JohnDeMayo.com: Internet Advertising Insight

We're hiring! Media Buyer Needed in SF

     This person will be working directly with me on all of our media buying and planning efforts, at a super fast growing company.  Drop me a line!

Job Description

As an Online Media Buyer, we’re looking for a strong track record of evaluating, negotiating, and purchasing online media campaigns. The ideal candidate is a self-starter, self-motivated, and has a self-learning work approach, solid organizational and analytical skills, ability to take control, excellent written and verbal skills and ability to impart knowledge on various levels.

This position requires that you have a thorough understanding of online media buying, including CPA, CPL, revenue-share, co-reg, CPC, and CPM models. You will bring an ability to manage a large number of CPA and revenue share relationships, and a strategic focus to execute important CPM and CPC related contracts with precision and a constant eye on ROI.

Skills

*2+ years of online media buying and/or business development experience focused on online customer acquisition
*Experience buying in-house on revenue-share or CPA a plus
*Strong analytical thinker with good quantitative skills

Company Description

Headquartered in downtown San Francisco, zozi is a fast-growing, venture capital backed internet consumer services company focused on vibrant things to do locally and abroad. Think sailing, kayaking, zip lining, wine tasting and more. You can see more here: http://www.zozi.com.

But let’s get down to the good stuff...YES, we’re hiring, and we’re excited about it. Specifically, we’re in need of experienced and passionate inside sales professionals.

We put a focus on a culture where every single person feels excited about building this company. The team is incentivized to do well, and we’re heavily invested in the future of each person. We realize that talented people have options, and those who choose zozi mean a whole lot to us. We want you to grow professionally, have a lot of fun and be surrounded by the best.

It is also probably worth mentioning that we offer great perks like a 401K, 100% company paid health benefits, and generous vacation time. We also offer free excursions in 160 countries, company iPhones, required sabbatical time, gym memberships, and a sky-lit office in the heart of Jackson Square. We also have a dog named Charlie who loves chasing tennis balls more than life itself, and a lot of jungle plants.

We also believe in a strong sense of community and do-goodery, so we give 10% of our profits back to the local communities in which we operate. We’re thrilled to help local schools, environmental causes, and other phenomenal projects – it’s part of our DNA and we’re psyched to do our part in making a positive impact in the community.

Consorte Media Sold

     According to an email from CEO Alicia Morga sent to various people earlier today, Consorte Media has been acquired.  A few rumors have been going around this week, but this is the first confirmation I have seen.  No confirmation on the purchaser or price.  I suspect we will see details emerge tomorrow or Monday.

San Francisco for Ad-tech Monday - Thursday April 19-22

   I'll be in the SF area Monday through Thursday of this coming week for various meetings and such given many people are in from out of town for Ad-Tech.  I don't value the ad-tech show itself much any more, but it does draw a number of people I wouldn't normally get to see to one place at one time.

  Right now Monday is looking pretty busy but on Tuesday and Wednesday I have plenty of time available as of now, if you are interested in meeting drop me a line.  I'm planning on being near the Moscone pretty much all day tue/wed.

    Also looks like I will be a bit south of the city Thursday and possibly Friday as well, and have time available then too if you are somewhere between SF and Santa Cruz.

LeadsCon in Vegas Feb 23-24

     I will be attending LeadsCon in Las Vegas Feb 23-24, and will be staying in Vegas for a few days afterward.  If you are interested in setting up some time to chat with me, please drop me a line, my schedule is pretty clear right now.  I'm really looking forward to this one, a few of my old friends and co-workers I haven't seen in a while will be in attendance.

Quinstreet Valuation

~$800 million.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a_mQ2s5tiC_c&pos=6

My estimate in November was $1 billion, not too far off.

My first patent granted

Back in 2000-2002 I authored / co-authored a number of patent applications, as an employee of Advertising.com.  It looks like one was finally granted.  United States Patent 7,617,121 - Apparatus and method for hyperlinking specific words in content to turn the words into advertisements.  I actually wrote the original javascript files to handle re-writing a html page to include the desired ads.....pretty funny as I don't consider myself to be technical, no programming background, I just learned what I needed to on the fly when I didn't have the required resources.

AOL to restrict Advertising.com's ability to sell premium ads

     Apparently AOL is going to start restricting Advertising.com's ability to sell its premium inventory.  It will be very interesting to see exactly what that will mean.  I don't think it will mean certain placements will never see clients booked by adcom reps, but more likely that they will not be able to guarantee delivery on certain placements (but they may still show up in the mix).  So likely they can't sell guaranteed delivery on a particular placement, but they can sell a performance campaign which ends up on that placement (just not declared beforehand).

     Given the large number of variables there are in advertising purchase orders, I'm curious to see the exact definition of what Advertising.com reps can and can not contract for....and what the loopholes are that the crafty reps and their analysts will find.

Shouk Media: Congrats to Jay Weintraub and Dave Wengal

     I just read that Dave Wengal has left Targus Info to join my old friend Jay Weintraub, helping connect and educate people in the industry, with their newly formed company Shouk Media.  Congrats to both of you.  Jay's spoken a bit to me about his vision for continuing to work on helping people learn about our industry, and connect appropriate people together for mutually benefitial relationships across a number of mediums (including and expanding on his work in conferences, and his writing on various blogs).  I couldn't be more excited on his continued execution on this vision, and his bringing in a partner with a fantastic reputation.  Let me know how I can help Mr. Jay :)

Modeling Admob and Millennial Media revenues and margin

    I read Cogblog's stab at modeling some of the mobile network's revenues, margin,overhead this morning.  Making a few modifications to their assumptions get us closer to reality.

    First, they assume revenues at $.50/CPM and publisher payouts of $.30/CPM for non-premium inventory.  In my experience the clearing rate for inventory is closer to $$1.00-1.25/CPM, as opposed to $.50/CPM.

    They also assume margins are 40% in the business, and that both companies have the same margins.  I suspect margins are slightly lower overall.  I also believe that Admob's margins are greater, because they have a larger number of smaller publishers.  Millennial Media's margins are likely lower as they represent a smaller number of bigger publishers that have more negotiating leverage.

    My numbers assume US traffic, so there could be a lot of play in these numbers based upon how well non-US countries monetize.  Also, these are clearing rates for "non-premium" inventory....I don't have any good guesses on the amount of inventory sold at premium rates (although the premium sell-through rate is likely much higher at Millennial).

Great Bid Strategy for Google Search Network

    RKG has a great post on the variance in conversion rates across Google and Yahoo's syndicated networks, and how there's one strategy that can be used at Google at least, to help de-average and bid a bit more appropriately then using a standard configuration.

     

    While you can't set separate bids for each source of traffic on their network individually (although you may well see this in the future), you can set a separate bid strategy for Google, and for all others grouped together.....

    "One set of campaigns is set to Google-only. A carbon-copy of those campaigns is set to Google + Syndication Network. The bids for the Google-only campaign are higher because the conversion rates are higher, hence on Google.com only the Google-only campaigns are in play. That means that the Google + Syndication partner campaigns actually only serve ads on the syndication network and the bids can be depressed en masse for that traffic."

    Eventually hopefully Google will let you bid separately for each site.  And maybe some day add even more variables into the data set that you can bid against.  One day search may even look like ad exchanges today, letting you place an bid on each individual impression.....imagine being able to bid more or less based upon someones search history, or on demographic data you may have stored on a user, or on purchase history info you may have on a user....this could get really complex at some point in the future, and really separate the serious math people from those that are kind of winging it.

    Anyways, make sure you check out RKG's full post, there's some great data that's well illustrated.