» The Rubicon Project believes the current ad server is a “legacy technology”, and must be put to the sword. In a blizzard of PR, hype, and typical Rubicon showmanship, the company set out its “manifesto” for content creators last week. The document lists the ways in which it intends to help publishers wrest more spend from the buy-side. I think there is a massive opportunity for the likes of Rubicon on the supply-side. Oversupply of ad inventory is driving prices into the ground. Future revenue growth for publishers now lies in extracting value from data: yield optimisers like Rubicon will have to equip publishers with the tools to better understand and build out audiences, so that they can sell at a higher price to media buyers. Rubicon is clearly positioning itself as a supply-side platform. If it’s to prosper, the new SSP will have to give publishers better technology, better inventory control, better yield management and better audience insight if the current decline in pricing is to be arrested. (The Rubicon Project Blog)
Behavioural targeting is on the radar of EU’s regulators. The EU wants to take the online advertising to task over perceived misuse of cookie data and behavioural targeting. They even passed a laughable directive late last year instructing EU publishers to offer explicit opt-ins for online behaviour tracking.
We can get into the semantics of what an EU directive actually means, but here it is in its crudest form: the EU drafts some legislation and then instructs EU countries to pass it into law; the EU has no say in how member states pass it into law and what form it will ultimately take.
There will doubtless be push back from some digital savvy member states and it will have to be re-worded. I can’t see the biggest online markets, like the UK, Germany and France, passing this directive (in its current form) into law.
John Were is Operations Director at Global Digital Markets. He took some time last week to speak to ExchangeWire.com about the state of the European exchange space, the arrival of the DSP’s and why exchange trading can return strong results for both brand and DR campaigns.
Can you give an overview of the service Global Digital Markets offers advertisers and agencies?
Global Digital Markets (GDM) is an exchange traded media business. We offer an efficient means of harnessing the global reach and volume of the key media exchanges on behalf of our agency and direct advertiser clients. We refer to ourselves variously as demand aggregators, brokers and exchange specialists.
Today’s data driven digital advertising no longer has the same rigid distinctions of old between response and brand. The DNA of both of these forms of advertising has begun to intertwine to form some super hybrid strain of advertising with ways to deliver content to the right audience at the right time to yield a response. It has begun to make response sexier and brand more efficient. Who would have thought? For the purpose of this post however I do deliberately make the distinction between brand and response. Campaigns are still bought on these metrics and there are many advertisers who would still fall into one of these forms of advertising.
This blurring of the lines between brand and response has been radicalised by the proliferation of companies now involved in this new era of digital advertising and media. Ad exchanges and the DSP space more generally have paved the way for response-driven advertisers to increase their buying efficiencies and performance. Spot buying impressions in real-time against specific target segments with dynamically served ads – and all underpinned by machine learning or computational algorithms. This of course appeals to the DR community. But what about advertisers that are not focussed on an immediate direct response?
Paul Silver is Digital Direct Response Manager at MEC Manchester.
2009. What a year. I am sure many in this space will agree that 2009 was the year that many woke up and realised that change was necessary. Change to the way we buy media, change to the way we serve advertising and fundamentally change to the rules of the display game (I appreciate that many innovators are currently ripping up the rulebook and pushing our industry forward).
For those just joining the conversation: if DSP and RTB are new acronyms to you, then where have you been? Stick to your PPC and SEO! In all seriousness, this year has seen some major traction from the major holding companies’ DSPs (mainly in the US). New tech firms are emerging every week it seems and VC investment has been flowing in line with this, despite what has been deemed as the biggest recession for thirty years. Data exchanges are becoming key to any media purchasing – and we have arrived at the stage of being able to spot-buy impressions, in real-time (depending on who in this space you speak to!).
Ad personalisation is becoming a major component of display campaigns, serving relevant ads to relevant users amongst relevant content (Dapper.net, Teracent, etc etc). Advertising is becoming more dynamic and offering much more of a service to the users it targets rather than simply signposting the ads on a page.
Ad exchanges are also beginning to have an affect on the display buying landscape. The re-launch of Google’s Adx has had some early success, and is increasing participation in exchange based trading. Other exchanges continue to develop their own platforms, offering strong trading opportunities for progressive ad networks, ad trading companies, data exchanges, analytics firms, and arbitrage traders.
For someone working agency side, these shifts in how we buy display advertising are welcome. The way we buy, the way we manage campaigns and the way we serve ads to our users had to change. It needed to change for this sector to really continue growing (or at least sustain their % of media budgets).
