Yallah Digital !

Hibernate Mode ?

2008-03-05T11:40:00.002+04:00

I have been quite irregular and not been making much progress as a blogger and hence its better i move on to something more ..er... LIVE !

My rants are up and running on Twitter ...Add me in and we can start the conversation....

You will find me here

Aamir the blogger ?

2008-02-20T11:40:00.000+04:00

Aamir Khan, the popular bollywood actor is quite a blogger as you could see from here ....

Great to see that blogging is catching on as a social medium beyond the techie and geeks :-)

Check the number of comments he recieves on his posts ...phenomenal !

Google is having the cake all the way ....

2007-12-30T10:49:00.000+04:00

fascinating article on how google is planning to eat the rest of the advertising market via the doubleclick acqusition...

Thanks to Microsoft's anti-trust bid we are having nicely worded and diagrammed idea of the extent to which google's has thought out on this .....

Check it on here http://googlewatch.eweek.com/content/google_vs_microsoft/meet_google_search_giant_monopolist_extraordinaire.html?kc=EWKNLBOE122907STR1

Egoistic Executives - Executive Careers - Portfolio.com

2007-12-22T18:05:00.000+04:00

Egoistic Executives - Executive Careers - Portfolio.com

Berry, Berry Ambitious - Pinkberry - Brand Buzz

2007-12-17T17:15:00.000+04:00

Berry, Berry Ambitious - Pinkberry - Brand Buzz

From Hip-Hop to Geek Wisdom

2007-12-13T17:16:00.000+04:00

From Hip-Hop to Geek Wisdom

Skateboarding Rolls Out of the Suburbs - New York Times

2007-11-10T20:32:00.000+04:00

Skateboarding Rolls Out of the Suburbs - New York Times

Thats Mine !

2007-11-10T16:12:00.000+04:00

Adverblog: Fight for a "free magenta"

Check this story on Adverblog, where T-mobile has been running around suing other brands who are using the magenta colors on their branding ......

hmm now where do you draw the line between creativity and infringement of rights......

Hey have you heard of the urban legend that it was coke who dressed up santa in red and white ?

Check it out here ..quite a fascinating read :-)

Its no bull !

2007-11-07T12:29:00.000+04:00

Not exactly in the digital domain ... But what the heck ?

First Drive: 2008 Ford Mustang Bullitt - Day 1 - Autoblog

Google phone tring tring yet ?

2007-11-06T10:57:00.000+04:00

The Google Phone: The Story So Far, Some Launch Details & What’s Next « GigaOM

The whole world is going gaga over the Gphone ......
Some say that its gonna be a handset with loads of Google Apps and goodies
While others were looking for a mobile software platform on the likes of symbian and Windows CE....

So now google has announced the platform with significant overtures towards building a worldwide ecosystem for mobile internet usage.

What the Facebook Ad Network Might Look Like

2007-11-05T10:32:00.000+04:00

What the Facebook Ad Network Might Look Like

Pretty cool to see how the self-serve mode works well for advertisers ! Yipee

DCist: Rochambeau Your Way to Free (Well, Almost) Tortillas

2007-06-23T16:45:00.000+04:00

DCist: Rochambeau Your Way to Free (Well, Almost) Tortillas: "Rochambeau Your Way to Free (Well, Almost) Tortillas

snipshot_e4njq71x0ai.jpgThanks to a tip from the writers at WeRiteGoode, we are letting you know of yet another fast food giveaway (well, almost).

For those of you who find that standing in extensive lines for a dollop of ice cream or a free doughnut is a tad 'lazy,' California Tortilla is offering a bit of competition with their discount. For today only, if you beat the cashier in a game of Rock Paper Scissors, (Rochambeau, Jankenpon, Muk-Chi-Ba, etc...) you will earn $1 off any entrée item. But please, do not play the 'extreme' variation and assault the cashier afterwards. Bask in your win while munching on some tortilla chips.

If you've forgotten how to play, you should brush up on the World RPS Society's rules, and practice some Rochambeau tactics. With enough practice, you too will feel the satisfaction of earning your $1 discount and perhaps find yourself in any number of RPS championships. Don't forget to stretch, or you'll sprain a finger.

