They say that a click is a click, but according to a recent Mpire report, using AdXpose, all clicks aren't equal. Especially clicks generated from run-of-network (RON) online advertising buys. According to the report up to 95% of these clicks and up to 50% of the ad impressions are generated from fraudulent sources.
by Kristina Knight
AdXpose is Mpire's campaign analysis, verification and optimization technology. Researchers found that just over 50% of the ad impressions delivered and 95% of the clicks generated were potentially fraudulent. This traffic was hidden beneath layers of I-Frames, which are ad units that pull advertising content from another source. Researchers also found a large amount of URL padding. URL padding happens when a range of URLs are made available for an ad but only a few of the URLs are actually used.
Other interesting findings:
• Ad networks need to improve on 'above the fold' ad placement
• Mpire tested three campaigns with 11 campaign buys on 9 ad networks/exchanges
• More than 20 million impressions were served during the test
"Click fraud and impression fraud is far more pervasive than the industry has been willing to admit, yet thus far the industry has taken a laissez-faire approach to policing downstream traffic providers, leading to material waste in campaign budgets," said Marissa Gluck, principal analyst at Radar Research, the company that verified the research. "By delving deeper into site-level data, advertisers and agencies can get a better understanding of the impact of fraud on campaign ROI, and can thus take steps to focus their ad spend on the sites, networks and exchanges that deliver the most legitimate impressions and clicks."
Along with this report, comes news that ClickForensics has identified a new botnet called "Bahama Botnet". The botnet distributes malware, disguising itself as a high-quality source of advertising traffic. Just another reason for pay per click marketers to research advertising networks and pay close attention to how a campaign is performing from beginning to end.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Adobe to Acquire Omniture in $1.8 Billion Deal
Adobe Systems Inc. agreed to buy software company Omniture Inc. for $1.8 billion, a deal designed to help customers track and make money from Web sites that were created with Adobe's programs.
Adobe said it will pay $21.50 a share in cash for Omniture, a 24% premium to Tuesday's 4 p.m. price. Omniture shares surged 25% in after-hours trading on the news, while Adobe shares declined 4.2%.
The announcement came as Adobe reported its profit fell 29% and revenue slid 21% in its latest quarter as the continuing downturn in media markets slows demand for its traditional software, such as Photoshop and InDesign.
Omniture, based in Orem, Utah, specializes in a field known as Web analytics. It provides to advertisers, media companies and other customers information about user activity, such as what Web pages they visit, how much time they spend there and what ads they click on. Customers may change their ads or Web sites based on such data, including data about the effectiveness of ads based on terms users type into search engines.
Deal Journal
Omniture Deal May Not Bring Change Adobe Wants Companies such as Ford Motor Co., Ameritrade Holding Corp. and Xerox Corp. pay monthly fees to access Omniture's services. The amount they pay typically reflects the Web traffic occurring on their sites.
Adobe, San Jose, Calif., said it plans to build code into its content-creation programs to help them exchange data with Omniture services, eliminating time-consuming programming by customers and helping more of them make money on their Web sites. "We really think that we can actually tranform how digital content is created," said Shantanu Narayen, Adobe's chief executive officer.
Web analytics generates about $600 million in world-wide annual revenue now, but the industry is expected to grow to $2.2 billion by 2011, according to a June 2008 estimate by J.P. Morgan.
Companies that compete with Omniture include Webtrends Inc. and Coremetrics. Google Inc., the search giant, also offers some analytic services.
Scott Kessler, an analyst at Standard & Poor's who tracks Omniture, said it has grown by buying smaller players in the market. But Omniture's business has been squeezed by the recession and the company has a mixed record of meeting Wall Street estimates, he said. It reported a loss of $44.8 million last year even as its revenue nearly doubled to $295.6 million. Partly for those reasons, Mr. Kessler remains skeptical about how quickly Adobe could benefit from the deal.
