More Ad Network Deals—Specific Media Raises $100 Million, AOL Close to Buying Quigo For $300 Million

Erick Schonfeld

2 comments »

The frenzy around online ad networks never stops (maybe because there are so many of them). This morning, Specific Media, announced a whopping $100 million investment by private equity firm Francisco Partners. This follows a $10 million venture round last June led by Enterprise Partners. Specific Media is the fourth largest ad network in terms of audience reach, according to comScore (after Advertising.com, Yahoo, and ValueClick). The 130.7 million people it reached across the Web in September was just below the 133.5 million reached by publicly-traded ValueClick, which has a market capitalization of $2.6 billion.

On the (possible) acquisition front, ad-targeting network Quigo might be bought by AOL for $300 million, according to Kara Swisher. Quigo provides contextual ad-targeting for many media Websites, including ABCNews.com, CNNMoney.com, Forbes.com, and USAToday.com. This would certainly be in keeping with AOL’s strategy to build out its Platform-A advertising network, even as it takes steps to allow consumers to opt out of such targeting. Quigo won’t confirm the rumor. But it didn’t deny it either. I called up Quigo CEO Michael Yavonditte earlier today to ask him about it. His non-response: “There are rumors that we are going public, there are rumors that we are going to be bought. We don’t comment on stuff like that.” Sounds like he is keeping his options open.

(Disclosure: I am a former employee of Time Warner, which is the parent of both AOL and CNNMoney, and I own Time Warner stock.)

Shoperion = Advaliant + Advario innovation tools

Extremely interesting technology built by our technology partner ELC Technology ( they are building all our new systems with Joe M.) these are very interesting mini tools that we could have in the Advaliant system as tools for publishers and advertisers. They are the next wave of embedded mini apps or widgets that STAY embedded!! We need to have a section for these in Advaliant. Where clients can give us theirs like the mobile widget PlayPhone is giving us. Also for ones we can create based on needs we see in the market. These could also be inside Advario intext ads. This is VERY INNOVATIVE and hands down the direction the market is headed. www.shoperion.com

Blog | About | Internet Rank | Terms of Use | Privacy Policy | Investors | Team

Welcome Advertisers Publishers Retailers Contact Us

rightcart"> RightCart fliplead"> FlipLead hoverpage"> HoverPage pushvote"> PushVote runcards"> RunCards Dashboard RightCart The in-page shopping revolution RightCart is helping reshape what people think about e-commerce. With the ability to add a complete shopping solution to your website in seconds. You can turn any web page into a store effortlessly. "RightCart is the end-game in shopping" -Amazon.com FlipLead Next generation, lead generation. Fliplead the a new way to deliver leads not just clicks to advertisers. Using our patented in-page technology we can expect more from our ad space and keep the audience on your website. HoverPage Bring your landing page to them. Unlike standard display ads, HoverPages use Ajax technology to allow users to visit and interact with your landing page without leave the site they are on. Allowing Publishers to retain the audience and advertisers to deliver more. PushVote Opinions matter Survey, polls and reviews help us to learn more about what people are thinking and guide our decisions. PushVote makes it easy to create, launch and review results from surveys while enhancing your site's experience for customers. RunCards Your site, your sale. Experiece is important when completing a sale on the web. RunCards is a mixture between RightCart and FlipLead and allows you to accept credit cards on your site to deliver and cohesive sales process easily. Dashboard One to rule them all. Mangaing web apps, creating new AdSpots and selling your ad space can be conquered using Dashboard. Brining innovation to help both novice and seasoned marketers to get more revenue out of their websites. Beyond Banners Shoperion helps advertisers, publishers and retailers engage customers through innovative web applications. Each application can be added to your website and help to add the ability to sell items, capture leads, take a survey and receive payments. Unlike traditional display advertising embed-able web applications keep the user on a publishers website to increase overall yield from the audience.

Textwise.com Semantic ad targeting

http://www.textwise.com/semanticSignatures.html is a very interesting page with interesting info. Espcially when you scroll over the images on the left hand side that show data regarding the difference between "contextual targeting" and their "semantic signature matching". Interesting use of the word DNA in reference to content and ads. Similar to our use of

"Dynamic triangulation = particles (behavior,context,tags,keywords,attention data etc) = digital DNA = content/user/ad = relevance targeting "

for the new version of advario to be released going into adtech NYC. Below is some further info from their site.

Semantic SignaturesSM are TextWise's patented contextual targeting technology. They innovate beyond simple keyword-based or category-based models currently used in so-called "contextual advertising" and deliver a new level of context-driven advertisment matching. MEET YOUR PERFECT MATCH, EVERY TIME, AUTOMATICALLY Semantic SignaturesSM is the only contextual advertising solution with: Precision that outperforms our competitors to obtain significantly higher ad-to-web page relevancy Speed/Scalability powering real-time placement Automation to support a dynamic environment Universal Appeal going beyond the English language to capture the global market Semantic SignaturesSM capture meaning through concepts, not keywords — including multiple meanings and topics within a single document. As a fully automated and real-time contextual targeting system for both advertisments and web pages, they provide a robust, scalable, and easily maintainable solution for advertisers. Request a White Paper