Ad Networks

Advertising networks are ‘in’ thing. Everyone is talking about it. I have been reading news articles about Yahoo picking up stake in Tyroo. Komli starting a new ad network based on behavioral targeting. And Google ad network increasing its footprint in the Indian market.

In India, like in many countries, it makes sense for the many small and medium publishers to be part of one or many ad networks, as it is an incremental revenue through banner advertising for them. I am told, that of the 250 crores of ad revenue, most of the revenue goes to the top 10 sites, and the remaining is split amongst the thousands of smaller sites.

What is it in for the advertiser? A single window shop for him to reach out his target audience based on various select criterions. He can choose his ad display based on the type of website (Industry vertical), demographics, time of day and most importantly a single dashboard to check the campaign performance.

Ad Network is basically an infomediary, which servers between a group of websites, and advertisers who want to run their ads on these sites. The cost of advertising in Ad networks is usually CPM model, but there are Networks that will work on CPC or CPL models too. The revenue is usually shared between the website owners and the company that owns the ad network.

A large website might join in an ad network, to sell their remnant inventories, where as a small website owner or a popular blog owner might join the Ad network because it gives them a source of continuous revenue, and no or low overheads in terms of having a marketing/sales team.

Type of ad networks:

Broadly divided the ad networks can be divided into –

Blind Network

Representative Networks

Targeted Networks

1) Representative (or Rep) Networks: They represent the publications in their portfolio, with full transparency for the advertiser about where their ads will run. They typically promote high quality traffic at market prices and are heavily used by brand marketers. The economic model is generally revenue share.

2) Blind Networks: These companies offer low pricing to direct marketers in exchange for those marketers relinquishing control over where their ads will run. Blind networks achieve their low pricing through large bulk buys of typically remnant inventory combined with campaign optimization and ad targeting technology. The financial model is arbitrage.

3) Targeted Networks: Sometimes called “next generation” or “2.0” ad networks, these focus on specific targeting technologies such as behavioral or contextual. Targeted networks specialize in using consumer click stream data to enhance the value of the inventory they purchase.


Some of the popular ad networks in India are

Google Ad Network

Tyroo

Ozonemedia

Tribal Fusion

Komli

Cheers

Santosh

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Best Indian websites - 2007

10 Reasons Marketing Strategy should include the Internet

The Disappearance of Gully Cricket: A Reflection on Changing Times