Suresh Vittal, an analyst at market researcher Forrester Research, was more optimistic. He said many aspects of Web sites aren't reliably measured now, and Adobe's ability to include such capabilities with its software could give site creators valuable new information.
Adobe said Omniture will become a new business unit. Omniture CEO Josh James will join Adobe as senior vice president of the new unit, reporting to Mr. Narayan.
The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of Adobe's 2009 fiscal year, which ends in November.
For the quarter ended Aug. 28, Adobe reported a profit of $136 million, down from $191.6 million a year earlier. Revenue was $697.5 million.
Adobe said it will pay $21.50 a share in cash for Omniture, a 24% premium to Tuesday's 4 p.m. price. Omniture shares surged 25% in after-hours trading on the news, while Adobe shares declined 4.2%.
The announcement came as Adobe reported its profit fell 29% and revenue slid 21% in its latest quarter as the continuing downturn in media markets slows demand for its traditional software, such as Photoshop and InDesign.
Omniture, based in Orem, Utah, specializes in a field known as Web analytics. It provides to advertisers, media companies and other customers information about user activity, such as what Web pages they visit, how much time they spend there and what ads they click on. Customers may change their ads or Web sites based on such data, including data about the effectiveness of ads based on terms users type into search engines.
Deal Journal
Omniture Deal May Not Bring Change Adobe Wants Companies such as Ford Motor Co., Ameritrade Holding Corp. and Xerox Corp. pay monthly fees to access Omniture's services. The amount they pay typically reflects the Web traffic occurring on their sites.
Adobe, San Jose, Calif., said it plans to build code into its content-creation programs to help them exchange data with Omniture services, eliminating time-consuming programming by customers and helping more of them make money on their Web sites. "We really think that we can actually tranform how digital content is created," said Shantanu Narayen, Adobe's chief executive officer.
Web analytics generates about $600 million in world-wide annual revenue now, but the industry is expected to grow to $2.2 billion by 2011, according to a June 2008 estimate by J.P. Morgan.
Companies that compete with Omniture include Webtrends Inc. and Coremetrics. Google Inc., the search giant, also offers some analytic services.
Scott Kessler, an analyst at Standard & Poor's who tracks Omniture, said it has grown by buying smaller players in the market. But Omniture's business has been squeezed by the recession and the company has a mixed record of meeting Wall Street estimates, he said. It reported a loss of $44.8 million last year even as its revenue nearly doubled to $295.6 million. Partly for those reasons, Mr. Kessler remains skeptical about how quickly Adobe could benefit from the deal.
Suresh Vittal, an analyst at market researcher Forrester Research, was more optimistic. He said many aspects of Web sites aren't reliably measured now, and Adobe's ability to include such capabilities with its software could give site creators valuable new information.
Adobe said Omniture will become a new business unit. Omniture CEO Josh James will join Adobe as senior vice president of the new unit, reporting to Mr. Narayan.
The deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter of Adobe's 2009 fiscal year, which ends in November.
For the quarter ended Aug. 28, Adobe reported a profit of $136 million, down from $191.6 million a year earlier. Revenue was $697.5 million.
Moving Flash Cookies Into Direct-Response BT
If you're confused about the ad networks or technology companies offering behavioral targeting, Tatto Media CEO Lin Miao says you're not alone. Consolidation is on the horizon, he says, and "smoke and mirror behavioral shops" will fall by the wayside within the next 12 to 18 months.
The problem is the industry has become "reckless" about using the word "behavioral" when referring to targeting ads online, he says. It not only creates chaos among advertisers and publishers trying to figure out the companies that actually offer the service, but it also has begun to affect what "behavioral targeting" means.
Miao predicts within the next two years BT will move away from being used as a reporting tool and into performance and direct-response-based metrics. As a reporting tool, the BT technology monitors and keeps track of the number of clicks and how consumers responded to ads. As a performance and direct response metric the targeting is done through Flash-based cookie and data tags that last between three and six months.
