“White-Label Network” Is This The Future?
Ad and vertical networks seem all the hype again although one could argue that Ad Networks have been the hype for some time. Last year while attending Ad-tech in NY, all the new networks blew me away. I literally did not recognize 20% or so of the networks that had booths. There are so many networks popping up these days, many with the same value propositions that it’s almost impossible to differentiate one from the other.
It increasingly appears that publishers that have experienced success are expanding and creating many of these networks. These publishers join numerous sales people who worked for some of the original Ad networks who have branched off and created Ad Networks themselves. The parallels can equally be found in what many sales and affiliate employees did coming from the affiliate network space themselves.
Perhaps hotter than Ad networks this year are the Vertical Networks that seem to be popping out of the blue again. Many of these Vertical Networks individually claim hundreds of audience segments delivering literally billions of impressions each month. I don’t care who these network are or how amazing their “proprietary” technology is, no one can effectively segment billions of impression effectively per month. If it were feasible to segment an audience of this size into hundreds of segments, why would we need Vertical Networks? Think about it, if a company claims they have hundreds of segments and then goes out and offers “verticals” on top of this is there really any difference? This sounds like more like a desperate pitch to a VC!
There really is no actionable difference, only another “hot term” in the industry aimed at getting advertisers to spend more for the same thing. But it is not just Vertical Networks that have created more of the same things; Ad Networks are equally staying afloat by creating more of the same. Generally it is the same distribution methods and publisher crossover, just different names with the same “proprietary” or “performance based” watered down results.
Regardless, Collective Media has definitely taken notice of the amount of networks popping up and announced today the creation of a vertical Ad Network that will allow publishers a platform for managing their own networks. Collective clearly understands that publishers increasingly want control and ways to diversify their income. What better way to offer this diversified control than thought the creation of a one-stop functioning platform that provides tools such as rev share, Salesforce integration and Dart for Publishers API.
In fact, DoubleClick announced earlier this month an enhancement to the DoubleClick Revenue Center. This will allow publishers many of the same abilities as what Collective Media has today announced. Factor this into the release of Google Ad Manager and you get an indication of where Google is going. Google is literally enabling small and mid-sized publishers to make more and more while becoming increasingly dependent on the hand that feds them (Google) all while traditional fly-by-night start-ups will feel the losses.
What does this all mean? Well for one, we are likely to see a lot more Ad Networks at the shows this year. Secondly, and more importantly, it allows networks such as DoubleClick, Collective and Adify to monetize these entrepreneurs looking to do more independently while at the same time increasing their distribution and taking advantage of this movement to diversify their corporate portfolios.
Publishers, advertisers and like-wise entrepreneurs are looking for a streamlined and outsourced one-stop shop to create networks. Think of it all as DirectTrack 2.0. The networks offering these “white-label networks” are at the forefront of where the industry is going and are leveraging their inventory to these same “white-label networks” they are empowering as a further means to distribute and monetize their inventory. What better way is there than to keep these “white-label networks” happy and to lock them in with dependency on their technology and ease of use! As mentioned this also helps to diversify the network’s portfolio of business, which of course makes the networks more appealing for those looking to be acquired, which many subsequently are.
Readers of this blog may be interested to know that quadrantONE which has been discussed here and here is being powered by Collectives Media’s Ad Network Management (AMP) Platform. More analysis on Collective can be found here.
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