How has all this affected the online display market in the UK? The developments mentioned above have thus far struggled to gain any real traction in the UK, and are certainly not mainstream yet. Networks are still networks. Irrelevant ads continue to be served to irrelevant users. CPA performance networks still take most network budgets (not that this is wrong but being reliant on view based conversions is no way to underpin the buying strategy of a campaign).
To move beyond this however we need to see a fundamental shift in the way we buy media. Advertisers who are unwilling to take risks and only trade on CPA metrics are stunting this innovation. It means removing [a large CPA based performance network] from the media schedule and investing in new opportunities and new ways to advertise. Some of these will work and some will fail. It is the fear of the unknown however which causes an element of reluctance to move beyond the ‘bread and butter’ of media schedules.
Admittedly, 2009 has been a tough year for advertisers. The ‘contingency’ or ‘test’ budget of old simply does not exist anymore. I am however a firm believer in the old English saying, ‘he who dares wins’. Those that are brave enough to embrace new technologies NOW will be better prepared for the future once we get out of this recession.
Advertisers need to have some blind faith. Otherwise we will forever be confined to sticking budget into CPA networks who serve bundles of inventory into below the fold placements and hope that at some stage (within said cookie window) the user heads over to the advertiser’s site and purchases. Is there actual any value to this?
The buck does not lie solely with advertisers of course. Agencies also need to change the way they operate in this data driven era. They need to invest in the systems to facilitate this change but above all else recognise that this is required. Buying relevant cookie data (easier said than done of course in the UK) and pairing it with ad impressions bought within a bid auction environment is no mean feat to achieve. Serving up interactive, dynamic ads which are optimised in real-time based on machine learning, and then taking users to dynamic landing pages is again another huge task.
The question we need to ask of ourselves in the UK is how do we change the infrastructure of the current model to move with the times? What systems do we need? Just by asking these questions will see us moving in the right direction.
2010 promises to be quite a year. With Invite Media and other DSPs looking to launch here 2010, I feel more budget will be spent on buying media across ad exchanges – and less will be thrown blindly across a network’s entire inventory set. Agencies need not worry about the inefficiencies (in terms of resource) of managing individual line items across exchanges as trading platforms such as Invite and MediaMath assist this process.
We adopted Search. We adopted the technology it brought to the table. It has been a long time coming but let’s give Display a chance.
Helen Clifford-Jones is one of the most senior online sales execs in the UK, and is currently the Head of Digital Sales at RBI Digital. She took some time last week to speak to FarneyMedia about ad exchanges, ad networks, yield optimisers and the current state of the online advertising market:
It’s been a difficult year for the display advertising market? Has there been an improvement in the past couple of months? Will 2010 see a return to growth?
RBI is fortunate to be in a number of markets. Trading has been tough in some but by no means all. Our biggest online display market is the professional IT market and one of our biggest brands in that market, Computerweekly.com, has had a record year. Across most markets we have seen an improvement in the last couple of months and we would expect to see that carry through to the rest of the year. Most of the Media auditing companies predict that 2010 will not see double digit growth which display had enjoyed over 2006-2008. Market sources (PWC, IAB, WPP, Aegis, etc) appear to be indicating a 4-6% growth. That said in many of our markets there is still a lot of print advertising that we would expect to see migrate online and this should help us outperform most market predictions.
There has been a lot of debate this year about non-premium and the 2nd channel. Does RBI use ad exchanges and ad networks to monetise non-premium inventory?
Currently, RBI doesn’t use ad networks to monetise remnant inventory. This is a very individual choice for publishers and will also be dependant on a variety of criteria. For instance, at what stage of development is the publisher’s proposition? Do they currently have their own online sales team or are they using 3rd party resellers. What sort of optimisation tools can be used to track and segment your users?As a B2B publisher, RBI has very defined audiences (unlike broader consumer sites/portals which have wider audience demographics) Can there really be a distinction between “high value” and “low value” inventory for more precisely targeted vertical sites? The audience and the quality of the audience remains the same in a business vertical e.g. construction or technology. As such we do not recognise that a senior business professional reading relevant content is in any way a non premium or second channel.
Do you think using yield management platforms such as AdMeld, Rubicon Project and Improve Digital, can help European publishers monetise unsold inventory?
It is a positive sign to see the market being more competitive and introducing optimisation tools. Any data which allows Publishers and media buyers to evaluate accurately and “price” inventory properly must be welcomed. However it is not a panacea for solving the problem of excess inventory in the first place. Publishers need to be transparent in their pricing policies and there are a number of challenges that are more critical. The choice of publishers to limit the white noise of advertising slots on a page that ensures that ads which do appear at the market value price point get the best chance of response?
