Despite all the noise this week about paywalls and foolish walled iPad content strategies, I was struck by comments made by Brian O'Kelly at the recent AlwaysOn OnMedia NYC 2011 event. He rightly pointed out that all online content, even with subscriptions, is ultimately paid for by advertising. If that's the case why would you shut out valuable traffic and data by throwing up a paywall for commoditised news that's available for free on the BBC and the Guardian. And do you really think a beautifully-crafted static page - without any optimisation - on an iPad is going to pay the bills? Sure some publishers can't quite get the online model to offset the losses of their decaying offline business. But the tools are now there for publishers to look at other business models. SSPs and DSPs are now making it easier for publishers to augment reach, helping power both DR and brand campaigns. I wrote a couple of pieces on this subject last year - one, where I argued that publishers should become media buyers; and in another, I suggested the FT should build a financial-focused DSP.

I made similar points on the ExchangeWire Linkedin group in response to suggestions that it would somehow be unethical on the part of the pub to look at this strategy:

The publisher I used would not augment premium reach - as the FT usually sell out every month. Instead by re-targeting its users across similar sites it could offer a network solution for the financial vertical. I think it's ridiculous to suggest that a publishers with proprietary data shouldn't think about augmenting reach.

In fact there are a number of publishers and publisher networks already doing this in the UK and Europe. Only a handful of niche and giant content pubs can really do this.

Let's look at the exchange inventory then. There is some dross available - but there is decent supply on there too, especially on the SSPs. It can be done and will be done. I have to say it annoys me when a pub like NI throws up paywalls, and excludes data and traffic that could be used to build its advertising business. If the Daily Mail can build out a dynamic network solution so could NI.

Also do you think this has to do with DR campaigns? Publishers are now doing massive bespoke brand deals with client direct that are not just about simple standard page takeovers. Much more granular targeting and real-time optimisation is powering these brand campaign. And re-targeting users across dynamic supply is a big part of it. You are going to see more of these campaigns this year.

But you can only do this if you have the right people in place. You need to hire smart analysts and ad ops people to build this type of offering out. Your business has to be much more data focused.

Sure ad nets add value, but someone like the FT isn't going to work with a rep firm. Fact. And if its advertisers are looking for more reach, why wouldn't it seek out their users across dynamic supply.

Data and real-time optimisation are going to play an increasing role in how publishers offer advertisers more value - and ultimately how they can win more budget. This is why paywalls are such a crazy idea. Data is the currency of the internet. Why would you give it away so foolishly? More to follow on how a publisher would go about building a data-focused business.