by Ed Sutherland on April 29, 2008
Adify, the San Bruno, Calif. online advertising back office company, was acquired for around $300 million by Cox Enterprises, the parent company of Cox Newspapers and Cox Communications. Adify has become the go-to shop for Fortune, Martha Stewart and others looking to create their own ad networks.
PaidContent is reporting Adify earned a 20 percent cut from revenues of each white-label ad network it managed. The company, which had a $3 million investment from NBC Universal, is on target this year to quadruple its $7 million revenue of 2007.
For Cox, the deal will likely be used to boost its cable holdings as well as supplant income being lost as the newspaper industry continues to bleed out.
Another reason for the buy: Cox is prepping its own ad network, according to marketing guru Andy Beal.
Adify will retain its independence and its 80 workers, the AP is reporting.
by Ed Sutherland on April 28, 2008
Federated Media, the upscale blog network with eyes to become a media company, let slip a few details about its plan. The pitch to bloggers: we’ll invest in you if you sign-up for long term ad contracts.
“If some of the blogs want to take some money off the table so that they can put their kids through college, we would be able to help them do that,” Neil Chase, vice president of Author Services at FM told our friends over at Silicon Valley Watcher.
Chase said FM was looking to invest 10-15 percent in blogs in exchange for longer ad contracts. This comes as the ad network finds clients aren’t so quick to buy-in as pre-recession days.
Earlier this month, John Battelle distanced his network from others, saying FM was a “cousin” to ad networks. Flush from receiving a $50 million investment, Battelle said FM is a “digital media and publishing company.”
by Ed Sutherland on April 28, 2008
We’d all like to attract the spontaneous buyer, the online equivalent of the consumer than picks up $20 worth of items while waiting in line to purchase the $1.50 candy bar. Well, 24/7 Real Media, the New York-based marketing company has signed up to target consumers based on their psychographic profile.
Mindset Media says it can track 20 different types of personality types, including assertiveness, creativity, self-esteem, and spontaneity.
“Every brand in the modern market has a psychographic target, and the more competitive the category, the more that target matters on the bottom line,” Jim Meyer, CEO and co-founder of Mindset Media, said in statement. “We are very proud to partner with 24/7 Real Media. Together, we make the Internet work harder for brands.”
by admin on April 27, 2008
Peter Longo to Become CEO of the IDG Technology Network
IDG has hired digital media guru Peter Longo as the first CEO of the IDG Technology Network, effective May 12. Longo was chief sales officer at Inform Technologies, a company that provides capabilities to automatically search, organize, and link content to attract and retain readers for media brands.
Charged with growing the recently announced IDG TechNetwork (www.idgtechnetwork.com) for independent publishers and technology advertisers, Longo’s experience at Inform and prior to that at Zinio Systems will help him develop relationships with third parties interested in IDG’s media and ad network.
Before Inform Technologies, Longo was executive vice-president and president of Zinio from 2003-2006. From 1991-2003, he held several executive positions at Ziff Davis Media. Prior to Ziff Davis, Longo worked at CMP Media, Long Island Monthly, and Sport Magazine.
by admin on April 27, 2008
Like thousands of other WordPress users, we spent the weekend upgrading to version 2.5.1, following it’s release Friday by Matt Mullenweg. The update has left people wondering whether the blogging software was released too early.
On Saturday, the Web Tools Collection site detailed how 2.5.1 users could enter their sites, after the new software began sending incorrect passwords during installation.
A day after the upgrade was released, people were complaining that they could not post, the “Publish” and “Save” buttons flashing and CPU spiking.
In a support message entitled “Upgrading the Upgrade Process,” a writer with the screen name misztai wrote “They can’t test everything, but maybe they should’ve spent more time before releasing everything, take more time and try not to upgrade things a lot. Like space them out.”
WordPress users are being asked to submit bug reports.
Here at Pro Blogging News, we started upgrading from 2.5 to 2.5.1 Friday night. Quickly we ran into the “can’t post” bug. After that, we ran into the “can’t login” bug. Once we learned about the solution, we were okay. However, without that, the famous five-minute WordPress installation process would take an hour.