What’s your view on ad exchanges and buying platforms?
Ultimately until Publisher’s buy into these platforms, agencies and their clients will still have to approach media owners directly for inventory. Some Publishers will be more ready and willing than others. It also depends on the technology investment that Publishers are making or whether they are still reliant on print legacy systems which I suspect is still the position of many. There are still a lot of Publishers out there who do not understand cookie targeting analytics and the metrics used to monetise them. Until digital revenues reach a critical mass, a majority won’t adopt new technologies until the market forces them to do so.
What do you think needs to happen before RBI puts its premium inventory on the ad exchanges?
Currently, ad networks operate on scale and volume. There is a consensus that media buyers can purchase ad units far more cheaply on a network. This gives the view to Publishers that they are risking their premium inventory price point. Until ad exchanges can find a way of differentiating or tiering in some way this view will continue.
Do you think data exchanges, like Bluekai and Exelate, offer European publishers the opportunity to monetise user data?
This is another interesting and ethical quandary. Data protection varies between EU and non EU countries (Germany in particular has very stringent protection laws). This makes it very difficult to offer a blanket or “one size fits all” offering to monetise European user data. Until there is a clear European data protection policy, the advantages will not outweigh the disadvantages. We evaluate our clients’ needs on a case by case basis. Even Murdoch’s newspapers are considering not allowing any search engines to access their content because of the difference in libel laws between the US and Europe.
ROI has become even more business critical to advertisers and agencies. Do you think the “audience buy” has become more important than context and branding?
This is a huge question and one that will be debated hotly. Return on investment comes back to one question how you define “return”? It is perhaps more accurate to discuss engagement points in an advertising campaign and what is the client trying to achieve in the engagement of the prospective customer. How do the different media options (TV, Press, Display, Search, Direct Marketing etc…) work together to create an effective campaign? So in answer to the question it depends. Context and branding will always be important to those clients who have high quality goods and services to offer a discerning audience (i.e. an RBI audience). For those clients who are less concerned with these issues then volume of clicks and audience delivery will be their main criteria for buying.
Can publishers leverage their own user data (segmentation for instance) to improve the value of ad inventory?
By the very nature of the RBI offering and the verticals we operate in we already offer a high degree of segmentation and have generated over 52% of our revenues online through ad inventory and data optimisation. There are still some challenges for publishers to better understand user analytics and the user’s journey whilst they are interacting with print and online products and services. This is a continuous improvement challenge for us and other publishers.
The EU passed a new law yesterday that will affect the continent’s online publishers, agencies, ad networks and advertisers. It is demanding that all internet cookies being served to a user’s machine must be approved first by that user. The “cookie consent” law states that all sites carrying advertising must seek the permission of a visitor for the serving of cookies.
You could seek consent with pop-ups, if you’re happy to ignore accessibility guidelines that discourage pop-ups – though users’ browsers may block pop-ups by default, which risks confusion. Or you could do it with a landing page that contains a load of information and some choices. The choices for users could be:
1. Give me a load of cookies, now and in future visits, and let me get where I wanted to go in the first place – and please don’t interrupt me like this again.
2. Cookies sound evil. I’m going to use American sites instead, because they don’t scare me with this cookie nonsense.
3. I don’t want cookies from your advertising partners, but I’ll gladly pay for an ad-free version of your site. What’s that you say? I need cookies for that too? OK, but just a few please.
You need to ask each new visitor just once, of course – until the visitor deletes his ‘consent’ cookie. Like a blow to the head, that action will cause your site to forget that you’ve actually met before and you’ll welcome the visitor like a stranger.
How will the industry get around this absolutely ridiculously short-sighted law? Robertson tells us that there is an exception in the new law: namely “where the cookie is ‘strictly necessary’ for the provision of a service ‘explicitly requested’ by the user”. Isn’t online advertising “strictly necessary” for the provision of free content? And without cookie powered advertising there would be no online publishing – and this would infringe on an essential service requested by all European internet users.
And what about terms and conditions? It might sound facile but surely a publisher can outline in its terms and conditions that any user on its site has to consent to cookies being served. Terms and conditions should be clearly outlined to users before they accesses the content so that the new law is being adhered to.
The race to find ways to work with this new EU law has begun – and no doubt the best and brightest in the European ad tech sector will have found ways to counteract some of the restrictions of the new law before it takes effect in 2011.
If any readers have ideas on how the online advertising sector might easily work with the new law, please don’t hesitate to get in touch – info [AT] farneymedia.com.
