Giga Omni Leaves Federated For IDG Ad Network

Giga Omni Media, the technology blog network led by Om Malik, Friday ended its three-year advertising agreement with upscale Federated Media, announcing a new deal with IDG.

In statements, the two parties attempted to put the split in the best possible light. However, the move may be the result of Federated’s recently offering advertisers discounts.

In response to Gig Omni leaving the Federated fold, FM Publisher Charles Edwards told CNET Giga Omni’s seven sites no longer fit its network profile.

“The Federated Media approach is the Conde Nast or Time Inc. approach. Our model has not been well-suited to take those smaller sites where they want to go,” Edwards said.

For his part, Malik said the two companies had diverged.

“As our needs became more specialized, we sat down with the folks at Federated to try and figure out how we could continue to work together,” he wrote in a blog post.

“Both sides quickly realized that instead it was time to wrap up what has been a successful business relationship,” Malik announced.

Friday, Silicon Alley Insider, a Federated Media publisher, reported FM had cut ad rates for Giga Omni, Tech Crunch and others members of the ad network by 35 percent.

“Our most recent changes should not be taken to imply that demand is waning for inventory on FM sites, including TechCrunch and Silicon Alley Insider (as you should know),” FM exec James Navin told SAI’s Henry Blodget in defense.

“In fact, we continue to see a high level of interest from our advertisers at attractive rates to our publishers,” Navin wrote.

Earlier this month, FM was criticizing for offering ads for $5 per CPM as part of what it called a limited-time (through Nov. 28) “holiday advertising campaign.” Valleywag reprinted a memo from FM.