Locations can be found throughout the D.C. area, including Chinatown, Cleveland Park, Courthouse Arlington, Bethesda, and Silver Spring."

An Integrated Agency "Pulp Fiction" Style?

2007-06-23T12:43:00.001+04:00

An Integrated Agency "Pulp Fiction" Style?

By Joshua Palau

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Separating agencies by specialties can work, but it's time to stop passing the buck. Here's a better approach.

My brother-in-law is an electrician for IBEW Local 3, which I vastly underestimated when he married into the family. Lawyers, doctors and accountants are nice to have, but a blue collar union guy is way more useful. He's also extremely handy at other construction matters, but I still wouldn't let him build me a whole house. Instead, there are carpenters, electricians, plumbers, et cetera who work together, leveraging their strengths to build a structure. The underlying theme here is that while you have people who can do facets of other people's jobs, it makes sense to leverage their strengths in a collaborative setting. This begs the question: If you wouldn't let an electrician build a whole house, why would you have one agency plan and execute all of your online marketing?

I was reading a recent article from The Wall Street Journal in which several companies that I respect were critiquing the current agency structure and trying to push Madison Avenue to come up with an integrated model. Based on my 10 years in the online space, not only do I not think we are getting there but, more importantly, I don't think it should be that much of a concern. I fear that if clients push us there, they'll end up with decent plumbing and lighting but a crooked house.

Shouldn't this have been solved by now?
With all the money, resources and clout, don't you think that if a large agency could have nailed integrating traditional and digital they would have by now? It would obviously provide them the ability to stamp out the pesky interactive agencies and eliminate their need to continue trying to buy us. How many e- or i-versions of a traditional shop do we need to see to realize that it's not as simple as it may seem. Culture, philosophy, logos, P&Ls and egos are just different -- between traditional and interactive -- and not the easiest things to meld together. It's not that big agencies don't want to adapt; it's just tougher to turn a battleship then a Schooner.

I want to make sure I am clear; I am not saying give up, or that it will never happen. I'm just saying that separating agencies by specialties can work, if handled properly.

Stop passing the buck
Here is the thing that I find the most interesting: Clients would like us to integrate, but I have met few if any traditional companies that are set up to plan and purchase in an integrated format. When I sold cross-media programs there were several clients I had to work with who all had a specialty. If you would like agencies to integrate, please integrate as well. If not, we're still going to have to deal with multiple meetings and learning curves.

I have a few clients that are struggling with internal competition. We have some ideas on who should own the category based on market share, company value, offerings to consumers, et cetera. However, there are a lot of politics, finance and egos that make this decision a lot more difficult. Although we know the answers, we have to manage the decision-making complexity that they live in. If an agency with this much experience struggles with category integration across business units, how easily can you expect your agency to handle integration?

Let's try and figure out why you want an integrated agency. Here are a few ideas:

Upfronts don't work online
The upfront is counterintuitive to interactive. In a world that changes so fast, why would you want to commit to a handful of partners? We continue to attend conferences that talk about the consumer being in control and that they want their media the way they want it when they want it. The theme here is flexibility and being able to adapt based on popularity and what's hot to consumers. The upfront buying strategy puts you in a box that doesn't allow you to take advantage of the very reason that you want an integrated agency in the first place, which means taking advantage of the fragmented media society.

One agency's view
Using one agency, you're stuck with one agency's view of how things work. One agency leads to vanilla plans that focus on their view of what is important or profitable. When you bring in experts from a few fields, ideas get bounced around and real marketing happens.

A hypothetical theory on this that I like to discuss is with Johnson's baby. Their tagline is "having a baby changes everything," and they're right. When I had my second daughter Logan, I didn't need to know that having a baby changes everything; I kind of knew that. Logan had sensitive skin and the same lotion that worked for Zoe (my first daughter) didn't work for her. If you're using one agency for all tactics they may be blinded by the baby message and not realize that they can stay broad and targeted for this campaign. They should continue with the broad reach campaign with print ad and TV, but online and search should change the online focus to both first-time parents, and parents who now have a second child. When I search for "changing diapers," I should get the "changes everything" message, but if I search for "sensitive skin lotion," I better get lotion.

