An article, touting the power of ad networks, written by the President and CEO of an ad network. Excellent job on the objective reporting. Can’t wait for Larry Page’s article on the power of search.

Posted by Andy | 1:10 pm on June 3, 2008.

I wholeheartedly agree. Behavioral targeting is key. The old model of send it to everyone and you’ll get some sales is over. You have to target the user yet most, I say this with reserved caution, most networks don’t target. They just take the offers and fill up the ad units. When I find networks that are willing to go the extra mile to target the consumers I find $$$. It’s time for a revolution!

Posted by Paul Avila | 1:11 pm on June 3, 2008.

I will have to disagree with this post wholeheartedly. ESPN denounced Ad Networks, because they are jealous or insecure? Let’s e real here. If the technology was so good, Turner, The Weather Channel, or ESPN for that matter would simply buy the Ad Network of their choice. We all know that many publisher sites have simply been disappointed with the performance of ad networks, and to a lesser extent concerned with the privacy issues.

As far as the “insight” ad networks have over a single publisher, this is perhaps overestimated. I think you are underestimating the importance of the information about a site’s users vs. the network’s users. But I’ll concede that in certain scenarios a view overlooking multiple sites can provide value.

This site is supposed to be a news source man, not a sales channel. A more objective viewpoint is needed to maintain credibility for this news site. Before confirming that you are in fact the founder of an adnetwork, I assumed it after reading the first few sentences.

Posted by Anonymous | 3:39 pm on June 3, 2008.

I think you have a point here, but you’re missing the big picture. I can see why major publishers who reach a broad audiences would want to bash ad networks. However, there are a host of mid-tier and small niche publishers who are the very reason why AD NETWORKS should be afraid. As the ad serving technology gets more sophisticated with these non-major online publishers, ad network becomes irrelevant. Online marketing is all about reaching the greatest audience size avaialble within a specific target. Read: it’s all about composition of the audience. And with a niche publisher, marketers actually know where their ads are running. Imangine that.

Posted by Huh | 4:28 pm on June 3, 2008.

You hit the nail on the head, Michael. Most of the time a network CAN provide better insight than an individual publishers, but it doesn’t mean they are. Most networks are leaving a ton of data on the table — which is why average CPMs for remnant are decreasing.

At the end of the day, the critical factors are (a) touchpoints/user and (b) how the behavioral technology works.

The number of touchpoints (or data collection points, pageviews) per user is critical, since we as web users shift our attention continually. Publishers generally have fewer touchpoints than networks, but even a network with 200 touchpoints/unique/month is not nearly enough to compete with the big 4. For that reason, today’s networks are better off sharing behavioral data (like an MLS in the real estate world) and competing on the basis of sales, ad ops, and their publisher relationships.

Next is the behavioral technology itself, which each network defines differently. Many networks’ behavioral offering is simple retargeting which doesn’t offer a whole lotta scale. Others drive behavioral targeting via simple contextual matching technology — If I go to a few pages with content about new car buying, I’m now an “in market auto buyer” for some period of time, even though it may have only earned a truly insignificant portion of my overall attention span.

However networks define it, their problem is still the same — in a world where online attention is changing continually, how do you know how much I really care about any given topic? What’s top of mind for me right now? Over time? A simple count of the number of pages I go to doesn’t do it.

Effective behavioral targeting requires a model of what the user cares about. To truly understand what a person cares about (anonymously of course), you need to have many many touchpoints and leverage from that a continually evolving picture of the topics they show an interest in, with an affinity strength for each topic, at various timescales. Affinity strength is key, provided there are sufficient and continual reinforcement/decay mechanisms in place.

Posted by Jordan Mitchell | 12:54 am on June 4, 2008.

dont agree, no one can sell your site like the salesperson who believes in and is passionate about the site.

The networks can’t create custom programs that work and have a blended ecpm the client loves.
Although I believe that ad networks have their place in the market, I still believe in the organic sell using the strengths of one’s property.

Posted by alicia molnar | 10:00 am on June 6, 2008.

I wanted to offer input, as I’m an agency-side online media director who has tested many top publisher sites and ad networks. We have used both run-of-network and behavioral placements to great extent — and we evaluate on CPA for a well-known auto client.

Most marketers/advertisers are increasingly concerned with ROI, which is news to no one. Having executed campaigns on ‘top publisher sites’ claiming a superior demographic audience and having executed behavioral campaigns across multiple and massive ad networks, I will say the performance metrics we have generated — for many campaigns, not just a few — point to ad network behavioral as the clear-cut winner for our CPA-oriented (ROI-focused) goals.

Results for generic, mass-reach, demo-targeted efforts pitched by ‘passionate salespeople’ have simply PALED in comparison to results we have delivered to the client using behavioral.

For sophisticated online marketers, it’s a matter of ROI. It’s NOT a matter of ‘being sold’ by a brand name publisher who smacked their fancy logo on a PowerPoint deck, then sits down with a smile and wants you to buy their ‘best pages’ for a $40 CPM or wants to create a ‘custom landing page’ with content that would be redundant to what’s already on your existing site and/or landing pages.

Ultimately, our campaigns must deliver results. Ad network behavioral has done that. I can’t remotely say the same for ‘top publisher sites.’ Based on our experience, technology is king.

Posted by Bill | 4:54 pm on July 11, 2008.