […]

Ned Brody can officially join Yahoo as SVP for the Americas, five months after resigning his post as CEO of AOL Networks, the unit that houses the company’s ad-tech properties. Brody had been constrained from heading to Yahoo by a noncompete clause, which could have kept him from starting the job until April 2014. But […]

Tapping into second-screen viewing and related search habits is the new black. Facebook confirmed Friday it is testing “trending topics” in the news feed after rolling out a hashtags feature, according to The Wall Street Journal. Apple and, especially, Twitter have made notable moves in the space. But, for all of the interest, the fact […]

Founded six years ago by three former Yahoo engineers, social commerce community portal Polyvore has amassed 80 million product boards or “sets” since inception. To date, the company has raised more than $22 million in funding from Benchmark Capital and others, and now feeds 7.5 billion product impressions per month to brand and retail clients […]

With its 6.3-inch screen, it is easy to mistake the new Samsung Galaxy Mega smartphone for a tablet. It isn’t even the largest smartphone — the Sony Xperia Z Ultra has a 6.4-inch screen. As the gap between smartphones and tablets shrinks, combined with the growing hype around wearable devices, the demand for tablets is […]

Twitter has opened up Lead Generation cards to all advertisers after a limited release earlier this May. Twitter appears to be after direct-response advertising. Writing in a blog post, Twitter product manager Tarun Jain described the Lead Gen cards as “a streamlined tool to help advertisers find and connect off-Twitter with users interested in their message.” […]

Relying on ads to monetize a kids’ mobile app comes with a minefield of rules and restrictions. Apple, for example, requires app developers to avoid any behavioral advertising, ask for parental permission for in-app purchases and include a privacy policy. Developers also must get parental consent before collecting personal information like phone numbers and email […]

Twitter’s wading deeper into the TV pool. The end goal? Unlock more viewer data to balance the scale on social engagement and determine the opportune time to push paid media promotions. With its latest acquisition of real-time social data analytics platform Trendrr, which is used by a range of media companies and TV networks such […]

While Yahoo has lately focused on buying and rolling out consumer-facing products, the Sunnyvale company also has ambitions around advertising. It drew attention to them yesterday, unveiling plans to add its Stream Ads format to several properties. Yahoo first introduced Stream Ads, which it refers to as a native ad format, to its homepages in […]

LifeStreet, an in-app advertising platform that claims to have more than 3,500 Facebook developers using its product, is going after a bigger slice of mobile with its new self-service publisher portal. The portal, which was launched today, is an extension of the company’s current portal that is used by Facebook app developers to publish display […]

Facebook is investing heavily in measurement products to help prove out the value of its ads. Its offline conversion tracking on behalf of CPG marketers is perhaps the key example of this. In one indicator of that program’s importance, the company recently promoted Fred Leach, who helped develop it, to head R&D measurement and partnerships across verticals. […]

Pinterest has always been a little different than the rest of the social pack –primarily because pinned products means pinned intent. The platform is inherently commercial. When Pinterest debuted price alerts in early August, it appeared to be a move on the visual social network’s part to help retailers reactivate purchase intent based on items […]

Hotels.com estimates more than one in five transactions on its platform occur through mobile devices, representing a growing area investment for a predominant player in online travel booking. “We can always do better from a brand recognition standpoint,” commented Steven Quach, director of online marketing for Hotels.com. “Anywhere we can find pops of growth that […]

With its new partnership with a number of TV media sellers, announced yesterday, Interpublic Group has begun to make good on its pledge earlier this year to “automate” 50% of media. The use of “automation” here is perhaps a bit misleading however, since what IPG is really trying to solve is a workflow problem – […]

Location data is often touted as the key to unlocking the targeting opportunities in mobile ads. How to best leverage location data varies by company, however. For JiWire—a 10-year-old firm that started out as a Wi-Fi hotspot provider—the answer lies in layering data over customized audience segments. AdExchanger talked to JiWire President David Staas. AdExchanger: […]

It’s a frenzied IPO season in the ad tech space. Despite the tepid reaction of investors to public offerings by Tremor and YuMe, companies like Rocket Fuel aren’t showing signs of cold feet. True, it helps to have a set of impressive financials, which Rocket Fuel submitted to the SEC last week. The Redwood City, […]

Google is ramping up its focus on online gaming by bringing its video ad-skipping tool TrueView to the space. In doing so, Google is making good on a promise Susan Wojcicki, SVP of advertising, made back in February at the IAB Annual Meeting to expand the use of TrueView, which the company sees as a […]