After the success of last year’s Ad Revenue event, Pubmatic is assembling the brightest and best from the exchange space for this year’s event. There are some great panel sessions for attendees. Farneymedia favourites include:
The Blurring Lines of Ad Exchanges, Ad Marketplaces, and Ad Networks
As advertising companies diversify the services they offer there is considerable overlap in what used to be more clear-cut roles. It is becoming more and more difficult, even for industry insiders, to maintain a firm grasp on what the differences are between major players in the space and how things are continuing to evolve. This panel will give publishers a better understanding of the roles and benefits that the blurring segments provide.
Moderated by Michael Learmonth, Reporter, Digital Media & Advertising, Advertising Age
Panelists:
- Jay Sears, Strategic Products & Business Development, ContextWeb
- Jed Nahum, Director of Network Planning and Strategy, AdECN
- Philip Smolin, GM, Platform Solutions, Turn
- Rob Rasko, President and COO, CPX Interactive
- Tom Sipple, VP, IAC/Dictionary.com
The Evolution of Media Buying and What That Means for Publishers
There might not be a faster evolving segment of the 2nd Channel than media buying platforms and technologies. Real-time technologies are not only changing the way media is being bought and sold, but they are also helping to create audience segments in ways that were impossible just a few short years ago. Hear from the leaders of this segment on what is happing now, and what we can expect in the years to come, and how this will affect large online publishers.
Moderated by John Ebbert, Managing Editor, AdExchanger
Panelists:
- Andrew Kraft, VP Technology Solutions, Collective Media
- Darren Herman, Founder & Presi¬dent, Varick Media Management
- Joe Zawadzki, CEO, MediaMath
- Matthew Greitzer, VP Search Marketing and Head of ATOM Systems, Razorfish
- Sean Kegelman, SVP, Partnerships, VivaKi Nerve Center
According to All Things Digital, Michael Rubenstein, has left Google to join AppNexus. AppNexus, run by Brian O’Kelly and Mike Nolet, specialises in building real-time infrastructure for the exchange marketplace.
Appnexus looks to address the inefficiencies in the current ad exchange model. Working with data providers, inventory aggregators, specialist buyers and agencies, they help to better leverage the trading opportunities on different platforms.
Rumored to be rolling out a real-time bidding infrastructure that multi-exchange management tools can build on, Rubenstein has left Google to join AppNexus at an interesting time. RTB is going to be a big area of growth in the coming year.
AppNexus is a serious player in the space. Remember, Nolet and O’Kelly sold RightMedia for close to $700 million in 2007. They know ad exchanges better than anyone, and with AppNexus they see an opportunity to address the serious shortcomings in the current exchange design.
Rubenstein’s contacts within the industry will doubtless win new business, as agencies looking to build their own buying platforms will want to partner ad tech companies. It might not be as big as Google, but AppNexus is going to be the sector’s leading infrastructure company. The growing complexities of the exchange marketplace will need to be addressed, and AppNexus are well positioned to provide solutions.
Data is fast becoming a valuable commodity in the new exchange trading environment. It is being traded by publishers, ad networks, specialist buyers and agencies to power online advertising campaigns. Good data can turn “dumb” ad impressions into an intelligent media buy. And the demand for this user data among media buyers is helping publishers develop a viable new revenue stream.
One of the leading data trading platforms in the US is Bluekai. Launched in September 2008, BlueKai is an intent-focused data exchange with access to over 100 million unique buyers, focusing primarily on consumer intent in the retail, auto and travel sectors. They aggregate user information based on cookies, IP, and Publisher-owned information.
Trading volumes have been growing steadily on the Bluekai platform – with the number of buyers and the spend-per-trader now doubling every quarter. The company has been busy rolling out new services to its customers and implementing codes of practice for data trading on its platform.
Bluekai’s Rowena Toguchi took time last week to speak to Farneymedia about their exchange technology, how they are attempting to lead the way in data protection and when they might be setting up in Europe:
How does the Bluekai platform work?
BlueKai manages the largest online intent data exchange that gives marketers, publishers and ad networks access to valuable data a-la-carte to impact in-market audience targeting. Our technology is based on aggregating anonymous behaviors from top tier ecommerce sites , which then goes through a classification process. It is then made available in our exchange for bidding, purchase and immediate influence on real-time campaign targeting. We do not own inventory and do not serve ads – we simply enable our partners to use our quality data to deliver better targeting across their media.
How does it benefit data providers, such as publishers and ad networks? Can they develop a viable revenue stream by trading on the Bluekai platform?