In the direct response model, advertisers don't pay for leads or actions until something happens. Publishers don't get paid on a CPM basis, but only if an action results from the campaign. "If you were an advertiser wanting to buy media on a site like eHarmony.com, you could go through a CPM network and buy traffic everywhere, which isn't that effective," Miao says. "Or you can choose a Tatto Media network to buy ads on eHarmony.com and target males ages 25 through 36."
The problem that continues to distress behavioral ad networks is the length of time a cookie remains on a person's computer. Legacy networks have built their tracking systems around regular cookies. The problem is the average lifespan is less than 15 days. Increasingly more browsers, such as Google Chrome and Microsoft Internet Explorer, successfully block cookie tracking. And we all know that this presents problems for ad networks trying to retarget consumers based on collected cookie and pixel tag information.
When Tatto began to develop its core behavioral frameworks and algorithms, it believed Flash cookies would remain the best way to slow the ability of consumers to delete cookies from their computers. Flash cookies are no different than regular cookies in terms of user privacy, but on average remain on a person's computer for more than three months.
Miao believe three months is enough time to accurately retarget consumers based on proprietary behavioral algorithm. Three months provides enough history as to what types of advertisements consumers may respond to, and how often they click or respond to certain ads. He has no doubt ad networks will turn toward Flash cookies in the future as a way to compete and gather the most relevant and precise information.
Miao views behavioral technologies as a complementary tool to Tatto's direct response initiatives. He believes the best way to innovate is demonstrate to advertisers through direct response that behavioral targeting can create efficiencies. Behavioral networks need to prove to clients the technology is sustainable and can provide real benefits to advertisers, publishers and consumers, he notes.
The problem is the industry has become "reckless" about using the word "behavioral" when referring to targeting ads online, he says. It not only creates chaos among advertisers and publishers trying to figure out the companies that actually offer the service, but it also has begun to affect what "behavioral targeting" means.
Miao predicts within the next two years BT will move away from being used as a reporting tool and into performance and direct-response-based metrics. As a reporting tool, the BT technology monitors and keeps track of the number of clicks and how consumers responded to ads. As a performance and direct response metric the targeting is done through Flash-based cookie and data tags that last between three and six months.
In the direct response model, advertisers don't pay for leads or actions until something happens. Publishers don't get paid on a CPM basis, but only if an action results from the campaign. "If you were an advertiser wanting to buy media on a site like eHarmony.com, you could go through a CPM network and buy traffic everywhere, which isn't that effective," Miao says. "Or you can choose a Tatto Media network to buy ads on eHarmony.com and target males ages 25 through 36."
The problem that continues to distress behavioral ad networks is the length of time a cookie remains on a person's computer. Legacy networks have built their tracking systems around regular cookies. The problem is the average lifespan is less than 15 days. Increasingly more browsers, such as Google Chrome and Microsoft Internet Explorer, successfully block cookie tracking. And we all know that this presents problems for ad networks trying to retarget consumers based on collected cookie and pixel tag information.
When Tatto began to develop its core behavioral frameworks and algorithms, it believed Flash cookies would remain the best way to slow the ability of consumers to delete cookies from their computers. Flash cookies are no different than regular cookies in terms of user privacy, but on average remain on a person's computer for more than three months.
Miao believe three months is enough time to accurately retarget consumers based on proprietary behavioral algorithm. Three months provides enough history as to what types of advertisements consumers may respond to, and how often they click or respond to certain ads. He has no doubt ad networks will turn toward Flash cookies in the future as a way to compete and gather the most relevant and precise information.
Miao views behavioral technologies as a complementary tool to Tatto's direct response initiatives. He believes the best way to innovate is demonstrate to advertisers through direct response that behavioral targeting can create efficiencies. Behavioral networks need to prove to clients the technology is sustainable and can provide real benefits to advertisers, publishers and consumers, he notes.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)