Getting Granular: The DigitalGrit Blog

Yahoo Fully Acquires Right Media

Yahoo today announced that it has fully acquired Right Media, expanding on the 20% stake they've held since October. Right Media is an ad exchange, rather than a standard ad network, which facilitates transactions between publishers and advertisers, auction-style and in real time.

Forrester's Charlene Li asserts that this is a "smart move" by Yahoo:

While this looks like a defensive move against Google's Doubleclick acquisition, as I note above, this expansion has been in the works for the past year. Depending on your perspective, I think it's actually an offensive strategy for Yahoo! to build on its dominance in the graphical ad marketplace.

According to their press release, Yahoo sees exchanges as a key element in the online advertising ecosystem, and views this acquisition as the differentiator that puts them at the front of the pack - especially with all the talk about monetizing all the user-generated content out there.

More from the press release...

Right Media's open exchange will facilitate a frictionless model where buyers have equal opportunity to engage with the largest, most valuable audiences and to extract the maximum value from their campaigns and sellers can access an enormous pool of advertisers and foster competition for their inventory to maximize revenue. Yahoo! will increase its participation in the Right Media Exchange both as a buyer and seller to help increase liquidity in the exchange while empowering publishers and advertisers to generate more value for themselves within this vibrant marketplace.

An open exchange will provide tremendous opportunity for advertisers, publishers, advertising networks, and for Yahoo!:

-- Advertisers will have greater inventory and audience options from Yahoo! and other participants in this exchange, as well as increased control and visibility into the buying process.

-- Publishers will be able to bundle their own ad inventory with Yahoo!'s inventory and the exchange's inventory - thereby boosting demand and generating the highest returns for each ad placement.

-- Advertising networks will reap the same benefits as advertisers and publishers, and additionally, the exchange will benefit those ad networks with unique value propositions, giving them an opportunity to compete with the largest players, thanks to reduced friction and increased transparency.

-- For Yahoo!, this more open approach will allow the company to increase liquidity, allow advertisers to more efficiently ascertain the true value of display ad inventory, and generate greater returns for Yahoo!'s own display inventory. It will give Yahoo! a new channel and inventory for excess demand and provide an opportunity to derive more value from non-premium inventory.

As the largest online publisher and one of the leading ad networks, Yahoo! can help drive additional participation in Right Media's open exchange and ensure a level playing field for all parties.

Hmm. While Li, in her quote above, was quick to point out that this isn't defense against "GoogleClick," but it does seem like RATHER an enormous coincidence, wouldn't you say?

Friday Fun: Twitter Updates

Twitter's grown so fast, their servers aren't able to support the traffic. So they're upgrading. Here's their upgrade notice. Love it!

"Leveraging" the Tragedy

Media outlets like the New York Times and Inside Edition are buying "Virginia Shooting" as a keyword on search engines, according to AdAge's Ken Wheaton. He also reports that "Dateline" has set up a community on Facebook in search of the shooter's friends.

I know you've "gotta do what you've gotta do," but does anyone else feel like this is just kind of...well, YUKKY?

Twittering

AdAge may hate Twitter, but as a lover of all things "social Internet," I admit my addiction. Twitter is like the simplest, fastest form of blogging -- an up-to-the-minute answer to the question, "What are you doing?" in 140 characters or less.

I've seen a lot of industry friends on Twitter, as well as some smart young recording artists who are using the immediately popular site to draw traffic to their MySpace pages. CNN is putting headlines up (sometimes), and the Edwards campaign is involved, too.

It has its shortcomings -- no search (yet), no way that I've discovered to view archives (yet) -- but overall, it's just fun and easy. It's gotten a lot of press already, and growing at a lightening-fast pace.

It may create a lot of (harmless) noise on the Web, but this new "nanoblogging" play will likely make a great addition to MySpace, FaceBook or some other online community. I expect to see lots of partnerships. And a lot more community growth.

Look for me on Twitter here. And, here are a few screenshots, just for fun. (My homepage + a 404 page)

Google Buys DoubleClick. Wow.

Funny how you can be online all day and -- then you catch the biggest story on the good ol' fashio radio on your home commute.