Buying power?
How often will it make sense to buy the same property across multiple channels? Just because you buy Viacom, Fox, et cetera in the traditional world doesn't mean you should buy them online. For every print ad in American Baby, I can show you a better reason to compliment that with Babycenter or About.com on pregnancy. So do you want a discount or a good strategy?

Pssst. Another secret from someone who has worked at two media companies: 90 percent of us are not compensated the same way and, while we smile at the meeting, we're fighting internally as to why one is more valuable than the other, which means you, the client, lose. Last I checked, one of the best-performing tactics is search. There is no buying power in search. If Google breaks into traditional it still won't care that you're spending millions on TV because the auction model works perfectly for Google and levels the playing field. The company can't discount search pricing because you're a big company or it will have a revolt on its hands.

Agencies are just good at what they do
There is a reason Ogilvy has managed IBM so well, for years making some of the best campaigns I can remember (I still love "the magic box," and I have no idea what the box actually was). There's a reason Avenue A | Razorfish (whom I work for) is the only interactive agency to crack Ad Age's top 10; like the union analogy, we all have specialties.

I promise not to sell you print if you promise not to buy interactive from e-traditional. My wife's old business partner is a recruiter. When he had his kid, the doctor asked him if he wanted to cut the cord, to which he replied, "I don't ask you to phone screen, don't ask me to cut the cord." You don't want my search people to write print copy or your traditional agency to write search copy.

So what do I do?
Next to Jules, the best character in "Pulp Fiction," is The Wolf because "he solves problems." That is what your agencies should do, but we need your help.

In a previous article on handling paid and organic search, I said that you should put your agencies in the same sandbox. Instead of forcing your agencies to crack a model that they haven't been able to just yet, let them live off their strengths and deliver you a world-class strategy. In order to make this happen, bring your agencies together at Zed's Pawn Shop and read them the following:

"I'm tired of reading Insert thought leader of the month and hearing Insert cliché of the month. I don't believe digital will kill traditional and vice versa. You're all important, and you're all going to help us solve our problems. Sometimes the answer is going to be traditional, but sometimes it's going to be digital. Sometimes we're going to lay out different tactics for each of you based on goals, but we're going to do it together. This means no more separate meetings on strategy or tactics. This means we all get together and decide what's best for me, because in the end, it's all about me. Don't feel threatened by each other; neither of you are going to steal the other's money unless it makes sense for my business. At the first hint that you're not playing well together, I'm bringing in the gimp and replacing you with Insert cool agency. We're going to develop a fees structure that plays to all your strengths and doesn't discount one of you because your tactic may be cheaper; it will be about performance. Now finish your Denver Omelet and let's go to work."

Joshua Palau is group director of search engine marketing for Avenue A | Razorfish. Read full bio.

NPD: Younger Kids Are Using CE Products

2007-06-23T12:12:00.000+04:00

By Colleen Bohen -- TWICE, 6/5/2007 12:57:00 PM

Port Washington, N.Y. — Children begin using consumer electronic devices at an average age of 6.7 years old, according to findings in The NPD group’s recently released “Kids and Consumer Electronics Trends III” report.

This number is down from the average age of 8.1 years found in the research firm’s similar 2005 study.

“[Children] appear to have no fear of technology and adopt it easily and without fanfare, making these devices a part of their everyday lives,” said Anita Frazier, an industry analyst with NPD.

NPD said the study measures device usage dynamics and trends to determine the penetration of consumer electronics in kids’ lives today and how this has changed since the group’s earlier studies on the topic in 2005 and 2006.

The group reported that the average age at which a child initially uses a product has shown a decline in virtually all categories since 2005. In this year’s survey, televisions and desktop computers were the CE devices shown to have the youngest initial exposure rates at about 4 or 5 years of age. Satellite radios and portable digital media players (PDMPs) showed the oldest initial exposure rates at about 9 years of age.

The report found that kids’ ownership of PDMPs, portable video games and digital cameras showed the most growth of the categories studied, even though it found that overall the average number of CE devices both owned and used by kids is down slightly compared to the year before. Cellphones and DVD players also showed increases in ownership.