The take-away from all this: upgrading is a nightmare - go with a new installation and rebuild your system via import.
by Ed Sutherland on April 25, 2008
WordPress guru Matt Mullenweg announced Friday a deal with Sphere to provide “possibly related” links for users of both the blog hosting service and self-hosted blogging software. The news from Web 2.0 Expo was part of an announcement the Automattic founder had promised Thursday.
Although available since 2005-2006 for blogs in general, this WordPress-specific feature is aimed at boosting traffic for small blogs, or the majority of micro publishers on the open-source platform. In particular, the feature will list a blog’s related posts and then posts on other WordPress sites using the new Sphere tool. Sites will have to opt-in to the service.
With Sphere one of the top feature requests from WordPress.com users, the creation of a WordPress-specific offering is a feather in Mullenweg’s cap. For the San Francisco, Calif.-based Sphere, which was recently acquired by AOL for a reported $25 million, the deal widens AOL’s blog audience to the 168 million WordPress.com users and the millions of self-hosted blogs powered by the WordPress.org software.
CNet’s Rafe Needleman noted Sphere will use the click data acquired through the network of WordPress blogs to “potentially make it available for other upcoming WordPress features.” Such data could be a treasure trove for the WordPress/Automattic/AOL triumvirate.
by Ed Sutherland on April 25, 2008
As we wait to see what WordPress evangelist and Automattic founder Matt Mullenweg has to say at the Web 2.0 Expo, he made some interesting comments during a short video interview with All Things Digital’s Kara Swisher. Among the most notable is Mullenweg’s view of the convergence of blogging and traditional media.
Noting a difference between bloggers and social-networking, Mullenweg said he likes where WordPress.com stands.
“I like our position, because it’s about content, it’s not around photos or people trying to connect to each other - it’s traditional content much the way the media business has operated for a long, long time,” Mullenweg told Swisher.
Mullenweg said he would like to see blog advertising change to what he feels should be something more tasteful.
“I hope the ad formats evolve to something a little more tasteful, because many of them can be kind of garish and some of them start to feel like the Las Vegas Strip,” he said.
Google’s Adsense is still the most innovative advertising platform, the WordPress creator told Swisher.
Asked why he doesn’t come up with a tasteful ad platform, Mullenweg shied away from the question.
“I’m thinking about it, but it’s not what I’m most passionate about. The monetization side isn’t something we think about,” he said.
The full 5 minute video interview can be found on All Things Digital.
by Ed Sutherland on April 25, 2008
The heads of Automattic and The Huffington Post are slated to appear Tuesday at next week’s EconSM conference. Both Toni Schneider and Betsy Morgan will participate in panel discussions of the impact of social media on business.
Morgan, who became CEO of The Huffington Post in 2007, will take part in a group speaking about how well politicians understand and use social media. The HuffPo has seen visits and funding skyrocket as politics and social media become intertwined in record ways during the 2008 presidential campaign.
Schnieder, who leads the private company behind the free blog hosting service WordPress.com, will plumb his knowledge as a past and present CEO to take part in the panel entitled “Getting Real: Grown-Up Startups.” Other questions for panelists include what to do after the start-up phase and how does a company determine success.
Both CEOs will appear on the second day of the conference.
by Ed Sutherland on April 24, 2008
Matt Mullenweg, the man behind the WordPress software and the WordPress.com hosting service, is scheduled to “launch something” when he speaks Friday in San Francisco, Calif. at the Web 2.0 Expo.
In a post on his blog, Mullenweg said he’ll be speaking at 10:15 am Pacific (1:15 pm Eastern) on the subject of WordPress. But most intriguing is the throw-away comment that he’ll also will be unveiling something - but what? So far, Mullenweg isn’t providing details.
“We’ll announce what we’re launching at the event, that’s the whole point,” Mullenweg responded on his blog.
However, we can offer a few guesses based on recent events.
Earlier this week, WordPress nemesis Six Apart stole some thunder by announcing it has bought a New York City design studio and created its own ad network. When WordPress 2.5 was delayed a couple times, Six Apart ‘chief evangelist’ Anil Dash took advantage of the timing to ‘invite’ fans of the open-source blogging software to try out Moveable Type. Might Mullenweg let loose with an announcement to upstage Six Apart?
by Ed Sutherland on April 23, 2008
Rachel Segal was named to the new Marketing Manager position at Canada-based B5 Media. Segal, a Canadian herself, had held that spot for Los Angeles, Calif.-based MusicIP.
