This has been a week of bad news about CPA networks - this is great for the industry! The last few days have seen Dow Jones reporting that NeverBlue is going on the auction block in order to help pay parent company Velo Holding's debts. Epic is in the news because of the upswell in rumors - see our report from a few weeks ago - that virtually their entire C-suite of senior … [Read more...]
Is A Dinosaur Eating Your Lunch?
The winners in the online marketing space have always been the fast movers. Quick and agile people who see an opportunity and have the motivation and resources to act rapidly. But as we’re seeing in the mobile marketplace right now, new opportunities are being fenced in by the biggest companies who control the platforms. In the evolving world of online advertising, the … [Read more...]
OPM Consolidation As Schaaf Buys PartnerCentric
Schaaf Consulting announced today that it has acquired PartnerCentric, creating one of the biggest outsourced program management companies in the industry. This move continues Brook Schaaf's plan for affiliate marketing world domination that began with the founding of Schaaf Consulting with his brother, Forrest, in 2006 and then accelerated with the acquisition of Stephanie … [Read more...]
Google Kills Twitter
Google killed Twitter today. With the launch of Google Buzz they ruthlessly attacked Twitter’s weaknesses and quietly set the scene for subsequent creeping infiltration into Microsoft’s stronghold in the enterprise market. Buzz is a big deal. Google’s Buzz is presented as a simple rival to Twitter. It shows up discreetly as a tab in Gmail, will play nicely … [Read more...]
Google Affiliate Network: Big-Time Backing
The performance marketing landscape changed dramatically last year when Performics, the third largest network, was sold along with its parent company DoubleClick to search giant Google. After more than a decade in the online marketing space, Performics became the Google Affiliate Network - gaining all the cachet of an association with Google, along with concerns from the … [Read more...]
LinkShare: Leveraging Technology and Global Markets
Nearly a year ago, LinkShare president Steve Denton stepped down. The company named co-presidents. Jonathan Levine and Yasuhisa "Yaz" Iida are both veterans of LinkShare's parent company Rakuten. Lisa Picarille: LinkShare is the only major network to have co-presidents. Give me the break down of your duties. Jonathan Levine: I used to be the chief technology officer at … [Read more...]
Shaping Up Your Business
Facebook, of course, is the social networking site college students used to call their own. Since the site opened up to the general public, its profile has definitely been on the rise. Bay Partners' Facebook program - called AppFactory - will be aimed at giving entrepreneurs microbursts of funds as they need it, from $25,000 to $250,000 in as little as a few days' turnaround. … [Read more...]
Power Plays
By their brief descriptions - "online auction website" and "Internet searching and online advertising company" - it does not sound like eBay and Google are rivals for the same business. But behind the boilerplate company descriptions, many experts claim that as these giants seek to grow even larger, they are going after the same types of acquisitions, which is exacerbating … [Read more...]
Look Out!
Last night you read on your local newspaper's website about how gas prices could reach $4 a gallon this summer, so you went to a car site to check out some reviews about hybrid vehicles and then visited an automaker site to learn about the car prices. This morning when you checked your email, you saw two ads for hybrid cars. Did you think - wow, this relevant ad sure is handy … [Read more...]
The Desire to Acquire
The new geography features auction-based ad exchanges and conglomerated companies with divisions that buy, sell and distribute ads: something that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. The emergence of these new entities with intertwined relationships has the potential to streamline the media marketplace and drive costs down and return on investment up. Consolidation will … [Read more...]
Linkshare Shuffle
In early February, just six months after LinkShare agreed to be acquired by Japan-based e-commerce portal giant Rakuten for $425 million, the founders of the affiliate network have decided to step aside.The resignations of Chairman and CEO Stephen Messer and President and COO Heidi Messer, who founded LinkShare in 1996, were not surprising according to industry watchers, but … [Read more...]
Stand By Me
The last of the big independent affiliate and performance marketing networks was finally swallowed up by another large international conglomerate.In early September, Japanese e-commerce portal Rakuten took its first step into the U.S. market by agreeing to acquire privately held New York-based performance marketing network LinkShare for approximately $425 million in … [Read more...]
Land Rush
Suddenly, Joe Speiser's phone rings more often than it used to.The calls are coming from venture investors and executives at some "very familiar companies" who've taken a sudden interest in buying all or part of AzoogleAds.com, the performance marketing company that Speiser co-founded four years ago."It just kind of started," he says, somewhat stunned by all the attention. "A … [Read more...]
Share and Share A Link
Talking about Steve Messer's role in online affiliate marketing is like talking about Davy Crockett's role on the wild frontier. Since founding LinkShare in 1996, Messer has been a leader in the rapidly expanding pay-for-performance channel. Deloitte & Touche has named LinkShare the fastest growing technology company in the New York area for the past two years, and … [Read more...]
Less Is More
Ask any guru in the affiliate universe what ValueClick's acquisition of Commission Junction means, and you'll get more answers (and more pitches) than you can imagine.Is it consolidation? "Yes and maybe." Does it matter? "Perhaps, but let me tell you why it won't matter to my business." Is it changing the nature of the affiliate industry? "No, but it reflects the changes."It's … [Read more...]