Last week I wrote about the heated reactions that followed the announcement of Visa and MasterCard’s potential plans to sell their purchase information data to advertisers. I argued that the outrage was based on misinformed notions of data use, fed by the various media stories that have been cropping up at regular intervals to put further fear into the privacy brigade. In this blog, I’ll be focusing on explaining how we at plista GmbH use data, and outlining the various initiatives that are being developed to ensure that there is better understanding between advertisers and consumers.

Data has caused a lot of debate not only in the media, but also within the online advertising industry itself; only the other week, AdExchanger.com asked a selection of ad technology execs to answer the question ‘Why is tracking good?’, which made for interesting reading. The arguments were that as ads keep content free, they’re unavoidable, and that targeted, relevant ads are better than random, irrelevant ads. By using data for behavioral advertising, online advertisers can add value to the user’s experience, serving them ads that are personalized and contextual.

It all sound fairly straightforward, except that of course it isn’t. Data has become an increasingly maligned term, with connotations of invasions of privacy and misuse of personal information. To defend and reclaim the word, we need to dispel the fears and misconceptions by explaining how we in the online advertising industry (the so-called ‘cyberazzi’) use data for behavioral targeting, and outline the benefits that are in it for the consumer.

At plista, our algorithms do not use private, personal information, not only because of data protection laws (though that’s a given), but also because it’s not relevant for our RecommendationAds. Instead, we use interest-based filtering, based on what past users who also visited the current page have read. Other anonymous data vectors also come into play, such as the publisher’s website, geolocation, demographics, the time and so on, all focused on the best content on the publisher’s website. A combination of these vectors then leads to the content recommendations the user sees.

This process allows for each visitor to have his or her own set of personalized recommendations, such as other content or articles related to what the user is currently reading, which comes in the plista “you might also find this interesting…” format. At plista, data is used for the benefit of everyone involved: combining ads with individual user recommendations means more revenue for advertisers and publishers (average CTR is over 7%), and a better, more informative browsing experience for the user.

Once the fears about invasion of privacy and misuse of personal details have been cleared away, the issue is no longer with data, as such: instead, it’s about control. A recent study by McCann showed that over half of consumers want to know and have a say in how their data will be used. If people don’t feel in control of their data and online experience, they will react with fear and outrage, as has been witnessed over and over. The same study also showed that 71% of consumers were willing to trade shopping data if they were compensated for it in one way or another (such as through discounts or promotions), with 86% saying they could see major benefits from sharing data with online companies.

More efforts are now being made to enable understanding of how data is used, and to set in place regulations for the online advertising industry. At plista we offer an OptOut as a matter of course, and have even produced a short film to further illustrate what we do, but industry-wide still more needs to be done to explain data tracking, and to make the opt-out mechanisms clearer. A recent US academic study showed that the current OBA (Online Behavioral Advertising) opt-out mechanisms were ‘fundamentally flawed’, often leading to more confusion than clarity for the consumer. Steps to improve are being taken: Google has increased ad transparency for consumers, and just last week, OBA self-regulatory compliance platform TRUSTed Ads announced it had gained customer contracts with several key brands for its solution, which is designed to clearly educate consumers about privacy practices.

Various self-regulatory programs are also in place, such as the Digital Advertising Alliance (DAA), the Network Advertising Initiative (NAI) and the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), and the US and UK in particular are enforcing regulations on tracking and data use. The US Federal Trade Commission presented its online privacy framework in October, promoting industry self-regulation, transparency, and Do Not Track functionalities, and in the UK, the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations (PECR) require companies to gain consent before collecting user data.

These are all encouraging steps in the right direction, and it will be interesting to see how the media and the anti-data tracking brigade respond to the measures set in place to further enlightenment and understanding, rather than fear and misinformation. It seems that the key to good online advertising and a happy browsing experience is more transparency and control for the user. As long as the opt-out option is clear, and everyone is informed of the processes involved with behavioral targeting and data use, people will be willing to subscribe and give information to the companies or brands they want to hear from. And the more information the marketers have, the better tailored, and better overall, the advertising will be.

