Technology

WPP Group has shared some new details on revenue performance and strategy for its Xaxis trading unit. Xaxis grew its revenue by 28% during the first quarter, said Pivotal Research Analyst Brian Wieser in a research note. WPP had previously stated the business had 2012 media billings of $270 million and a headcount of 200. […]

Google’s offering in the ad viewability space has scored third-party accreditation from the Media Ratings Council. Google joins others who have wended through the MRC’s approval process – the respective viewability products from comScore, Double Verify and RealVu have been approved – so Google does not stand alone. But given its expansive relationship with marketers, […]

Using customer data to personalize or optimize individuals’ website experiences can increase conversion and customer satisfaction, yet a majority of digital marketing professionals do not prioritize it, according to two recent studies from Adobe and Econsultancy. As marketers leverage more digital tools, turning to real-time behavioral and existing customer data helps segment website visitors and […]

The New York Times Co. CFO Jim Follo reiterated a point he’s been making on earnings calls since last year, namely that “premium” digital advertising continues to be challenged by the rise of audience targeting and the infinite amount of digital inventory generated by social media. Read the release. During the Q1 earnings call, Mark […]

“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 John Ramey, CEO of isocket.  At the AdExchanger Programmatic I/O conference in San Francisco last week, while people schmoozed at the rooftop after-party, an unofficial meeting was held down the […]

MailOnline’s site is an endless broadsheet of breaking news, tabloid gossip and tawdry thrills (pictured: the money a stripper makes in just ONE shift – and it’s more than most people make in a month). Some might consider this publishing format tailor-made for real-time bidding. But the site, which has its own dedicated editorial and […]

Salesforce.com introduced today a new addition to its Marketing Cloud – Social.com, which allows marketers to apply their CRM and social listening data to their social ad campaigns. Creating targeted ads, marketers frequently run into the “silo issue” of being unable to connect their various customer data sources, noted Gordon Evans, VP of marketing at Salesforce.com. […]

It’s been almost a year since Microsoft first pledged to default-enable Do Not Track in Internet Explorer 10, setting off an urgent debate about the future of third-party ad tracking which continues to this day. The company has endured attacks both withering (“paternalistic,” said Evidon) and mild (“absolutely not helpful,” offered IAB CEO Randall Rothenberg), […]

Last week, Ford Motors kicked off its latest long-term ad campaign, dubbed “And Not Or,” with a theme that could also apply to its digital strategy. The spots, which began running on TV and have heavy online video components, touch on concepts that people expect to naturally go together; consumers are asked to choose between […]

Minneapolis’ Star Tribune has been a relatively early and aggressive adopter of programmatic ad sales. The newspaper site has just finished a re-installation of Google DoubleClick’s DFP system as part of a wider effort to expand its own Advantage program, which covers real-time biddable inventory and targeting. The basic promise of Star Trib’s Advantage is […]

Google is pushing even more “premium” and direct-negotiated media deals through its programmatic pipes. This week it added a new sell-side Private Auction bid type to DoubleClick Ad Exchange. Google calls this an evolution of Preferred Deals, first offered last year as a means for publishers to negotiate direct deals with buyers and then transact […]

And the results are in! According to its Q1 2013 results, the GOOG made about $3.5 billion in profits, depending on your accounting principles. Get the release here. From the release: “Google Revenues (advertising and other) – Google revenues were $12.95 billion, or 93% of consolidated revenues, in the first quarter of 2013, representing a 22% […]

Epsilon, a data-focused direct marketing company, is seeing continued growth not from its data or technology businesses but from its agency side, after acquiring digital ad agency Hyper Marketing Inc. (HMI) in late 2012. The companies focused on integration during the first quarter, said Charles Horn, CFO and EVP of Alliance Data Systems Corporation, Epsilon’s […]

Last October, European social gamer Spil Games began shifting away from direct sales to completely programmatic by automating ad buys across its 46 local gaming sites network. The company is attempting to grow its business in the rest of Europe, Russia and Asia as well as the US, claiming an average active user base of […]

The consumer packaged goods (CPG) market presents an opportunity for Amazon to better serve its customers, according to Lisa Utzschneider, VP of Global Advertising Sales at Amazon. Speaking at AdAge’s Digital Conference in New York City today, Utzschneider talked about her company’s approach to targeting ads and the growth of the CPG sector. In discussing […]