In terms of purchases, cellphones, digital cameras and PDMPs were mentioned most as being bought in the past year.

When compared to their adult counterparts, NPD found that kids’ versions of all electronic products show “strong performance” and children are using kids’ versions at a younger age and more frequently. However, almost all adult versions of these products, save for video games, show higher penetration rates than do the children’s versions of the same products.

Though the level of interest in branded kids’ versions of electronics products is still present among the majority of parents surveyed, that level of interest has declined from 83 percent last year to 74 percent this year.

According to a release, NPD collected data for this report via an online national survey of adults ages 25 and older with children ages 4 to 14 in their household and whose children had used at least one of the CE devices measured in the study. The study was conducted from March 16 to March 22.

CrunchGear

2007-06-23T12:11:00.000+04:00

Coming from CrunchGear: "iPod Controls On Your Lady Lumps

I’m really thirsty and I’m not sure why. Anyways, these fine young ladies are sporting the hottest new trend for the Summer: iPod controls on a bikini. I’m certain that this will cause a few pubescent lads to be smacked when they try and skip to the next song. “I was only trying to fast forward, I swear. I can’t help that your boob is right there.” Sure, pal. Whatever you say. Her eyes are a little north, buddy. Focus!
Read the rest of this entry »"

Is Wis.dm Your Next Web Obsession? | TIME

2007-06-23T01:49:00.000+04:00

Is Wis.dm Your Next Web Obsession? | TIME

Check out another cool web 2.0 social networking site, interestingly based on conversations and Q&A.....
That reminds of Consumating, a tags based socialk site agian with querstions and interactions being the base of the whole site.

Advertising Age - Major Marketers Push 20% of Ad Budgets Into New Media

2007-06-16T17:36:00.000+04:00

Advertising Age - Major Marketers Push 20% of Ad Budgets Into New Media: "Major Marketers Push 20% of Ad Budgets Into New Media
AAF Study, Conference Demonstrate Advertisers' Feelings About Web

By Ira Teinowitz

Published: June 14, 2007
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AdAge.com) -- Facing a shifting media environment, major marketers are allocating up to 20% of their total ad budget for experimentation in new media, according to a survey unveiled at the recent American Advertising Federation annual meeting, where grappling with the changing marketing world was a common theme among the 750 attendees.

Marketers and media executives described several ad campaigns that achieved significant results with virtually no media spending, instead aiming limited dollars toward creative that developed web buzz.

Coffee and razors
Mary Baglivo, CEO of Saatchi & Saatchi, New York, detailed a campaign for Procter & Gamble's Folgers coffee aimed at an 18-to-24-year-old audience (well below its normal target) fashioned around the idea of how to wake up in the morning. Matt Freeman, CEO of Tribal DDB Worldwide described a campaign for a Philips razor that would have been next to impossible to run on TV -- but it generated so much traffic that the number of razors the company hoped to sell in a year sold in six weeks.

Aldo Quevedo, president-chief creative officer at Dieste Harmel & Partners,"

Analytics Simplified......

2007-06-16T12:42:00.000+04:00

Have been thinkin for a while to sit down and put these thoughts down so that a dialogue could be initiated and we all could get to learn more on the fascinating subject of web analytics.

Simply put analytics would be the science and equally so the art of studying the behaviour of the actions ocurring in a space inorder to arrive at actionable information to support decision making.

Now as funny as it may sound, even a highly regarded peer information source such as wikipedia cant arrive at a satisfactory definition of the word. More on that here .

Nevertheless, suffice to say that anaytics gives you the numbers to play around so that you can get a better picture to make decisions.

Now this gets more interesting and more relevant when we apply it to websites and online marketing
The key feature of any web related marketing activity is the fact that everything is measurable and quantified right from the moment someone clicks on your banner to the point of checking out from your website.

Now the very fact that everything is measurable and accountable leads to unprecendented accountability and shall i say reliability on online media.Because at the end of the day if the objective is to drive sales or to sell then why spend on website A or Approach B ( Email marketing, Search Ads, Viral Marketing) if you know that it doesnt work.