Find out more about what we do: watch the short plista GmbH film

In the last few weeks, the Orwellian-named new social media network ‘Unthink’ has tried hard to stir up interest as a real contender to the Facebook social media throne. The reason for Unthink’s brassy attitude in stepping into the ring with Facebook (and Google+) is that it’s confident in its punch: namely, the promise that it will not mishandle its users’ data. Unthink users- or ‘owners’, as CEO Natasha Dedis prefers to call them- will have control of their own data, which Unthink won’t sell on to advertisers. The idea is a clever one, especially in light of Facebook’s various recent data tracking misdemeanors, and the continuing data-tracking scaremongering stories in the media.

So far, online commentators have been fairly unimpressed- especially as the website was unreachable for part of the time of the potential buzz-build up. The video used to promote the social network, seemingly aimed at teenagers, is also not doing them too many favors. Rather unfortunately for Unthink, it reminded me of a spoof video poking fun at Google+ which did a much better job of hitting the current mood in promoting its (albeit fictional) new social network, ‘Not Google+’ .

What strives to be a call to action to rebel against the ‘data oppressors’ (Facebook, mainly, though Google+ gets a part in the clip as well) ends up feeling like a misguided and slightly creepy attempt to be part of the gang. Or, as AllThingsD put it: “the tone is not unlike someone ranting in a town square to try to attract followers to some new religious sect”. This attempt to stir up a social media teenage rebellion is reinforced by a strapline on the Unthink website proclaiming “We don’t need another social network. We need a social revolution”.

Though it’s easy to make fun (especially as, unthinkingly, Unthink chose to call themselves a non-word that had previously been used in a badly-received KFC campaign in 2009) , the spirit with which its founders have created Unthink- the cornerstones being ownership, privacy, security from unilateral term changes- is highly poignant in today’s data-fraught climate. Data is becoming increasingly important not least as a privacy issue for social networkers, but also as a crucial part of the development and use of online advertising, with data-informed behavioral targeting and re-targeting ever more common.

However, instead of turning its back on the benefits of using data for advertising- as Unthink is doing- and thereby stoking the fire of fear and ‘big brother’ element of online advertising, it would make more sense to focus on lifting the veil of misunderstanding between advertisers and consumers. As a recent Ad Age article stated, if the use of data, as well as the mechanics and benefits of tracking and behavioral targeting were better explained to consumers, they would not be as opposed to it. There needs to be clearer communication in order to better inform the online world. As the author of the Ad Age article rightly points out, the advertising industry has “even made ‘cookie’ sound like a bad word”- I believe everyone will agree that that’s not a good state of affairs.

At plista, our RecommendationAds use algorithms which analyze data from online users as they are browsing, tailoring the website content to the interests indicated and recommending other content the user might also like. These user-individual recommendations, put together through precise interest-based information, reduces the search effort of the browsing experience, bringing what the online user is potentially looking for or interested in right to their screen.

One can’t stop the web and all it entails, from social networks to online advertising, from evolving.

After all, even though Unthink may not sell its users’ data onto advertisers, advertisements are still present on the social networking site in the form of ‘iEnforce’. The idea behind this is that the user selects a brand to ‘sponsor’ their page- the only way to avoid ads completely is to pay. Call me selfish, but I would rather have the best of both worlds: free content, and ads tailored to what I am interested in, recommending new content that I perhaps would have missed were it not for those data-tracking algorithms. I’d say it’s time to ‘unthink’ what we think we know about data.

Find out more about what plista GmbH offers: http://www.plista.com/

Es gibt Begriffe, die werden umso wichtiger, je unscharfer und flexibler verwendbar sie sind. Ein solches begriffliches Konzept, eine Theorie wäre zu viel gesagt, ist momentan die Governance. Das hört man im Fernsehen, damit schmeißt die Firmenleitung um sich, da steckt irgendwie Government drin, aber so richtig weiß man dann doch nicht, weshalb der Begriff so an Popularität gewonnen hat und was er in der modernen Unternehmensführung sucht.

