Colin's Corner

Internet leads US Advertising gains

According to data released by TNS Media Intelligence, total advertising expenditures for all media in 2004 increased 9.8 percent to $141.1 billion compared to 2003. Almost all of the media measured by TNSMI experienced growth throughout the year, with the Internet, Outdoor, Cable TV and National Syndication showing the strongest gains. Local Newspapers led in dollar spending for 2004, posting $24.5 billion, an increase of 6.7 percent versus 2003. The Internet showed the most robust year-over-year gain for 2004 posting a 21.4 percent increase to $7.4 billion in ad spending versus 2003. Outdoor advertising increased 20.1 percent to $3.2 billion in spending. 

FoldOvers and Dog Ears

PointRoll, Inc. officially launched FoldOver, a new ad format positioned in the upper corner of a publisher�s page. When a user initiates a mouse-over, the ad visually folds over the page, exposing close to a full page ad. It is claimed that advertisers can deliver their video commercial or any advertising message with greater impact while not disrupting the web users behavior. A demo of an Audi ad on Yahoo! can be viewed here.

CMP Media's TechWeb Network also announced a similar ad unit - the Dogear Peelback. When a user 'mouses' over the dogear, the entire page peels back to reveal the advertiser's landing page behind the TechWeb Network news page The effect gives advertisers a about half of the page real estate. View the demo here. - (although I was not able to make the demo work on a Mac using Safari or Firefox).

Kanoodle launches RSS ad service

Have you been noticing more and more ads and sponsored links creeping into your RSS feeds ?  Well, if companies such as Kanoodle are successful, expect to see a lot more of them. With the help of Moreover Technologies FeedDirect RSS ads, Kanoodle has introduced BrightAds RSS a self-service system that lets online publishers include advertising with their RSS feeds.

Publishers can choose if the ads (which will be in text format) will appear either as a separate post in the feed, or as part of an existing post. Publishers share  revenue generated with Kanoodle . Kanoodle is also working with blogging software company Six Apart to insert ads in the company's hosted blogging service, TypePad (used by this blog).  Other players like Overture, Pheedo, Industry Brains and RSS Ads are also exploring this opportunity.

Firms eye RSS as an ad vehicle
Kanoodle expands ads to smaller publishers
rss

Embedded RSS links

Macworld and Playlist have started to embed comparison pricing into their product review RSS Feed. 

The abstract on one review is shown below and you can immediately click to obtain the latest pricing via Macworld's PriceFinder, which is run in conjunction with PriceGrabber.

12-inch PowerBook G4/1.5GHz with SuperDrive (4 mice)
Individually, none of the changes introduced in the latest PowerBook G4 upgrade will knock your socks off. But taken together, they make the PowerBook product line more appealing and more powerful. Henry Norr examines all five PowerBooks in this Macworld review.
Best Current Price:$1689.00  (via ProductFinder)

Macworld Reviews 2/23/05 4:06 PM

PC World has embedded pricing in a similar way in their RSS feeds.

Other IDG sites such as Infoworld are also testing embedded text in RSS advertising.

Skype users may soon be sending text messages

Users of the Internet phone service offered by Skype International may soon be able to send text messages to mobile phones thanks to a service that went into beta testing on Friday.

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RSS Advertising from Ziff Davis

Ziff Davis has started to include advertising in their RSS feeds from eWeek.com and no doubt their other sites will follow.
The link showed up as ADV: FREE WHITE PAPERS from HP.

Learn more about optimizing your data storage environment by downloading a FREE HP White Paper. The link takes you to a data capture form at:http://internet.ziffdavis.com/hp/

This follows their over coverage of how sponsored links are extending their reach

Coverage of RSS advertising can be found at:
Blocking RSS advertising
Yahoo! readies ads for RSS

4th quarter online revenues

Internet advertising revenue in the fourth quarter of 2004 came in at $2.7 billion while full-year revenue totaled just under $9.6 billion -- a 32% increase over the 2003 total according to estimates released by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers. The fourth quarter figure is the highest revenue quarter ever reported by the IAB.

The IAB didn't break out spending by category, media type or creative type in the report. The fourth quarter figure translates to a 24% increase over the fourth quarter of 2003, ($2.2 billion), and a 17% increase over the third quarter of 2004 ($2.3 billion). The third and fourth quarter online ad revenue figures were estimated by surveying and aggregating fourth quarter 2004 data from the top 15 online ad sellers. The results were then extrapolated to calculate the total estimated industry revenue figure.

Actual third and fourth quarter 2004 results will be reported in the full Internet Advertising Revenue Report, which is slated for release in spring 2005. The IAB sponsors the report, which is conducted independently by PricewaterhouseCoopers.