Uncategorized

Viant, a holding company of several adtech units including Specific Media and Vindico, and the owner of MySpace, has been acquired by Time Inc, the company announced today.  Terms have not been announced. At CES in January, we spoke with CEO Tim Vandorhook about the company and the continuing value of MySpace for targeted advertising. […]

LAS VEGAS — When should you put an in-article video ad on a page – and when should you hold back? Two-year-old Genesis Media of New York is an ad tech platform aiming to sensitively place auto-playing out-stream video ads, a format that is gaining in popularity. “Video ad formats are easy to build, they’re difficult to […]

As hundreds of executives from the media and marketing worlds gathered yesterday under the AWNY banner, at glitzy dinner to honor media luminary Wenda Harris Millard, we sat down with two of the evening speakers: GE’s CMO Linda Boff and Carolyn Everson, advertising chief at Facebook. Both longtime acquaintances of Millard, they speak to her talent, […]

PALM SPRINGS — Since it was launched more than a decade ago, the fan wiki hosting site Wikia has built up a huge following for, essentially, static information. Now it wants to put some momentum in to that content. That’s why CEO Craig Palmer this month launched a big outgrowth of the site, calling it Fandom, a place where […]

The transformation of the media agency and its trading desk; the next evolution in programmatic; the new forms of video advertising across screens, will be among the topics explored at Beet Retreat, a two-day executive retreat being held on the Caribbean island of Vieques next week. Doug Ray, CEO of Carat U.S.  will be among the […]

PALM SPRINGS — As the digital media industry celebrates its 20 years and the milestone of being a $50 billion global industry, the business needs to become more diverse, says Michael Kassen, CEO of the powerhouse media consultantcy in this interview. We spoke with him on Sunday at the IAB’s annual leadership meeting.

LAS VEGAS –Marketers need to ensure that they are reaching consumers not only at the moment of purchase, but years before when they are beginning to develop affinity for products, says Scott Ferber, Chairman and CEO of Videology, in this taped interview from CES. For example, if a car buyer first hears about a Lexus when the […]

AOL announced a “strategic alliance” with Taboola for content discovery and recommendation.   The Taboola platform, which recommends content to users on various platforms, will be widely used across AOL media brands in the U.S. and Canada. The Wall Street Journal reports that as part of the deal AOL will take an equity stake in […]

FreeWheel, a pioneering adtech company  that enables many of the world’s leading digital video publishers manage dynamic ad insertion, has unveiled a solution that allows insertion into linear television. The company is making available its Hybrid Linear Digital Ad-Scheduler (HyLDA), a program that enables premium video publishers to plan, optimize and manage live content using a […]

FORT LAUDERDALE –  The state of automated media transactions and audience targeting with deep  data is growing quickly, but it should not be called “programmatic” explains  Matt Spiegel, SVP/GM, Data & Technology Solutions at MediaLink.. Programmatic isn’t a media platform, it isn’t a thing and the perception of the word is actually limiting the growth of […]

LONDON-   Cablevision, a large U.S. regional cable and Internet provider, long a pioneer in offering addressable TV advertising, has made its first “upfront” deal with Modi Media, the advanced TV unit of WPP.  It is a longterm partnership around addressable advertising. At the Future of TV Advertising Forum in London earlier this month, we interviewed Ben […]

FORT LAUDERDALE — Bank of America is working with Starcom and NBC on dynamic ad insertion in live streaming sports programming as part of its ongoing efforts to dig deeper into customized advertising strategies, says Lou Paskalis, Senior VP Enterprise Media at Bank of America in this interview with Beet.TV. “That allows us to get to the best […]

Addressable TV advertising, the delivery of ads to a specific home set-up box, saw its initial value around “sales lift” meaning the affecting of a direct purchase.  As the medium has evolved, marketers are finding value in addressable as it powers “considered purchases,” meaning awareness of goods and services which would be considered for future […]

Fox announced  plans today to offer consumers of its shows on Hulu the opportunity to watch less ads by interacting with one “engagement” ad.   The technology platform for the engagement ad is true[X] – a video adtech company that was acquired by 21st Century Fox last year. At Cannes Lions this past June, we spoke […]

Data and technology provider Experian Marketing Services is the “hub” for the growth of addressable advertising.  It has arrangements with marketers and key cable and satellite operators who deliver addressable TV advertising, explains Brienna Pinnow, who leads Experian Marketing Services’ addressable advertising products. Demand for addressable products have tripled recently, she says. She says the roadmap […]

The staid world of TV ratings business, long dominated by Nielsen,  is in a state of  dramatic change with the recently announced merger of comScore and Rentrak. Another TV ratings provider Tivo Research is aggressively raising  its visibility by giving away its TV ratings for free – at least its “basic” offering, the company has […]

While video’s function in advertising has historically been for branding, it’s now possible to track its impact on sales. While television has been a kind of black box in terms of available insights into how a campaign has actually performed, “now digital closes the loop,” observes Oren Harnevo, CEO of Eyeview, a video ad platform, in […]

The news last week about the acquisition of Rentrak by comScore has been hailed by some as the emergence of a new competitor to Nielsen in the TV ratings space.  For Bill Wise, CEO of  TV media buying platform Mediacean, competition is a good thing, and while the newly combined forces will keep Nielsen “honest,” it […]

ZenithOptimedia  EVP Julian Zilberbrand has been tapped by Viacom as EVP of the newly formed Audience Science unit.  The unit will apply audience targeting around cross-platform delivery of video advertising.  The news was reported this morning by the Wall Street Journal. Earlier this year, during the Digital Content NewFronts, we sat down with Zilberbrand to talk […]

The acquisition of Rentrak by comScore represents “an alternative” approach to Nielsen, says Irwin Gotlieb, Chairman of GroupM, the media buying unit of WPP, in this interview with Beet.TV WPP has had minority ownership positions in both Rentrak and comScore.  It will have a 16 percent stake in the combined company which could go up […]