Dabei gibt es viele Beispiele dafür, was Governance bedeutet und warum es in unserer modernen Industriegesellschaft so bedeutsam geworden ist. Eins vorweg: Governance ist nichts, wo jeder „mitmachen“ muss. Governance ist auch kein In-Begriff, dessen Verwendung globale Kompetenz signalisieren soll, sondern kommt tatsächlich aus der jüngeren Wissenschaft. Weil die Verwendung des Konzeptes eben nicht einfach modern und schick ist, es dabei nicht nur um einen anglizistischen Modeausdruck geht, sondern Governance neue Potentiale der Unternehmensführung eröffnen kann, soll es heut in seinen Grundzügen einmal vorgestellt werden. Inklusive Beispielen für eine mögliche Adaption in der Marketing-Branche.
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Am vergangenen Freitag war es endlich wieder soweit. Bei einem nächtlichen Bummel durch einige deutsche und internationale Großstädte ließen sich die verschiedensten Menschen beim Wildcampen beobachten. Statt dem Motto „Back to the roots“ war jedoch technischer Fortschritt und totale Vernetzung der alle verbindende Faktor. Statt die Zelte an einem See aufzuschlagen, wurden die Stühle mit dicken Decken vor den Apple-Stores dieser Welt postiert. Richtig, der Verkaufsstart des iPhone 4S war gekommen. Und mit ihm die Apple-Enthusiasten. Neben einigen kleineren Verbesserungen hat das iPhone 4S vor allem Siri an Bord.

Als Tim Cook während der letzten Keynote die Bühne betrat, um das iPhone 4S zu präsentieren, fragte er Siri, ob er morgen einen Regenmantel brauchen würde. Daraufhin ermittelte Siri das morgige Wetter für den entsprechenden Standort und gab zur Antwort, dass er keinen bräuchte, da morgen die Sonne scheine. Eine intelligente Sprachsteuerung also, die Fragen verstehen und damit die Bedienung des Geräts noch intuitiver und automatisierter ablaufen lassen soll. Da musste ich an einen Post vom August letzten Jahres zum Thema Semantisches Web denken. Auf den ersten Blick scheint Apple mit Siri nämlich einen großen Schritt in diese Richtung zu machen. Zeit also, einige Gedanken zu dem Thema noch mal aufzugreifen und auf Siri bezogen weiterzuspinnen.
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The online world has been abuzz with debate over the last few weeks in reaction to the announcements made by social media rivals Google+ and Facebook. Google threw down the gauntlet and opened up Google+ to everyone, whilst Facebook in turn announced several changes to its site during the F8 developer’s conference. The two giants had officially stepped into the ring, ready to fight it out.

Each contender has his own strengths, but in the short term at least, it seems Facebook need not be overly concerned. Despite an initial huge surge in traffic – 1,200% – after opening Google+ up to the world on 20 September, since then traffic to Google’s social media offering has seen a substantial drop, 60% according to data analytics company Chitika.

Facebook’s extensive changes – including a timeline and partnerships with major music and film companies – appears to be an attempt to transform the world’s biggest social network into a key entertainment hub. Facebook wants to be everything to everyone, the center of one’s web experience, with music sharing, film, and online socializing all in one place.

These changes received mixed reviews from the twitter and blogospheres. Some opined that Facebook had not learned the lessons of AOL and that in trying too hard to be all things to all people, it may have gotten too big for its boots. Meanwhile, Google was also experiencing its share of difficulties, having to defend itself against claims it’s monopolizing the internet search market.

