Act I: Crank That The year was 2007. Ten years ago. Microsoft bought aQuantive for $6.3B. Google bought DoubleClick for $3.1B. Yahoo bought Right Media for $680M. Display was poised to take massive amounts of advertising dollars from television over the next decade and become the dominant form of advertising. Microsoft, Google and Yahoo were… Continue reading The Decade of Display That Wasn’t 2007 – 2017
Autumn for Digital Publishers…and Everything After
The digital media world was a rocked yesterday by news that Buzzfeed is going to miss revenue targets by 20% and Mashable was sold for $50M when its valuation last year was $250M. What is going on? The short answer is a lot. Buzzfeed is actually right in their statement where they put blame on… Continue reading Autumn for Digital Publishers…and Everything After
Snap Revenues in Perspective. And What it Means.
Snap announced revenues yesterday and the stock got hammered. The miss was about 15% off projected but the company still did half the revenue it did all last year in one quarter. Pretty solid. What matters is not what Snap did last quarter but the overall potential of Snap as a company that sells media.… Continue reading Snap Revenues in Perspective. And What it Means.
The New Google Era
Something has been happening on the Google SERPs (Search Engine Result Pages). It is the very thing that the FTC just closed the case on. It is the delivery on the promise that Larry and Sergey made from the beginning. That Google would organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible. The keywords (pun… Continue reading The New Google Era
End of the CPM Experiment
The flag bearer of display advertising was always Yahoo. Their massive sales force stoked 15 years of equity into “the web banner.” Yahoo arguably had the greatest hand in providing the economic foundation for the entire web for many of its formative years. That is why nothing better symbolizes the collapse of that foundation better… Continue reading End of the CPM Experiment
Defending the Future of Mobile Ads
The first time I read Fred Wilson’s Mobile is Where the Growth Is I was disturbed. I commented. Not what I really wanted to say but I said something. The second time I read it I had to write a blog response. Now I agree there’s a shift happening. But… This is unknown. Foursquare hasn’t… Continue reading Defending the Future of Mobile Ads
Taste Graphs and the Future of User Controlled Media
My friend Andy Weissman posted some really interesting ideas last week on the future of branded media that got me thinking. “we are moving to a world where almost everything is available, basically on demand. The problem for users in this environment is no longer "what CAN I watch" (or read or listen to). Instead,… Continue reading Taste Graphs and the Future of User Controlled Media