Which actually brings me to the point of how much information or analytics would one require to get enough information as to smoothen the transaction process and figure out which segments in a media plan works and doesnt work.

In the past few days two of my clients have shown a remarkable level of interest in knowing what happens beyond the click and what is really working for them and not working for them.

In lieu of this i jus did some diggin around in order to understand where to start in this regard.

I have to admit that i jus know the few bare minimal things on web analytics ie, the various vendors in the market and the two primary types of web analytics sytems etc.

To clarify on this i jus did the usual basic reasearch on google

The 10 / 90 Rule for Magnificent Web Analytics Success » Occam’s Razor by Avinash Kaushik

Liar Liar !

2007-03-24T12:48:00.000+04:00

Now this is really a freaky thing .....

Imagine having a widget on your mobile or your skype account which can analyze a conversation and sort of detect wether the person is lying or not !

Well you dont need to imagine anymore ....since its alrady there !

Check it out !

MTV : Pimping it all the way ......

2007-02-20T18:05:00.000+04:00

When MTV decides to make a move, you get an idea of how significant the move is ...
Coz 25 years down the line the network has managed to remain more or less a staple fare to the most fickle minded consumer segment in the history of mankind . :-)

Now what happens to MTV ( or rather 'empty-we' as some really harsh critic friends of mine would slam in India), when it enters an era, where the kids chitchat with their neighbourhood friends through guestbooks on myspace and facebook and no longer on the good ol walkie talkie or the phone, where to 'pimp' is deemed as something respectable enough to spend hours on....especially when it involves HTML plugins and Avatars :-).

Thats the simplest of the questions thats sumner redstone has to answer......

Check out this fascinating article on IHT Publish

Resolutions 101

2007-01-04T21:56:00.000+04:00

Thats sort of says it all ....
My New year resolution ....or atleast my blogging resolution ( sneer !) would go as follows ....

I will...

Blog regularly eventhough it would mean that i might sound obnoxious,whimsical and trivial :-)

Blog on trends,media especially digital media and how it affects the way humans percieve and act !

Blog more on my personal experiences as opposed to reporting on what others have said about something that has been talked about on something that need to be ..... BLAH BLAH BLAH :p get the point ?

So without further adieu.....

Going Bedouin !

2006-10-31T19:06:00.000+04:00

Livin in dubai , i dont think anyone needs a primer on the traffic conditions ......the less said the better :-)

I start off from home at sharjah ( A neighbouring state theoritically but then its more or less like a suburb to dubai ) at 7 in the morning so that i can make it to my office in DMC at 9.

I think its time a lot of us in dubai go bedouin ( No pun intended ) :-)

RSS is here !

2006-10-10T11:15:00.000+04:00

Ok this has taken a long while in coming .....

RSS feeds although a 4-5 year old concept has really revolutionised the way people consume digital content.Although its been a a buzz word in the digital media circles for the last few years it was never seen as a mass vehicle for advertising like email or content.
But the fact that its gonna be integarted into a browser jus flips this qualm all the way aroun ...

Mozilla Firefox had this cool function ( infact this was the clincher that made me shift my office surfing to fox ! )

and now the guys at redmond have realised and added it on to the IE7 ....the sheer size of IE ( more than 80%) make this a D day for the world of RSS !

Also dont forget to checkout the IE7 its a pretty nifty thing and seems like its gonna give some fight to the cool fox !

check out what steve rubels got to say .....

Due Diligence ...

2006-08-12T19:38:00.000+04:00

I guess at times i do find the tinge or arrogance in some of us in the online ad industry ...but im sure we got a long way to go before we get this sort of brotherly advice ;-)

Online Spin » Blog Archive » Hold the Arrogance, Please

ALT

2006-08-02T17:01:00.000+04:00

Yeah one look here and you kinda get the idea about how tough an act it is to maintain a fresh and regularly updated blog ...
and now when these folks at yahoo are putting their act together :-), guess its time that we at the media side take the cue and chug along ....

Revenge of the Nerds (Truly !)