For the advertising world, there was better news; Google rolled out +1 button recommendation ads, which are now also available for display ads run through the Google Display Network. The similarity to Facebook’s popular ‘Like’ button is obvious, and in swift succession, Facebook launched new insight tools. Twitter also got involved, announcing that it would start to allow brands to promote their ads to non-followers- until now, advertisers could only reach their own followers with their Promoted Tweets.

Social media advertising is on the rise; eMarketer recently forecasted that by 2013, social network ad spend will grow by 10 billion dollars worldwide. Considering that social media sites are where online audiences flock to, this prediction seems accurate. The research company Nielsen recently published a report on social media which found that, not surprisingly, social networks and blogs are still the top destination online, with 53% of active social media users following a brand on social networking sites.

plista’s social media ad format, LikeAds, help brands gain more followers on their Facebook pages by  integrating into Facebook for more reach and interaction with the target audiences. Combining the successful RecommendationAds format with the popular Facebook ‘Like’ button, the advertisers’ message is multiplied and promoted through Facebook as soon as the user clicks on the ‘Like’ button.

The success of plista’s RecommendationAds and LikeAds is based on the fact that users receive contextually relevant recommendations. Taking this into consideration, Twitter’s decision to allow Promoted Tweets to show up in the tweet timelines of those not following the brand is a bold one, considering how vocal the Twitter community is. If these promoted tweets were to be perceived as irrelevant spam, the backlash would be immediate and severe. Twitter is safeguarding against this by restricting the roll out to only 10% of its global users at first, and by showing the promoted tweets only to those people who it deems has similar interests to the brand in question.

This is great news in terms of further reach for advertisers, but whether Twitter succeeds or not will rest on its ability to fine tune the relevancy of the Promoted Tweet to the interests of its users. By personalizing publisher’s website content to fit what the user is looking at, plista has created highly successful ad formats. Essentially, it boils down to the preferences of the user: to like or not to like is not the question, it’s their prerogative, and anyone in the advertising game needs to sit up and listen.

Find out more about LikeAds: http://www.plista.com/infos/demo/likead

Last week was filled with video-related announcements. From Accuen adding video DSP TubeMogul to its toolkit to SpotXchange and BrightRoll making their video ad inventory real time biddable to Google expanding AdWords for video, anyone who is anyone in the online advertising world will have gotten the picture: video advertising is one to watch.

Research backs this up; statistics from the Online-Vermarkterkreis (OVK) of the Federal Association of Digital Economy (BVDW) in Germany showed that video advertising had the strongest increase in the German online advertising market, with a 115% increase of net spending from last year.

This increase can be attributed to the simple fact that video advertising is effective. The new hybrid of ‘advertainment’ results in viewers that are more engaged and involved- as long as the content shown is relevant, of course. Irrelevant and unrelated content is still seen as a nuisance to be avoided, not watched and enjoyed.  A recent study by Specific Media on the effectiveness of online video advertising showed that when video ad content was relevant, “61% said they were happy to watch adverts in exchange for free content”.

At plista, our expandable video ad formats VideoAds use behavioral targeting to ensure the content shown is relevant and interesting to the viewer. The ads are also voluntary, as the video ad only expands when the user scrolls over it, resulting in a more positive brand perception. Our ActionAds encourage the viewer to engage further, by combining video and banners with interactive and social sharing options.

The influx of video advertising with RTB capabilities is a positive step for the adoption of video advertising, as is Google AdWords for video, in that it allows for measurement of performance. However, tools for the measurement for online video advertising are not fully in place yet; only last week, AdExchanger.com had key industry people debate whether video advertising needed an online GRP (Gross Rating Point) frequency metric, which has been used successfully for TV advertising.  Response was lukewarm, with most agreeing that a better overall solution for measurement was needed.

At plista we offer measurable data for the behaviorally targeted VideoAds, which, due their relevant content, have seen a high success rate. Advertainment works; as to what’s next for online video advertising, it’s a case of staying tuned.

Find out more about VideoAds: http://www.plista.com/advertisers/info/videoad