metarand

The New Deconomy: Advertising Under Siege?

Yesterday I mosied around the Sydney ad:tech conference. Being in that wonderfully liberating point of time of seeking my next windmill to tilt at I figured it to be a worthy destination.

My first impression, after factoring in the change of venue from last year, was that it was much subdued. Bearing in mind how photographers see things in capture frames, I spoke with one of the photogs doing the rounds and she had the most wonderful comment which totally summed up the atmosphere.

Her takeout was that she was reticent to take pictures of speakers whilst their slides painted doom and gloom backdrops. She kept finding herself hesitating and waiting for more upbeat slides – which didn’t often materialise.

Last year there was almost a feeling of whimsical discovery – ad execs and marketers in a discovery comfort zone: “tell me again how social media works?”. This year – a totally different picture: “we’ve gotta figure a way to make money from this social media stuff”.

I was also somewhat bemused by the rise of Twitter across the conference consciousness. It was definitely the tech word of the day – much like Google was on everyone’s lips a few years back. Expect a Twitter consultant or two to pop up near you soon. It’s the new SEO in the new Deconomy.

Seriously though, the new epiphany for an industry that is increasingly under pressure, will soon be around engagement and I suspect there to be a panel or more at next year’s event on this topic.

Tags: ad:tech, Advertising, Sydney, Twitter

Social Network User-Placed Videos Get Auditude With MySpace and MTV

Palo Alto-based Auditude is a startup focused on identifying videos, and parts of videos, uploaded to the web and then overlaying ads within these clips. They’ve amassed a database of over 250 million videos and 4 years of TV content and have now done a deal with MySpace and MTV that will allow these parties to monetize the videos being uploaded by MySpace users.

As MySpace’s president of sales and marketing is quoted as saying in the LA Times, “This is a game changer.”

No longer are the content players swimming against the tide – if this holds as a precedent, we should see a complete about face and some strong strokes as they all try to pull ahead in the race to monetize their content.

Tags: Auditude, MTV, MySpace

Web Advertising Rates Cross The Rubicon

Ad-optimizer, The Rubicon Project has reported that CPMs dropped by 11% from Q2 to Q3 across their advertiser and publisher networks.

Nicholas Carlson, writing for the Silicon Alley Insider notes that:

Particularly hard hit: social networks (down 3% q/q), young adult (down 8% q/q), music and entertainment sites. News and reference sites actually saw a 36 percent increase.

Tags: Rubicon Project

Is Facebook Desperately Seeking Monetization?

Do we need a new business model for monetizing on the Internet?

Barry Diller, while being interviewed by the WSJ on the break up of IAC, pointed out that social-networking advertising is currently a big headache and methods are yet to be found to make it effective -

“will that get figured out? I absolutely believe it will. What form will it take? Absolutely unknown.“

It seems Facebook is still grappling with the right algorithm as well. The company’s COO and ex-Googler, Sheryl Sandberg stated at the American Magazine Conference in San Francisco yesterday -

“The monetization question on the web is a very big and open one.”

The holy grail, according to her, is “demand generation” and she’s calling for a new model and metrics.

John Furrier believes Sheryl needs to focus more on being a product leader and landing key business development deals – both things that MySpace has excelled at – rather than worrying now about monetizing.

I’m not quite with John yet. I believe that Facebook, and others in the industry, should be starting to think very seriously about what business model they follow.

We are definitely entering a phase when advertising growth slows. I’ve had this view corroborated by a number of very smart people on Sand Hill Road, including folks like Jeremy Liew at Lightspeed Venture Partners, and companies who totally rely on advertising for revenue are going to do it tougher for a while.

Tags: Barry Diller, IAC, Jeremy Liew, John Furrier, Sheryl Sandberg

LookSmart Shuffles The Board

Nasdaq-listed online advertising and performance solutions provider LookSmart (LOOK) has appointed Mark Sanders as Chair of the Board.

Mark has served on the former Australian company’s board since 2003. He replaces Edward West, who is CEO and President, in a move aimed at beefing up the company’s corporate governance regime.

The San Francisco-based company’s shares were down 1.28%.

Tags: LookSmart

Metarand Unplugged: Matthew Colebourne, CEO of coComment On Markets As Conversations

In this session of Metarand Unplugged, we talk with the CEO of Geneva based coComment, Matthew Colebourne.

As an aggregator of millions of comments across the web, Matt has a good understanding of how brands are beginning to grok that markets are conversations and that there is a huge opportunity to build deeper brand engagement through conversations.

Stream the mp3:

here

Stream the Session in Quicktime:

here

Tags: coComment, Matthew Colebourne

Playboy Embraces Social Media

Playboy has dived head first into the social media arena, setting up partnerships with Break, Howcast, Metacafe, Veoh and YouTube.

The entertainment-lifestyle brand sees this move as a great way to leverage off of the success of “The Girls Next Door” and create the Playboy Audience Network.

Mixercast will also be developing ad-supported content and contest widgets for use on the network, which will move to short-form content franchises. This suite of marketing and interactive content widgets will be used to extend Playboy-branded experiences to social networks and also to blogs and start pages.

A talent search is currently underway on YouTube to find the 55th Anniversary Playmate.

Playboy is aiming to create more of the interactive engagement in their digital business that they’ve achieved through the high-touch world of parties, events, location-based entertainment venues, and retail stores.

Tags: Break Media, Howcast, Metacafe, Mixercast, Playboy, Social Media, social network, Veoh, Widgets, YouTube

Twitter Has Steady 20% Daily Active User Rate

Twitter has doubled in size over the past nine months. From one million total users to two million.

What’s really interesting, though, is that it has kept a steady number of active users over this time: 20%.

This is a really high DAU rate and points to a depth of engagement not found, for example on Facebook apps. Most apps on Facebook have a DAU in the 1-2% range [there are exceptions, of course, like the massively mulitplayer game Imperial Galaxy - DAUs have reached as high as 30%].

I’m sure both the rate of growth and the level of engagement are factoring heavily in the current financing round Twitter is going through.

My current favorite Twitter apps:

* Twhirl, an Adobe Air-based Twitter interface, recently acquired by Seesmic;

* Twinkle, an iPhone app that taps into other Twinkle users in a specified radius – great for swarming.

[via Techcrunch, disclosure: I am Chairman of Creative Enclave, the makers of Imperial Galaxy]

Tags: Twhirl, Twinkle, Twitter

Cox Confirms Acquisition of Adify Ad Network

Cox Enterprises has confirmed that it has acquired vertical online advertising network company, Adify Corp.

Adify provides Build Your Own Network technology, which empowers media companies to increase their reach and boost revenue. Backed by Venrock and US Venture Partners, this Silicon Valley company will become part of Cox TMI in a transaction expected to complete in May.

Cox is a leading player in the automotive media vertical, but has pledged to remain committed to serving the broader media industry through Adify.

Some sources are reporting that the deal is valued at $300 million.

Tags: Adify, Advertising Platform, Cox Enterprises, US Venture Partners, Venrock