2006-07-10T15:09:00.000+04:00

Love this ..this is what i call digital empowerment of the individual !
Revenge of the Nerds

MicroMarketing

2006-07-10T11:18:00.000+04:00

been a while since i blogged :-(
Was quite caught up with work
and when work hits you ....you know what im talkin about ...
Ok now comin back to the subject of micromarketing
The web is a interesting filter which enables you to seperate the eric clapton fans from the george harrison one's and so on and so forth ....
what this presents,is a tremendous oppurtunity to address niche markets which otherwise would have been impossible due to the massive entry barriers errected by the incumbent players...
check this place out....
if you are interested you could also check cafepress
Tcritic - Daily T-Shirt Blog as well as Zazzle
Seems like some action on these lines are also up in Dubai...
Watch this space for more dope on that ;-)

Google Middle East Coming to Egypt .....

2006-07-03T10:04:00.000+04:00

Old News ...Yeah from what little info that i could 'Digg' aroun on it ...

Arab world's the Hotspot.....

2006-06-26T12:39:00.000+04:00

(VIA: International Herald Tribune)

A media battle for hearts and market share in the Middle East "is evolving into a teeming crowd of Western news organizations poised to deliver headlines--and geopolitical views--in the language of the Koran," reports the International Herald Tribune. With government backing, Germany's Deutsche Welle plans to air as much as 24 hours of news programming in Arabic this autumn, while a French CNN-style Arabic channel is in development. Even the state-owned Russia Today is eying the region, with plans for a Web site and Arabic television. Only CNN is holding back for now--sticking with its Arabic Web site, currently getting more than 300,000 unique visitors per month. "I'm losing track," says Jerry Timmins, head of the BBC World Service's operations in Africa and the Middle East. "There's pretty much of an announcement a week, and it seems to be part of the fashion industry." His operation is already in the fray, spending $35 million to roll out an Arabic news broadcast in the fall, starting with 12 hours a day and moving to round-the-clock coverage. "People will have a look" at the new channels, predicts Nasib Bitar, a Dubai-based producer and media consultant. "It all depends on content and how they run it. I believe if any broadcaster showed compassion through its programming, people would watch." - Read the whole story...

Traits of successful bloggers

2006-06-25T17:15:00.000+04:00

(VIA Micropersuasion)

Blogging is gaining a lot of traction as a social medium of communication
over here steve rubel, a leading blog and CGC evangelist tracks a fascinating study on the traits of successful bloggers.more down here ....

A fascinating new UMass study penned by Dr. Nora Ganim Barnes, Chancellor Professor of Marketing, interviewed 74 different business bloggers to identify what makes some stand out more than others. The paper (PDF) is chock full of really interesting information. Among other things, the study tracks the time commitment required to make a business blog a regular read. Dr. Barnes extracted the following "truths" from her research:

1. Blogs Take Time and Commitment
2. Blogs Must Be Part of A Plan
3. A Blog is a Conversation
4. Transparency, Authenticity, and Focus are good. Bland is Bad

PwC: Internet Sector To Lead Global Media Growth

2006-06-25T13:58:00.000+04:00

The Hollywood Reporter
Global entertainment and media is expected to grow by $500 billion over the next five years, thanks to online media, says PricewaterhouseCoopers, topping off at $1.83 trillion in 2010--up from an estimated $1.33 trillion in 2005. The financial services firm says media spending will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 6.6 percent; advertising growth is expected at 6.2 percent, again, increases will be largely driven by Internet ad spending, which the firm expects to grow at a compound annual rate of 12.9 percent. The other major growth driver for media overall will be video games, PwC said, estimating an 11.4 percent annual gain. Analysts said increased adoption of digital media delivery will help ramp up consumer spending. "Virtually every segment of the entertainment and media industry is shifting from physical distribution to digital distribution of content," said Wayne Jackson, global leader of PwC's entertainment and media practice. He added that the digital revolution will remain a key theme in the U.S. in particular, where video games and the Internet sector--including Internet advertising--will see the strongest five-year gains, 8.9 and 8.4 percent, respectively. Globally, advertising is set to grow from $383 billion last year to $521 billion in 2010; not surprisingly, PwC expects Internet advertising to see the largest increase--growing 18.1 percent per year to $51.6 billion worldwide, and $25.5 billion in the United States. - Read the whole story...

Online Ad Exchanges Sprout Up...

