Family Learning Center

Posts Tagged ‘Advertising Technology’

Placecast lands $5M more for location-triggered mobile advertisements

San Francisco’s 1020 Placecast, a company working on new mobile advertising technology, said today it raised $5 million in more funding to continue developing its opt-in location-triggered ad service.

Placecast, which previously raised $2 million, pushes advertisements from major brands to the consumer’s phone depending on their physical location, but allows users to opt-in to the system. Here’s a scenario: You’re shopping and have opted in to receive advertisement alerts from your favorite store, say GAP (you can do this by visiting the retailers store, website, or even Facebook page). You’ve parked your car and happen to be walking just a few blocks from a GAP — bang — your phone goes off and there’s a “30 percent-off” message from GAP on t-shirts.  While some might think this would be annoying, remember you did opt in.

For retailers, the service gives them an opportunity to combat dropping foot traffic at stores and energize regional specific marketing campaigns. Focusing on Fortune 500 retailers and brands, Placecast has several well recognized partners, including: Yellowbook, FedEx Office, Avis and Budget Rental Cars and Hyatt Hotels.

Placecast recently comissioned a survey by Harris Interactive that determined that 27 percent of consumers would be somewhat interested in receiving cell phone alerts about sales, assuming it was an opt-in system. As for what alerts they would be interested in receiving, the majority noted either restaurants, events or weather.

Similar companies like Useful Networks and Creativity Software are also providing global brands  – Burger King, BP, Samsung, Pearson and Walt Disney  – with location-based systems.

Round two funding included Quatrex Capital and current investors Onset Ventures and Voyager Capital.

Read the whole story…

Yahoo Veterans Launch Rocket Fuel, A “Hybrid” Ad Network

A team of Yahoo veterans who built its behavioral targeting advertising technology are publicly launching a hybrid ad network today called Rocket Fuel, which they’ve tested over the past year with major brands including Nike, Dell, Microsoft, and American Express. Despite keeping quiet, Rocket Fuel’s ad network reaches 40 million people and shows them about 100 million ads per month.

CEO George John calls Rocket Fuel a “hybrid ad network” because it combines all sorts of targeting data (social, behavioral, contextual, geographical, search) to figure out what works best at any particular moment. “We saw how important it was to let the data tell you which ad to show,” says John, who came from Yahoo along with president Richard Frankel and CTO Abhinav Gupta.

Rocket Fuel’s algorithm considers everything from a consumer’s online behavior and location to the time of day and what particular ad was shown. If people who listen to electronica music are more likely to click on an ad than those who listen to jazz, or people who log in from work respond better than people from home, Rocket Fuel tries to ferret out those details and feed them back into the mechanics of the ad campaign. John explains:

We let the date tell us what works and what is important. Instead of inflicting on customers thousands of targeting options, we figure out which options are working well and move inventory in that way.

Sounds simple enough, but apparently this is not the way most ad targeting is done. Instead, advertisers and ad agencies typically are given a confusing array of targeting options and are left to their own devices to sort through them all. Rocket Fuel is automating that testing process and speeding up the feedback loop so that advertisers can hone in on whatever combination of targeting is working at that second.

But does the world really need another advertising network, hybrid or otherwise? If Rocket Fuel can deliver better advertising campaign ROIs, advertisers will give it a shot. That’s all that matters. If it can’t, it won’t make it off the launchpad.

The companyl raised $6.8 million in a series A round a year ago from Mohr Davidow, Labrador Ventures, and individual angel investors.

Crunch Network: MobileCrunch Mobile Gadgets and Applications, Delivered Daily.

Read the whole story…

Kontera Raises $15.5M For Annoying In-Text Advertising Technology

In-text advertising technology provider Kontera has raised $15.5 million from its current investors Sequoia Capital, Carmel Ventures and Tenaya Capital, the former venture capital arm of Lehman Brothers. This is the second Israeli startup to announce multi-million VC rounds today after 5min informed the public about its $7.5 million Series B round, and once again first reported by business news site Globes.

Kontera provides publishers with real-time semantic analysis technology that can enhance content and other information to dynamically link terms that most accurately represent and predict user-intent and engagement. This is known as in-text advertising, and you might recognize the double-underlined words on some sites that make display ads pop up when you hover your mouse over them. Other market players include Vibrant and Infolinks.

Personally, I find this type of contextual advertising annoying from a reader perspective, and I don’t think I’ve ever clicked on any ads launched by in-text advertisements, unless it was by accident. But I keep hearing from publishers and advertisers who have implemented campaigns using in-text advertising that it’s actually a highly effective way of pay-per-click promotion, and you wouldn’t be the first to tell they were skeptical at first but lauding the technology afterwards.

With the fresh injection, the total amount of capital pumped into the company has now reached $32.8 million. The $10.3 million Series B round now dates back nearly two years.

Crunch Network: CrunchGear drool over the sexiest new gadgets and hardware.

Read the whole story…