ScanScout, one of the leading online video ad networks, has introduced a new ad unit called the Super Pre-Roll, which the company says is a more interactive unit than the typical online video ads.
A Super Pre-Roll will take a company’s existing TV ad and place multiple interactive ‘overlay’ placements on top of it. The overlays will be strategically placed throughout the video to correspond with the ad’s content.
ScanScout shows an example of a Super Pre-Roll campaign for Unilever’s Vaseline Sheer Infusion, which asks the viewers the question, “what do you look for in a body lotion?”, and then provides various answers to choose from within the overlay placements that users can easily click. Advertisers may use this new unit as a way of performing polls with their customers, provide coupons or collect user data asys Bill Day, ScanScout’s CEO.
The obvious risk to the Super Pre-Roll may be lower than expected interaction rates than expected, which may drive CPMs down even further. Currently a Pre-Roll video ad is a more passive experience for users, but perhaps the interactive experience will drive more awareness.
TRAFFIQ has announced the appointment of Steve Felsher to its Board of Advisors. Mr. Felsher previously served as the Vice Chairman and Chief Financial Officer-Worldwide of Grey Global Group Inc. He oversaw the acquisition of Grey Global Group by WPP Group plc.
Six newspapers in Pittsburgh have formed an ad network that reaches over one million unduplicated readers called the Greater Pittsburgh Newspaper Network.
The newspaper companies within the newly formed ad network include, the Beaver County Times, the Butler Eagle, the Indiana Gazette, the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Trib Total Media and the Washington Observer-Reporter.
The newly formed ad network hopes to make media buying easier as a single point of contact.
Federated Media Publishing, a digital media ad sales rep firm that helps advertisers and marketers reach consumers on targeted blogs and websites, has named Deanna Brown as its president and COO. Prior to Federated Media, Brown served as the president at Scripps Networks Digital, and also held vice president and general manager titles at Yahoo and AOL.
Jambo Media, LLC, an online video solutions provide, has announced today that it has selected content delivery network (CDN) services from Limelight Networks Inc. to power all of Jambo’s video properties, which include the Jambo Video Network and JamboTV.com. Jambo Media serves more than 2 million daily video plays and supports video on more than 120 web sites.
Jambo Media is also releasing a white label version of their technology for advertisers, publishers and content owners called “Jambocast.” Limelight CDN will be an integral part of the Jambocast technology.
CEO of Jambo Media, Robert S. Manoff, says that his team has created the Jambo Video Network by licensing video from sources such as AP, iVillage, and Ivanhoe Broadcast News, and then packaging them into channels for distribution to affiliate sites via the Jambo video player. The offering provides websites with a variety of advertising formats and content to earn ad revenues.
A recent phone-based survey of 1,000 Internet users found that 66 percent did not want web sites to show ads to them that are tailored to their interests. In fact, 73 percent said that they thought the practice of customizing ads based on their previous online behavior was “not OK.”
In addition, 92 percent of all respondents felt there should be laws requiring “websites and advertising companies to delete all stored information about an individual, if requested to do so.”
Joseph Turow said that the report was not tailored to debate economics, but rather to highlight consumer attitudes towards advertising, when asked why the study did not ask users questions like “would you rather pay for content or have it supported by tailored ads.”
Turow went on to say that the premise of his study was dispute that “the industry is claiming that U.S. users want targeted ads.” Turow denied he was in favor of further legislation, but rather wants to spark a debate on the issue.
The new hires bring appssavvy’s employee base to more than 25 employees, which is a number that has tripled year-over-year.
In addition to their employee growth, founder and CEO of appssavvy, Chris Cunningham, also announced that they have recently surpassed 100 social media application campaigns involving major brands representing every major advertising category, including automotive, beer and liquor, consumer electronics, consumer packaged goods, entertainment, financial services, food, pharmaceuticals, retail and technology.
The new hires include Rob Holiber, director of East Coast Sales, who most recently comes from Daily News Digital. Lauren Jaramillo, Jeff Skaggs and Michael Vos, sales directors serving the West Coast, who join come from CraveOnline, Collective Media and Specific Media respectively. Jerome Brissett, senior traffic manager, who joins from ASMALLWORLD Holdings. Yael Zeman, account manager, who joins from National Cable Communications, jointly owned by Comcast Cable, Cox Communications and Time Warner Cable. Dillen Phelps, creative assistant, who joins from Vault.com.
U.S. affiliate marketing spend is expected to grow from $1.9 billion in 2009 to $4 billion by 2014, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 16% from 2009 to 2014, according to a recent study by Forrester Research. Forrester Research interviewed “vendor and user companies, including Commission Junction, Intuit, LinkShare, Pepperjam.com, Peformance Marketing Alliance, Stateless Systems, ValueClick and Vertive.
“Payments to affiliate sites direct from marketers will represent the majority of the affiliate spending, or 57%, in 2014″, according to Forrester. Additionally, social media is not expected to be on of the sources of considerable growth, at least within the next five years. Search will remain a key driver of traffic to affiliate sites. The top three affiliate marketing spenders will be financial service providers, retailers and online education.
The fifth fastest growing company on the Inc 500 list this year was IntegraClick (ClickBooth), an affiliate & CPA network. I would keep an eye out for more companies like ClickBooth to reach the Inc 500 list over the next few years.
Burst Media has announced today the promotion of Chuck Moran to the position of CMO. Mr. Moran joined Burst in 2001 as Market Research Manager and has since advanced to VP of Marketing.
Burst Media’s President and CEO, Jarvis Coffin said, “Chuck’s extensive industry knowledge and experience has played a vital role in our success over the past 9 years and I look forward to his continued leadership.”
During 2008 and the first eight months of 2009, Lotame examined over 100 rich-media campaigns it ran and found that social media advertising does not perform nearly as well as ads running on non-social sites. Their study showed lower click through rates on sites like Bebo and Flixster.
They compared their data with the industry standard measurements published by Google’s DoubleClick and found that the click-through rates for ads on social sites were lower than the average across all ad sizes, formats and types of advertiser.
Although they found that users on social sites are less likely to click an ad to leave the site, they also found that these same users were likely to interact with ads that kept them on the social site, such as including playing videos or expanding an ad message on-screen.