2006-06-25T13:56:00.000+04:00

(Via Clickz)

Finding the most value for available ad inventory has always been a problem for publishers, and advertisers are of course interested in getting the best deal when they make a buy. Several companies, including Right Media and AdECN, have begun to address this problem by creating auction-style exchanges to facilitate transactions between advertisers and media buyers.
"We're seeing lots of new inventory being created, and a lot more money flowing in once the pockets of inefficiency are removed," Right Media CEO Michael Walrath told ClickZ.
The Right Media Exchange (RMX) auctions every ad in real-time to the highest bidder. Online ad networks participate in the exchange by putting their publishers' remnant inventory up for sale, and by buying relevant inventory on behalf of their advertisers. Publishers and advertisers don't participate directly in RMX, but are instead represented by ad networks.
Without an ad exchange, unsold inventory today is sometimes passed through multiple ad networks to find avails, with each network along the path taking a cut. RMX is designed to keep that from happening by identifying the inventory that offers the most efficient path, providing the highest ROI, and otherwise delivering the most value to the advertiser and publisher, Walrath said.
Right Media's Yield Manager product is the interface for ad networks to buy and sell inventory on the exchange. The company also offers tools for publishers to create a private exchange and link it to RMX, or to sell their ad inventory on RMX as well as manage inventory sold elsewhere. It also has a similar tool for buyers to manage all of their campaigns, both on and off the exchange, in one place.
More than 50 ad networks representing 2,900 advertisers and 7,900 publishers are using the exchange already; numbers that have been growing steadily for the past 15 months, according to Walrath.
Online advertising exchange AdECN is not quite as far along. It's currently running with only one ad network, Experclick, in which it holds a controlling interest. It was necessary to create Experclick as a proof of concept for AdECN, according to CEO Bill Urschel, but the company is examining ownership options for Experclick once AdECN invites other networks to the exchange next month.
"It's important that we keep the two separate in order to avoid any conflicts and remain neutral," he said. "I expect we'll spin it off soon."
Another key to maintaining neutrality is its pricing model, Urschel said. AdECN charges participants a flat fee per transaction, so it remains a disinterested party in the deal, and has no incentive to favor one ad network over another.
Like Right Media, AdECN does not do business directly with advertisers or publishers; it works instead with ad networks, ad brokers, and a few ad agencies that maintain relationships with buyers and sellers, acting as a network themselves. Urschel likens it to a stock exchange, where buyers and sellers work through a broker.
AdECN, through Experclick's network, currently supports five IAB-standard in-page units and a pop-under format. It does not allow ads with adult content, and publishers working with a participating network are able to exclude ads by category.
The AdECN model lets advertisers decide up-front how much they're willing to pay and only delivers ads when those requirements are met. AdECN also monitors individual placements on publisher sites, and will adjust an advertiser's bid downward if it determines that a given position is worth less than others, such as being at the bottom of a page or surrounded by other ads.
"It's one thing to create a liquid market, but it still needs to be a fair market," Urschel said. "The spot where the ad appears needs to be up to par, so we keep a history of every spot and compare it with its peers before allowing the ad to go through."
Publishers benefit because they are assured of getting the highest price an advertiser is willing to pay at the time for their inventory, and can even end up selling more inventory in smaller chunks than they would ordinarily, Urschel said. Publishers also have a safety net, in that they can choose a back-up provider of ads if their requirements are not met at a given time by an AdECN-brokered ad.
The exchange model will not cut out ad networks, as long as they are providing value, both Walrath and Urschel insist.
"It holds networks accountable to a value standard. If they're taking more margin than they're providing in value, they'll get disintermediated," Walrath said. "If the ad network is creating value, they'll get more business from the exchange."
"We're not going to change the way good ad networks do business," Urschel said. "Extraneous middlemen will suffer. If there's no value-add, and they're just brokering a deal, that's not bringing anything to the table."
Ad networks can provide value and benefit by participating in RMX in many ways, Walrath said, including offering advanced targeting, reporting and optimization; or packaging inventory creatively to improve revenue optimization for publishers.
Support for creating these kinds of exchanges for ads has been growing. Walmart, HP, Microsoft and several others are reportedly exploring an online marketplace for TV ads through eBay.

