A few months ago, Facebook announced that it would make their user profile and demographic information, available for the purpose of advertiser behavioral targeting. Last week, MySpace announced that it too was going to make its user profile information available to better target advertising.

There is no argument here that if the option of blind advertising on a promise of impressions versus, big box representation in an area where those dabbling will find your ad pertinent to them were raised as door number one and door number two, I would go with door number two.

We have spoken often here about examples of traditional big money advertisers getting smarter about where they spend their money and with who. Advertisers are looking for partners who can bring proven results to the table. Result ladened with demographic detail to ease any doubts an advertiser may have about where and how to advertise.

Given the obvious potential of behavioral targeting, I think anyone with an already strong and continuously evolving database, should look at mining their data for the purpose of getting to know their users and converting that message to commercial revenue.

As newspapers and niche magazines are fighting for the same commercial clients we see moving to other networks, it wouild make sense that they review the types of data they are collecting in house. I assure you that the industry and consumer insight these publishers have on store and at the local level, would be difficult for others to gather.

Already, publisher sites collect user information at the point of registration. Adding a few more profile questions during registration and tracking user activity via IP, could provide great insight of those using the site. After doing this activity enough times and consistently, newspapers and magazines too could participate in the targeted advertising space. Unlike many other sites, the newspaper does have a unique relationship with the locals of the metropolis it represents. So asking a few additional questions when a visitor signs up for service, should not be seen as a challenge. However, if a publishers feels leery about the self-service behavioral targeting methodology described above, they too can engage the aid of a third party agency that specializes in this practice.

In the end, behavioral targeting could aid newspapers and niche magazines keep a share of the advertising dollars, which seem to be slipping to other mediums, quarter over quarter. The approach could also be used as a methodology to further product retention. Collecting user data and tracking the activity types, while on a publisher’s site, would provide further data on what their online visitors and readers want. Meaning, no more guessing on re-design and functionality aspects.

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: behaivioural targetting, Magazines, Newspapers

Remember the days where traditional media publishers snubbed the thought of syndication or partnerships with online only media forums? Publishers thought that they knew their market better than anyone and as a result, would be able to provide a level of service, from point A to B, in the fulfillment process that would encourage any customer to stay. Well those days are completely gone and Google’s further development to their Google Print Ads suite ferments that.

Late yesterday Google unveiled their free online tool to aid their AdWord customers with creating display and text ads for newspapers.

As we all recall, Google ‘officially’ launched Google Print Ads in July, to facilitate their AdWord customers placing ads, within the Google network of newspapers. The service allowed AdWord patrons to simply choose from a list of participating newspapers and bid on ad space, based on geography, circulation, and readership and so on. If the newspaper publisher approved the bid, the two would then start to work on ad copy, image layout and perhaps countless proofs. All this has changed, for the better, with Google’s online tool launch.

The announcement of the free ‘print ad creator’ makes the print transition that much easier for small to medium sized businesses, with little capacity or bandwidth in advertising dollars and time. With the online tool, all that is required from an advertiser is a quick upload of an image, the entering of some text and voila! Advertisers also have the flexibility to go in and edit their ads, including resizing images.

From a complete review of the process, publishers begin to benefit greatly from the program. They now have the opportunity to gain revenue from the small to medium sized business arena, with expending little costs or people power. The program streamlines costs for content processing and leaves a positive effect on publisher margins.

Some of the newspapers in the Google network are:

• Chicago Tribune
• Houston Chronicle
• Los Angeles Times
• New York Times

See Full List

Google Print Ads at this point, appear to be exclusive to the US, but based on the program results, I would expect it to surpass its current geographical boundaries, relatively soon.

written by Beverly Crandon

If you have been reading my blog posts for a while, you will know that I repeat some of the same messages, directed at those in the traditional media space. The messages speak to what the future holds and ways traditional media can enhance their properties, to capitalize on the trends and their vested local brand awareness. I start with all of this because I recently came across an automotive site that has at least tried to incorporate some of the principals we discuss here on ‘What Little I know…’

Although it is not a newly launched website, CarSpace is worthy of discussion because of its well thought out integration of a traditional classified media vertical (automotive) and new media aesthetic and components.

The site owners themselves call it the social media site of automotive and in many ways, they are right. The site encapsulates all the elements users have come to expect with the emergence for forward thinking site design (web2.0) and functionality. The lack of serif text, large photos, colour pallets that work well with each other (although I would love to hear from the site owners the reasons for the colour choice) and the use of tasteful multi-media, can all be found on CarSpace.

CarSpace allows its visitors to do a plethora of things online, all car related, yet keeping in mind the public’s desire to interact.

