Google Buys Intelligent Display Firm Teracent; Rubicon Appoints Former Wunderloop Exec Bas Seelen

Google Buys Intelligent Display Firm Teracent

Google continues its foray into traditional Yahoo advertising territory by beefing up its display offering with yesterday’s acquisition of Teracent.

Teracent’s technology produces display advertising in real-time based on the specific user and site. Its algorithm uses variables such as geographic location, language, the content of the website, the time of day and past performance to serve up the most “relevant” ad.

The platform allows advertisers to optimise the creative parts of an ad, such as colour and text, in real-time. This intelligent display technology could well be a huge draw for advertisers as it improves campaign performance on the DoubleClick Ad Exchange.

Google’s blog talks about the potential of the Teracent technology and how it will fit into Google’s present offering:

Teracent's technology can pick and choose from literally thousands of creative elements of a display ad in real-time — tweaking images, products, messages or colors. These elements can be optimized depending on factors like geographic location, language, the content of the website, the time of day or the past performance of different ads.

This technology can help advertisers get better results from their display ad campaigns. In turn, this enables publishers to make more money from their ad space and delivers web users better ads and more ad-funded web content.

We're looking forward to welcoming the Teracent team to Google and to making this technology available to our display advertising clients — including those who run display ad campaigns on the Google Content Network and our DoubleClick clients.

Rubicon Appoints Wunderloop Exec To Lead Sales Effort In Northern Europe

Rubicon continues its European hiring blitz. After a number of key hires in the UK market, Rubicon has announced the appointment of former Wunderloop Netherlands MD, Bas Seelen. Seelen has been hired to lead the sales effort in Northern Europe. He will be selling the Rubicon platform and service into key premium publishers in the region.

Rubicon is, in fairness, adopting a very pragmatic approach to expanding its operation in Europe by hiring local talent with deep knowledge of local markets. US media companies often make the mistake of running their European businesses out of London, and overlook the fractured nature of the region's market. Here Jay Stevens gives an interesting insight into the multi-faceted nature of the European market, pointing out how some German publishers remain non-plused about working with ad nets and ad exchanges due to early bad experience and consistently low CPMs:

As we continue to expand internationally and meet with publishers in Europe and beyond, it has become apparent that bad experiences with ad networks and exchanges early on have created a somewhat hostile climate. In particular, publishers with established brands in Germany garner some of the highest CPMs for their audiences in the region, so they’re reluctant about turning any of their inventory over to an ad network or sales house that would potentially buy low and sell high. However, with his industry experience and knowledge of the market, Bas is well-suited to deliver the support and education that publishers need to start rebuilding trust in ad networks and in turn improving their channel management practices – and with it their revenue potential.