Programmatic ad network Rocket Fuel will acquire [x+1], an older ad tech company with a dual demand-side platform (DSP) and data-management platform (DMP) offering. The estimated value of the deal is $230 million. The acquisition brings Rocket Fuel a strong direct-to-advertiser capability – an area where it is seen as lacking and where [x+1] has strength through client relationships with […]
Popular audio-recognition app Shazam, which has amassed 475 million users to date, set its sights on TV Tuesday with the release of a network sales platform called Resonate. Initial launch partners include: A&E, AMC, FUSE and dick clark productions. Kevin McGurn, the company’s chief revenue officer and former SVP of sales for Hulu, said television […]
Scout Media is pulling together an A-team of digital talent in the wake of founder James Heckman’s repurchase of the business from Fox/News Corp. The new leadership, including Ross Levinsohn as executive chairman and Ramsey McGrory as EVP of programmatic and media partnerships, will help build Scout into a larger content and commerce play with programmatic […]
LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner confirmed the social network wants to enable customers to prospect and nurture leads well beyond its own walled garden during the company’s Q2 call Thursday, though he stopped short of calling it an ad network. “As big a network as LinkedIn is – and they’re adding exponential numbers of people everyday […]
Professional social networking platform LinkedIn on Thursday posted Q2 revenue of $534 million, a 47% YoY increase from $364 million. Marketing Solutions revenue, now 20% of LinkedIn’s total business, was $101 million for the second quarter, a 44% uptick from last year. Talent Solutions and Premium Subscriptions account for 60% and 20% of revenue, respectively. LinkedIn […]
Updated with additional comment from SpotXchange CEO Mike Shehan and RTL. European entertainment network RTL Group announced Thursday it will acquire a 65% stake worth $144 million in video supply-side platform and programmatic marketplace SpotXchange. Depending on the performance of the company, RTL could acquire additional stake in the company through the terms of an earn-out […]
Like many publishers, The Washington Post’s Kelly Andresen grapples with success metrics for native advertising campaigns. As director of ad innovations and product strategy, she has a front-row seat on her publication’s digital evolution and oversees teams that are dedicated to creating new digital advertising revenue, including native. “When you move into content marketing, it’s […]
“Marketer’s Note” is a regular column informing marketers about the rapidly evolving, digital marketing technology ecosystem. This week it is written by Lizzie Komar, Associate Analyst, AdExchanger Research. Over the past few weeks, I began conducting research for my upcoming report, “Defining PII,” a title that is proving overly simplistic, perhaps, as PII (or personally identifiable […]
Horizon Media, the largest standalone media agency in the US with some $4.5 billion in ad spend across 100 clients, has not been a major participant in the programmatic trend. But that may be changing. Horizon is rolling out a programmatic division, dubbed HX, to handle its machine-driven ad buys for clients. The initiative, supported […]
What’s the hottest new digital toy? If you’re Facebook and Twitter, it’s the buy button. To recap: Facebook published a blog post explaining its experimentation with a buy button – currently with select small and medium-sized businesses – with which users can purchase goods directly through the Facebook platform. This announcement followed Twitter’s own dalliance with […]
Yahoo has doubled down on its mobile bet, agreeing to buy mobile analytics and advertising company Flurry. What does that mean for a company that less than a week ago reported disappointing earnings as it struggled with declining CPMs? A company that’s not yet even breaking out its mobile revenue in its earning statements, while […]
What does Yahoo’s deal to buy Flurry have to do with Twitter’s purchase of mobile exchange MoPub last year? Nothing and everything. But first, let’s define our terms. What is Flurry, exactly? Flurry has a grab bag of solutions under its umbrella: analytics, ad network capabilities and ad exchange functions. But at its core, Flurry […]
LinkedIn will buy Bizo, a B2B display ad platform, for $175 million in cash and stock, the companies said Tuesday. “It’s exciting for us to bring Bizo’s expertise and technology into our ecosystem,” said Deep Nishar, LinkedIn’s SVP of product and user experience, in a statement. “Our ability to integrate their B2B solutions with our content marketing […]
Just a week after Yahoo’s Q2 earnings call, in which CEO Marissa Mayer said she was looking to position Yahoo as a “mobile-first company,” the M&A bug has hit again: Yahoo is acquiring mobile analytics platform and ad marketplace Flurry. Publishers sell their ad inventory through Flurry’s platform or buy traffic from applications, which also provides analytics to […]
Updated with comments from Brett Wilson, TubeMogul’s CEO Video demand-side platform (DSP) TubeMogul ($TUBE) made its NASDAQ debut Friday. While its share price was projected at only the $7 to $8 range – below previous predictions of $10 to $11 – within only an hour of trading, TubeMogul’s share price increased to $9.84. At the top of the hour, the company […]