Forums: here you can post to or just read the forum notes. Nevertheless, forums are categorized by make, automotive body style and theme. The forums are also a great source for car owners or perspective car owners, to ask questions. From what I could see, the quality of the responses were good.

Video: users can upload videos using all known sources, including their cell phones. Once videos are posted, users can add comments and ratings. Currently, the most popular video has been viewed over 24,000 times.

Blogs: read and or subscribe to CarSpace blogs

Guides: a lot of how to’s – very helpful!

Connect: you can connect with other site members. Your connections can be streamlined by the other person’s car interest. Nonetheless, you create a friend network on your profile. Sound familiar?

The one thing that surprised me however, was that the site was void of a marketplace ~ A marketplace where members could list their used cars for sale. It seemed to be the natural next step, allowing one stop shopping for the sites almost 81,000 car enthusiast members.

What ever their future plans are for CarSpace, one thing is for sure, they have done a fantastic job in marrying a traditional content vertical to new online media components. And if I could be so brazen as to predict the future of CarSpace myself, I believe the market place component to be only four months away. It is way too lucrative a source to not implement.  Lastly,  CarSpace will partner with niche automotive print publications and newspapers who have noticeable print car sections.   It is unclear who will engage the relationship, but I believe a marriage in is inevitable.

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: auto forums, Automotive, automotive blogs, automotive videos, carspace.com, social media

NBC announced today that it is offering free downloads of its TV shows on their site.

The announcement really comes and represents a sign of the times. I actually hold a lot of respect for the media giant for taking matters into their own hands. Instead of filing laborious and long lasting law suits against online, user generated, video streaming sites (YouTube), NBC has decided if you cant beat em’ join em’.

Attracting users to the NBC site for television show downloads will give the network the flexibility to embed advertising or commercials in the downloads and even more, expose site visitors to their branding and other affiliate programs on the site.

It is a smart formula that feeds both ends of the spectrum. Advertisers are still ensured placement in downloads and viewers have access to their favourite shows ‘on demand’.

written by Beverly Crandon

Google announced yesterday that it has launched an AdSense program for mobile phones. The program has been designed to allow publishers with mobile sites to take advantage of the revenue sharing model AdSense brings to standard websites online.

For advertisers and or agencies wanting to take part in this form of search or mobile advertising, the Mobile AdSense program rules are the same as Googles current AdSense and AdWord programs, where positioning is determined in somewhat of an auction format.

Opening up this possibility to advertisers provides another area where marketing budgets and allocations will have to be reviewed. With so many types of new media solutions out there you cannot help but think that the dollars will more than likely be transferred from traditional media sources. However, the outlook is not grim and the ship has not sailed. Publishers willing to look at offering new media solutions and if one them is mobile functionality, feel assured in knowing that there are many capable third party vendor companies who specialize in mobile publishing software. And with their aid, any publishers site can be mobile enabled.

As many are trying to get the advertising formula correct with mobile and also with Social Networking sites for that matter, there is still time to engage in this area. How long of a window exists? That I cannot answer, but with Googles already exasperating reach I am sure it will not be too long before their form of mobile search advertising becomes the model other online only and agile companies follow.

With global mobile indices as they are, advertisers and publishers would be naive to wait on acting.

Mobile Publishing Resources

4Info

Quattro

Enpocket

written by Beverly Crandon

Another job site has just stepped on the scene, but their primary focus does not seem to be jobs.

Beyond.com differs greatly from the already existing job sites, as it boasts of a network of 15, 000 other websites that through advertising with them, an employer can take advantage of. Their network of sites include ITWorld, America Job Central, Blue Collar Jobs, Job Nut, etc…. They have been able to create a large network because of their job board software. Beyond’s success in entrenching their software in other sites can be attributed to their revenue sharing models. They provide the content and of course, depending on the traffic the partnering site proves, a revenue sharing model conjured. The concept would work especially well for niche bloggers or sites that are industry specific. Beyond could or would aggregate job listings that match the readership profile, in turn providing a value add on the partnering site. The content share does not have to stop with job listings, as Beyond also offers editorial that can be customized.

Where Beyond is similar to CareerBuilder or even Monster is that they too allow for employers to list jobs on their Beyond.com site and seekers to find employment. Providing similar functionality to what already exists today. The site boasts of jobs in over 25 industries and over 25 million professionals in their database.

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: Beyond.com, Career Site, Job boards

In my online travels, I came across an aggregate list of Real Estate sites that may act as interesting research/reading for publishers. If your primary or even one of your niche publications focus on new, resale or recreational homes, condos and or rentals, you should find this interesting.

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: Real Estate

The founder of Career Builder has launched Jobfox, an employment site that focuses more on the job seeker, as opposed to job listings.