As tablet usage increases, magazines and other publications are working to create digital editions that take advantage of features on devices like the iPad and iPad mini. New York-based publisher Bullett Media has expanded its offerings into the ad agency space, providing education and creative offerings for clients. Working with Adobe Digital Publishing Software (DPS), […]

2012 was another banner year for the online advertising space, with revenues up 15% over 2011. Mobile and digital video led much of that growth. Mobile ad spend grew 111% compared to 2011, the second year of triple-digit growth,  accounting for 9% of total internet advertising revenue at $3.4 billion. Digital video revenue increased 29% […]

How Twitter will enter into the programmatic ad business remains a mystery to many.  During the past few months, rumors have swirled over some sort of Twitter ad exchange to be launched. How that will happen is unclear. Nevertheless, various strategic directions seem possible as Twitter tries to siphon growing programmatic media ad spend.  The […]

Recent reports from research firms IDC and Gartner suggesting that PC shipments are on a downward spiral confirmed what marketing software vendors already know: we are living in a post-PC world in which consumers move between various channels. According to IDC, worldwide PC shipments totaled 76.3 million units in the first quarter of 2013, down […]

Recent months have seen an uptick in shady display ad practices – or at least media coverage of them. These incidents often take the form of fraudulent impressions generated either by bot traffic or browser plug-ins that manipulate ad space on a webpage. Others are simply not viewable by design, generating ad calls below the fold […]

Last week’s PROGRAMMATIC I/O delivered many interesting discussions, and one of them revolved around transparency in bidding on an exchange. What if you had sufficient transparency on every impression’s auction, such that all buy-side participants bidding in an auction (even bidding “lurkers” or non-bidders) were revealed? Who would care about this data and why? Hold […]

“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 Bodhi Short, SVP of Operations & Product Development at Integrate. It often takes only two words to pause a deal with brands and agencies: performance marketing. This effect is reinforced […]

Brian O’Kelley wants you to know he’s serious about mobile. On the same day IDC reported Q1 PC sales plummeted 13.9% as consumer usage shifted dramatically to tablet and smartphone devices, the CEO of AppNexus told attendees at the company’s San Francisco summit that the company is going “all in” with its mobile strategy. O’Kelley […]

Here at AdExchanger, we love data. We tell you how brands are using it to target consumers and leverage programmatic buying. But beyond that, it can often be confusing just how marketers use all of the data collected throughout their entire marketing strategies. So we decided to ask the data, analytics, and insights companies this […]

More than 300 marketers, agencies, and platform companies gathered at the St. Regis Martin in San Francisco on Monday for AdExchanger’s Programmatic I/O conference.  Below is a selection of comments made by speakers throughout the day, as recorded by AdExchanger’s editorial staff, including Judith Aquino, Kimberly Maul, and David Kaplan.  Andrew Casale, VP Strategy, Casale […]

Last week X+1 secured a new $17 million debt facility with Ares Capital, a cash reservoir the demand-side platform plans to tap for two acquisitions this quarter (one social, one mobile). A global expansion will follow in the second half of the year, including a possible outpost in Brazil, according to CEO John Nardone. By […]

“Workflow” is not the sexiest of topics, even in the realm of digital advertising. But as the process of buying, planning and tracking digital ad buys gets more complex, both agencies and software companies are taking a more serious look at what can and should be automated. Several months ago, Mediaocean, which was the product […]

Business Insider, the chief digital tabloid with its screaming headlines, bold commentary and incessant slideshows, attracts a lot of pageviews, controversy and ad spending. But the mix has left it grasping for profitability. Now, with Jeff Bezos’ venture capital group leading a $5 million funding round — bringing the total raised to $18.3 million over […]

“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 by Douglas de Jager, founder of Spider.io.  In Will Luttrell’s AdExchanger article of last week, he argues that if the display advertising buy side adopts better performance metrics then the problem of fraud […]

Marketing automation vendor Marketo has filed for a $75 million IPO, adding fuel to speculation on whether it will soon be snapped up in an acquisition. From 2010 to 2012, Marketo’s revenue grew from $14 million to $58.4 million, according to its S1 filing. The San Mateo, Calif.-based marketing automation firm has raised $108 million in venture funding […]