Ecko 1, Pentagon 0

2006-06-24T19:37:00.000+04:00

Yeah that weird is what we got here ;-)

It used to be that the benchmark for a successful viral campaign was whether it came back to you in an email forward. Now, thanks to the combined efforts of David Droga and Smuggler Films, it's whether you can rouse the attention of the White House.

If you haven't yet seen the handheld film of a graffiti artist breaking into Andrews Air Force Base and tagging Air Force One, chances are you've heard about it in the news. So convincing and pervasive is the three-minute film that the mainstream media has taken to it like bloggers to a Bushism. In addition to "Did They Or Didn't They?"-type sequences on CNN, MSNBC and ABC, the story has been picked up by a reputed 17,000 individual news outlets. But the coup de grace for everyone involved has come in the form of not one but three official denials from none other than the Pentagon. "The level of media attention shocked us," says Droga. "Once it got to the White House, it took on a new life."

The first project to come out of Droga's brand new endeavor, Droga5, the video made for an ideal extension of the Ecko brand. According to director Randy Krallman, the spot posed some pretty major logistical challenges, the largest of which involved finding an old plane to repaint. "Getting a 747 that has engines on it is a big deal - they're either out of commission or [really expensive]," he says. Fortunately, luck was on their side, and within days, the crew found an old plane to scrub up. "It looked like Latvia Air or something, it was just this real Third World-looking jet," says Krallman. "You never would've stepped on this jet. But after a $150,000 paint job, it looked dead-on."

The next hurdle involved finding a way to make San Bernadino, California look like Andrews AFB, Maryland. For that, Krallman turned to the great oracle Google. "If you go on Google Earth you can see the whole layout of the base," he says. "I wanted the level of detail to hold up for someone who'd been there, and that was the high watermark we prepared for." According to the pundits at CNBC, he did a solid job. "One of their Pentagon correspondents was like, 'At least one of the shots in this is real because if you've been there as much as I have, you recognize that hangar'," laughs Krallman. "I was like, 'Fucking sweet!'"

For Droga, the success pales in comparison to what might have happened had the spot somehow gone wrong. "The lawyers made us put a disclaimer on the end, just so we didn't end up in Guantanamo Bay... I was nervous, to be absolutely honest. I thought, 'Holy crap, I'll be so annoyed if the first piece I do gets me in trouble'."

The Video

http://www.smugglersite.com/02/directors/comm/krallman_stillfree.html

Dude, The Future is out of the tube.....

2006-06-24T19:34:00.000+04:00

Mark Tutssel, worldwide CEO of the ad agency Leo Burnett, told marketers they need to learn to reach consumers on user-generated content sites like YouTube, which the Financial Times points out now has greater reach than MTV. Tutssel said TV-like commercials would be effective on a site like YouTube, but savvy marketers would create videos with the intention of having them distributed virally like the other viral content on the site. Consumer interaction, allowing consumers to create their own commercials and content, and trusting that they want to interact with your brand would also be key to the future of video advertising. "Once consumers have interacted with brands, they will not go back to being shouted at by marketers," he said. Tutssel, speaking at the annual Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, delivered his speech prior to handing out an award to a campaign that was designed to look like a homemade video. Viral video was a hot topic in Cannes this year, FT said--not only because of its enormous potential reach, but also because it sometimes doesn't involve any spend on media at all. Last year's Chevy-Tahoe campaign, which invited consumers to create their own ads using TV commercial footage, is a good example: it drew 5.5 million consumers to a Web site and produced 22,000 entries--just 16 percent were negative. - Read the whole story...

Yallah ..lets get going huh ?

2006-06-16T18:25:00.000+04:00

hey ...
Jus been over a month since u have shifted from delhi to dubai...

Some of the key indicators out here made me believe that the Digital media space here is gonna be exciting in the coming days.

A relatively untapped market,high penetration of access devices,high consumption of traditional media,relatively big youth segment in the population,and ofcourse a very dynamic government.All these factors make the middle east and interesting flagpost on the World Digital Media Space

I will be jotting down my observations here...

yallah.....