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Newspaper Ad Network Shuns Google, Yahoo, MS
Ian Lamont writes "The New York Times, and the Tribune, Gannett, and Hearst companies have launched their own ad network, called QuadrantOne. It will let advertisers place ads on media sites in 27 major markets, and let them target readers by content type, demographic information, and online behavior. Notably absent from the deal: Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft. Both Google and Yahoo have their own ad networks focused on newspapers, but, as the article says, 'if newspapers develop better ways to sell their own online ads, they may not have to share revenue with their Web counterparts such as Yahoo and Google.'"
That makes sense.
A big problem with Google's "content network" is that most of the ad sites have no real content. The newspaper industry at least has something worth attaching ads to. Google is taking a 50% cut of ad revenue without doing very much for it.
This may push Google ads towards the "bottom feeder" made-for-Adwords sites, especially if the news media become very aggressive about going after anyone copying their content. This will make thosse ads much less valuable; that's where the low-value clicks come from.
From the http://www.quadrantone.com/ site:
"Access to sophisticated audience targeting by context, behavior and demographics".
I can see how they can target by context (selling to specific websites), but how can they target by behavior or demographics? Will they be looking at the cookies on user machines to try to determine behavior? How will they get demographic information?
The New York Times is dying.
Even the New York Times confirms it.
I don't block Google ads because Google has avoided obnoxious ads. I won't block Q1 ads unless they decide to make them obnoxious (e.g. flash, animations, large, pop ups, etc). Given the history of the newspaper business not keeping up with the world, I worry that I may end up having to block them. Then I'd become some kind of news freeloader.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
Google is KNOWN for their search engine and for how targeted their ads are between the end viewer AND the site. In the denver post or rocky mountain news, when I see ads beside some article, they have NOTHING to do with the content. ABsolutely nothing. I noticed that when I was reading about the butchery at NIU, that I was being shown ads about dating women on the east coast. I am not single, and I have nothing to do with the east coast, and what does dating have to do with an idiot running around murdering ppl? All in all, the newspaper have less and less news, and unless they hire some good ppl on, even their ads will remain worthless. Off hand, I believe that the "news" papers are heading towards being the bottom feeders.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
I read some of the comments and it seems like people are saying that this is a desperate attempt to save the newspaper industry. I don't think it's desperate at all - I think it's actually a wise choice. The players are engaging in what's called a "vertical market" - in case anyone overlooked this fact - in order to serve the needs of the core business.
They're not trying to save the ship: they're building a better ship.
"It was hell!" recalls former child.