Absolutely. The BlueKai Exchange functions on an auction-model, meaning we let the data buyers set the price they want to pay for the data. This way, we let the market determine the value of the data – the better the results, the more they are willing to pay for the data. In turn, data providers are compensated fairly on the quality of the data they are bringing into the exchange. In addition, there are added benefits for publishers to work with data exchanges like BlueKai:
They can generate more revenue through one marketplace that encourages competition and bid up from multiple parties who value the data. BlueKai data is used by marketers, ad networks, and publishers who all drive up monetization for the creator of the data.
They won’t have to make a hard choice of selecting several of hundreds of ad networks to partner with on individual data deals.
They can work with a company who is consumer conscious and active in driving full transparency on consumer data sharing practices.
The data bought on Bluekai is often used on the exchanges to better target advertising. Do you partner with exchanges? How does this partnership work?
Anyone with inventory can use BlueKai data to impact better targeting – this includes ad network, ad exchanges, publishers and portals. Many ad networks and marketers buy our data and then target that data on the leading ad exchanges.
You’re clearly concerned about user data? How do you allow users to protect their data?
Currently we are taking active steps to help raise awareness for transparent data sharing practices by bringing understanding to the consumer. The BlueKai Registry allows consumers to see the type of information that is being collected based on browsing activity on their machine. They also get the option to change these saved preferences based on their actual interest or purchase intent. Of course, the user can still choose to opt-out of data collection from BlueKai at www.bluekai.com or across the Internet at http://www.networkadvertising.org/. In addition, BlueKai does not retain ANY user data for more than 6 months. We think that this is an area that needs a lot more industry focus. Consumers need to be aware of what data is collected and we will continue to push publishes to provide clearer and simpler ways for consumers to take control of their own data.
What is intent data – and how does it differ other cookie information?
At BlueKai, we focus on aggregating intent data, which is strictly qualified as actions taken that shows clear intent towards a purchase. We consider these low-funnel activities that happen before someone makes a purchase. These activities include searching for travel, comparing automobile prices, actions on a loan calculator or price comparison shopping. Intent data is a prime indicator for purchases and is very effective at driving measurable results. This is the core of BlueKai’s business.
In the market today, there is an abundance of top funnel data including contextual, demographic, and geo data. We believe this type of data is more suitable for branding and awareness campaigns to push consumers deeper into the purchase funnel. Through partnerships with other data providers, we also offer these types of data within the BlueKai Exchange; sold and typically bidded at a different price range from the intent data categories.
Can you explain your new Certification Program in more detail?
BlueKai recently rolled out a new Certification Program to streamline agency and marketer adoption of BlueKai data. When we launched the BlueKai Exchange, we saw immediate excitement from the agency community on the need to define quality “data” to power their online campaigns. However, buying data separate of the media appealed to the early adopter agencies. For the rest of the agencies, the extra legal steps and separate insertion orders created work many of them would prefer to avoid. This prompted the creation of the Certification program with the goal of helping agencies get from “interest” to “running BlueKai-powered campaigns” in the most streamlined way possible. We’ve received very positive feedback from the agency community and we feel the program is successful in addressing some of the adoption barriers.
Are you active in the European market?
BlueKai is not yet active in the European market, though some of our ad network partners have international coverage.
Are you intending to roll out a service in Europe?
Yes we are intending on rolling out a service in Europe – however we can not share details at this point.
Do you think EU laws on privacy are preventing BlueKai from offering a similar service in Europe?
We believe that the bar has to be raised for consumers regardless of legislation. Consumers need assurances that no sensitive data is being collected. Consumers need complete control of their data. Consumers need awareness on how their data is being used. Consumers need viable and functional opt-out mechanisms. This is true in Europe and it is true in the US.
» The Rubicon Project believes the current ad server is a “legacy technology”, and must be put to the sword. In a blizzard of PR, hype, and typical Rubicon showmanship, the company set out its “manifesto” for content creators last week. The document lists the ways in which it intends to help publishers wrest more spend from the buy-side. I think there is a massive opportunity for the likes of Rubicon on the supply-side. Oversupply of ad inventory is driving prices into the ground. Future revenue growth for publishers now lies in extracting value from data: yield optimisers like Rubicon will have to equip publishers with the tools to better understand and build out audiences, so that they can sell at a higher price to media buyers. Rubicon is clearly positioning itself as a supply-side platform. If it’s to prosper, the new SSP will have to give publishers better technology, better inventory control, better yield management and better audience insight if the current decline in pricing is to be arrested. (The Rubicon Project Blog)
