[X+1] Introduces Data ‘Bridge’ Across Platforms

As companies try to improve consumer messaging around online ad targeting in anticipation of new privacy regulation, technology platform company [x+1] this week released an application giving marketers and agencies the ability to integrate customer and third-party online and offline data to target ads. The platform, Open Data Bridge, supports targeting data across multiple channels, such as display ad, Web site and email campaigns. The service, being offered as part of [x+1]‘s trading desk platform, has been tapped by several undisclosed “large” clients.

Read More: MediaPost

Does Apple’s iPad Take A Bite Out Of Web Advertising

We’ve known for quite some time about the iPhone’s inability to render Flash content within the mobile Safari browser, and based upon Apple’s announcement of the iPad today, it looks like that device isn’t going to do it, either. Touted as a savior for the publishing business, this device will potentially revolutionize the delivery and commercialization of content. But most publishers are publishing their content to the web. Via websites. And for those that don’t yet have paywalls, they support their websites with advertising. Those ads are almost 100% rendered in Adobe’s Flash. So when people use the iPad’s web browser to visit their favorite newspaper (as Steve Jobs did in his keynote; see photo at right, courtesy of Engadget), they won’t see the ads at all. That either means advertisers will need to stop building ads in Flash (no chance) or publishers will need to build app versions of their publications upon the iPad SDK (software development kit), resulting in a lot more work, a lot more time, a lot more resources.

Read More: AdAge

Sick of Ad Networks? Start Your Own

Last month media giant CBS Interactive announced that it would stop using third-party ad networks to sell inventory across media properties and instead use its own internal ad serving platform, dubbed “Madison.” It’s not the first time a publisher has openly rejected the use of ad networks, which are sometimes considered a necessary evil for publishers that can’t sell all of their inventory. (After all, some revenue is better than none.) ESPN, Weather.com, Turner Networks, Forbes and Gawker have been very vocal about their refusal to do business with them, noting that they can greatly devalue inventory and create channel conflicts. But as consumers’ media consumption becomes even more fragmented, single-domain publishers are finding it more difficult to provide adequate reach to advertisers, both in quantity and quality. A website with just a few million unique visitors and no sophisticated behavioral or contextual targeting capabilities is all but invisible to big brand advertisers, who will just turn to ad networks to deliver large, targeted audiences for their campaigns.

So what’s a publisher to do?

The answer is simple: reject the ad network, not the ad network model.

Read More: Adotas

Bill Gates Defends Google, Then Pans It

Bill Gates dropped by The New York Times on Monday to discuss his full-time job as head of the Gates Foundation, the world’s largest philanthropy, especially its work in global health and development. Mr. Gates was on his way to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, where he is expected to announce an expansion of the foundation’s vaccine programs in poor nations. But Mr. Gates is still the chairman and largest shareholder of Microsoft. And when asked, Mr. Gates had a few observations on the Internet search efforts of Microsoft and Google that were, by turns, acute, sardonic and tart.

Read More: NYTimes

P&G Embraces Facebook as a Big Part of Their Marketing Plan

Procter & Gamble Co. loves Facebook after all, and besides encouraging brands to develop a presence there, the world’s biggest marketer has opened an office in Silicon Valley to help develop social-networking systems and digital-marketing capabilities with the website. Those messages came in a meeting last week between P&G executives and venture capitalists, recounted by David Hornik on VentureBlog in a post that quickly picked up currency over the weekend on, of all places, Twitter. “P&G’s explicit goal for 2010 is to assure that each of its brands has a meaningful presence on Facebook, and they are willing to pay dearly for that,” Mr. Hornik wrote. “And while P&G’s thought leaders expressed some skepticism about the efficacy of Facebook’s ‘engagement ads,’ they certainly view Facebook as a must-have for digital advertising and brand building. They didn’t quantify what they are paying for that exposure, but it is quite clear that the numbers are very big.”

Read More: AdAge

Will Foursquare Be The Twitter of 2010?

Foursquare is social network billed as part social city guide, part friend finder, and part nightlife game. The NYC-based startup is being hailed as the next-generation social network, calling on gregarious technophiles to broadcast their locations via geo-aware mobile devices. What sets Foursquare apart from many competitors in the “local social” space is its undeniably sticky platform. Users are awarded points for their check-ins, and they scramble to earn badges and vie for bragging rights as the most frequent visitor of popular places. In short, Foursquare is fun. Many observers are quick to draw parallels between Foursquare and Twitter. Both services made their public debuts at South by Southwest (during different years), where both were hailed as breakout hits. One of the reasons behind Foursquare’s current momentum can be found in the type of user it has continued to attract: early adopters and social media mavens — vocal segments that others look to for trends in the space.

Read More: iMediaConnection

Online Advertising to Adopt Traditional Offline Metrics

Brands demand the promises and the guarantees of performance — the same performance and fundamental metrics they have come to know in traditional media, such as television and radio.  During his keynote at OMMA Performance Monday, Young-Bean Song, senior director at Microsoft Advertising Institute, told attendees the online industry needs to adopt traditional performance metrics into online to make brands that traditionally advertise on television and radio feel more comfortable about moving advertising on the Web.

Read More: MediaPost

Dentsu Acquires Innovation Interactive

Dentsu Holdings USA, the U.S. division of one of Japan’s largest agency holding companies, this morning announced the acquisition of Innovation Interactive LLC, the New York-based parent of interactive agencies specializing in search, social media and audience targeting, including: 360i, SearchIgnite and Netmining.  The companies said the Innovation Interactive units will continue to operate under the leadership of co-CEOs Will Margiloff and Bryan Wiener, who will report to Tim Andree, who in a separate move, was named president-CEO of Dentsu Holdings USA, and an Executive Officer of Dentsu Inc.

 Read More: MediaPost

2010 Predictions

2009 was a big year at AdRoll. While we’ve watched display advertising come back into vogue, it’s been awesome to see our team innovate and develop the best display-based solutions for a growing range of SMB marketers. As we’re gearing up for another big year of growth, we thought we’d ask our own Adam Berke, VP of Business Development and Marketing, and founding team member here at AdRoll, to take a quick look forward at what he expects in 2010…

Read More: AdRoll