On Jobfox, job seekers create a web page highlighting their skills, experience, receptiveness to relocation and so on. The site then matches candidate profiles via keywords to potential employers. Potential Employers are then alerted and directed to the seekers page on Jobfox and so the talent hunt begins.

Jobfox’s major telling point is its enabling ability for job seekers to track how many times their resume has been viewed, who has looked at it and have the option to receive the alerts via text message on their cell phone.

The CEO of Jobfox, Rob McGovern, alludes to attracting Generation Y audience as a driver for the sites creation. “The MySpace and Facebook generations of young people are now in the workplace,” McGovern noted. “A lot of what Jobfox is about is allowing those people to have a professional existence on the Web.”

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: Career Builder, Employers, Employment, Job Seeker, Jobfox, Rob McGovern

The Kelsey Group report entitled the US Mobile Advertising Forecast, estimates a CAGR for the mobile advertising industry of 112%, measured through to 2012.

Mobile technology and adoption has been one area where Europe and Asia have been miles ahead of the western world. If the North American trend follows even in a remote likeness to Eurasia, the Kelsey Group may be bang on with their assumptions.

The Kelsey forecast looks at the mobile advertising industry in three ways:

• Ad Sponsored Directory Assistance
• Mobile Internet
• Multi-Modal Applications

The area with notable growth, according to the forecast, is in the Ad Sponsored Directory Assistance. It is estimated that DA calls will go from 270 million to 2.1 billion by 2012 and DA search will represent a large stake of the growth in mobile advertising dollars (33.2 million in 2007 to 1.4 billion US by 2012). The Kelsey forecast also refers to carriers changing their pricing models on directory assistance calls and either going to a free model or a consolidated monthly fee program, all to promote an increase in usage and a story to sell to advertisers.

The concept can also be extended to publishers with online entities that enable browsers to send searched items to their mobile phones. This could open up a new media revenue stream that many offline publishers are in great need of finding. Offline publishers should also be made aware that many of the larger online search companies have acquired mobile 411 like organizations or have created applications internally. And although it has not been confirmed, these search entities that offer online classifieds ( Google, Microsoft) could easily move into offering commercial advertising on classified ads laymen’s choose to send to their cell phones.

Finally, the report assumes that all directory groups have started or will start to focus sales teams on Directory Assistance Advertising. I can safely say however, in Toronto Canada, a large enough market, 411 results on your mobile phone are void of advertising. All of that though, may change as more and more US Directory bodies begin show Directory Assistance Advertising revenue returns.

Further Independent Directory Assistance Resource: Free411

written by Beverly Crandon

I have just caught wind of a vertical based video classified site for automotive, called HotSwap.

It seems as though video enabled media is at its peak and obviously so based on the amount of blog posts covering the product. And although I have now grown a little pickier about what video related items I blog about, I could not pass up HotSwap.

The site is still in beta, but it is planed to launch officially next week. The full launch will mean the release of additional functionality on HotSwap and the entry of new users. Nonetheless, a visit to the site, even while in beta, will leave you impressed. In a Michael Arrington TechCrunch post about HotSwap, he asked his readers to picture YouTube for car sales and that is what HotSwap is.

HotSwap enables potential car buyers to search for their ideal car through using a sleek set of drop downs and dynamic selection boxes. Sellers on the other hand, will be impressed to know that account set up is not a laborious activity and video upload is fairly simple. The cost a private seller is expected to pay for all of this functionality - absolutely nothing. Although there are no listing fees for privates, it is clear the group will monetize the site through dealer advertisements and dealer classifieds. As we touch on dealer inclusion however, this is one area I feel the site could improve upon. Dealer functionality is pretty much non-existent and often times it is difficult to tell from listing details if it is a private or commercial sale. Some sort of differential is necessary for dealers to see the reasons why their ad placements will have a price tag on them and the private seller’s will not.

The other area of opportunity worth noting is the relevance of the search results displayed. I was looking for a black Acura and received an ad for a gray Acura and a commercial showing people lined up as dominoes (I really didn’t get it). The point is however, should this be a serious search, I may get frustrated and look elsewhere. As HotSwap differentiates itself by vertical focus (automotive) and is not a generalist-classified site, browsers will expect the search results to be degrees more specific and relevant. The expectations are raised once you announce that you will specialize in one thing only.

HotSwap does have some decent funding behind it and I suspect that it will do quite well once the official launch takes place and further strategic planning (dealer advertising, browser experience vs. technology, etc…) gets underway.

written by Beverly Crandon \\ tags: Automotive, Cassifieds, Dealers, HotSwap, Video