Google acquired DoubleClick for $3.1 Billion.  It was announced after the markets closed today. While some analysts evidently think that Goog's overpaid for the grandaddy of ad networks, let us not forget that DoubleClick serves all the ads for MySpace, WSJ and AOL. DoubleClick pulled in about $300 Million last year.

Google's gone way beyond text-based search ads in recent years, but this acquisition puts them pretty squarely ahead of the pack. As the New York Times points out:

Acquiring DoubleClick expands Google’s business far beyond algorithm-driven ad auctions into a relationship-based business with Web publishers and advertisers. Google has been expanding its AdSense network into video and display ads online and is selling ads to a limited degree on television, newspapers and radio. 

The Times speculates that DoubleClick's new auction-based system, which is not limited to any publisher network, will be a springboard for Google offline aspirations.

My favorite quote on the acquisition comes from Shar von Boskirk, senior analyst, Forrester Research -- she hits the nail right on the head:

"This shores up Google as the absolute leader...This rounds out their capabilities in everything in the online space. There isn't anything they don't have."

Bingo.

Yahoo - 70 Character Limit on Titles and Descriptions

Yahoo will be shortening  ad descriptions to 70 words or less, forcing all to be a little more brief and concise in our marketing copy. Yahoo claims that the change is driven by a better user experience, which will result in a higher conversion rate. (DigitalGrit team: Please comment with your experiences on conversions vs. copy length?)

The skinny on short copy rules from the Yahoo blog:

As an advertiser, you have two options for your ad descriptions, one long (up to 190 characters) and one short (70 characters or fewer). At present, you may use either. Starting in May, however, a short description will be required, while a long description will be optional. This means for all new or modified ads you must provide a short description.  And starting in June, ad descriptions longer than 70 characters may automatically be cut off in Yahoo! Sponsored Search results. We will shorten the description at the nearest complete word to 70 characters, followed by an ellipsis (”…”).  Long descriptions will continue to be shown on some of our external distribution partner web sites.

One more change: "The space limit for titles will remain at 40 characters, while display URLs will be reduced to a maximum of 35 characters." Yahoo promises more information on this soon. 

I see many, many long nights ahead for the SEM team...

Thanks to MarketingVox for the tip!

Google Launches Multivariate Testing

Google launched its own MVT tool yesterday, after 6 months of closed beta testing (see our October 2006 post). There's an overview video on Google that explains it pretty well.

Google considers the testing tool the third leg on the three-legged stool (our industry's favorite cliche), supporting AdWords and Google Analytics.

From ClickZ: "The main problem we're trying to solve is to get people out of the dark ages in terms of how they develop pages," Tom Leung, Google's product manager for Website Optimizer, told ClickZ News. "All too often, they'll just put a page together and maybe the designer will do a few mock-ups, and they'll point to the one they feel is going to be the best one."

Leung says the goal is to help marketers convert their Web sites into a "living laboratory" and expressed the hope it will improve the usability of the Internet overall. Sites will, theoretically, provide more of what online consumers are looking for.

The service currently allows users to upload 10,000 page versions.

Interestingly, the service has launched with "trusted partners" who will serve as consultants to companies new to MVT. Among them is Optimost, one of the leaders in the MVT space. You'd think that they'd view Google's multivariate testing offer as some serious competition, but instead, they've "locked elbows to serve leads and inquiries from customers who ultimately can't afford the latter's technology. These leads the firm will refer to Google and support as a consultant," per ClickZ. Interesting.

(We, as reported in the past, offer MVT through partner Offermatica.)

Google TiSP (Sorry - not compatible with Septic Systems)

Google's latest BETA offer: commode-based TiSP wireless. Easy to install yourself, or go with the in-the-pot delivery.

That's right..."Want WiFi Around? Just Flush it Down." Best thing about it? It's FREE WiFi. Go with the flow. Check it out.

A few reasons to switch to the new service (from the FAQs):

Why should I switch to Google TiSP?

• It's fast. In our testing, TiSP delivers a 10x higher flow rate than basic DSL.

• It's FREE. No more paying hundreds of dollars a year for Internet service that doesn't even necessarily extend to your bathroom!

• It's good for you. Your FREE TiSP service includes a Google Toolbar-based analysis of your dietary habits and genetic predispositions, along with recommendations for healthier living.

Here are some screen shots from the latest addition to Google's suite of services:

 

(Best April Fool's gag for 2007. Hands down.)