Nikesh Arora, Google’s SVP and chief business officer, will be leaving the company after a decade, according to the company’s earnings press release. He’ll join Japanese telecommunications and internet company SoftBank, where he’ll be vice chairman of SoftBank Corp. and CEO of SoftBank Internet and Media. Omid Kordestani, a senior adviser to the CEO and one of […]
Kevin Akeroyd, SVP and GM of the Oracle Marketing Cloud, warned a crowd of 1,500 marketers Wednesday to “beware false marketing clouds.” All jokes aside, Akeroyd did not mince words about competitors’ perceived strengths at the Oracle Marketing Cloud Interact 2014 event in San Francisco. “It’s not just web analytics and it’s not going to come […]
In its second quarter, Yahoo sold 24% more ads compared to the second quarter of 2013, and yet the price per ad went down 24%, suggesting the company has been unable to stem the tide against declining CPMs. (Read the press release.) CEO Marissa Mayer expressed disappointment in the company’s display ad performance. “Our top priority is […]
A recent article by New York Times media columnist David Carr revealed a radical publishing technology catching on in news media companies everywhere: email newsletters. Carr wrote that email is a marketing tool many people tend to forget about. But, he argued, email is the most consistent and useful medium for advertising. Email and search drive […]
“Marketer’s Note” is a weekly column informing marketers about the rapidly evolving, digital marketing technology ecosystem. It is written by Joanna O’Connell, Director of Research, AdExchanger Research. Last week, I had a wonderful conversation with an interactive lead at an independent agency as part of my ongoing “When and How to Take Programmatic In-House” research […]
There’s a digital ad fraud outbreak – one that gobbles up roughly $14 billion in advertising spend and between 25 and 50% of ad spend per campaign. White Ops CEO and cofounder Michael Tiffany likens the landscape to a cholera outbreak. Bots cause their devastation in a certain corner of the web and move on. White […]
Walmart’s widely revered as a retail maven, but media buyer? It’s a brand-new capability for the $473-billion company, which on Friday revealed more details about the digital marketing platform it’s developed, the Walmart Exchange (WMX). Like Amazon, which has turned massive amounts of shopper data into monetization opportunities for brands via Amazon Media Group’s demand-side […]
“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 Jean-Baptiste Rudelle, CEO and co-founder at Criteo. Return on investment (ROI) is the only thing that matters for an advertiser: How much return am I really getting for my money? […]
Remember the scene in the movie “Kill Bill, Vol. 2“ where the vengeful heroine, the Bride, is buried alive in a coffin and has to pound her way out with her bare fists? That’s your video ad. It’s essentially trapped in a box and buried in the publisher’s web page, and whether it can get out […]
“Marketer’s Note” is a regular column informing marketers about the rapidly evolving, digital marketing technology ecosystem. It is written by Joanna O’Connell, Director of Research, AdExchanger Research. So many fascinating questions, trends and technologies to research, so little time! Thankfully, I’ve now got some help. I’m pleased to announce that Lizzie Komar has joined the AdExchanger Research […]
Video demand-side platform (DSP) TubeMogul has updated the S-1 it filed in March, saying it will sell 7,187,500 shares at a suggested offering price of $13 per share. Read the S-1. TubeMogul hopes to raise $93 million and will now take this offer to potential IPO investors – “the roadshow” – prior to the company going public. […]
Missing in the Media Rating Council’s (MRC) definition of in-browser video viewability (50% in view, playing for two consecutive seconds) is any stipulation around audibility. This isn’t an oversight – the MRC chose not to institute an audibility requirement because the technology doesn’t exist to determine muting in all instances, said David Gunzerath, SVP and […]
Facebook has agreed to buy video ad platform LiveRail, the companies said today. The acquisition will build Facebook’s capabilities around video, both on its own platform and on those of other publishers. LiveRail customers include Major League Baseball (MLB.com), A&E Networks, Gannett and Dailymotion, giving Facebook its first video ad server integration with premium video owners. Terms of the deal weren’t […]
PubMatic had a good spring. The company won top honors in Forrester’s sell-side platform shoot-out, acquired a mobile ad server (Mocean Mobile) and hired up to support its product initiatives around programmatic direct. The macro strategy, according to CEO Rajeev Goel, is to provide a full stack spanning all publisher ad revenue. That means guaranteed […]
“Marketer’s Note” is a regular column informing marketers about the rapidly evolving, digital marketing technology ecosystem. It is written by Joanna O’Connell, Director of Research, AdExchanger Research. Call me naïve but I believe in the open exchange model. I always have. Something about the battle of wits it promises always spoke to me: The buyer who actively […]
