Over the last 10 years one of the main topics I have covered is advertising fraud. Over and over again fraud keeps on popping up in the industry both from small players to major players. It seems that no matter how much the industry matures, how much technology is created; fraud is a significant issue that siphons both money and confidence away from the industry. I’ve written about banner farms, click-fraud, lead-faking, IP spoofing… you name it. My friend Ben Edelman, famed attorney and Harvard researcher has made it his life to cover issues in interactive advertising and has exposed complex schemes that boggle the mind. Advertising fraud seems to be everywhere in all forms and needs to be exposed, talked about and changed. However, as much as there are obvious kinds of fraud, there are sometimes more nefarious methods of fraud that are not always classified by fraud but still affect the industry significantly and need to be talked about.

Click to read more ...

This morning, I wanted to talk a little about the incentive marketing game, which still has a significant impact on revenue generation of almost every company in the marketplace. We’ve even come up with a word that my spell-check hates, called incentivization, which is the process where you provide rewards for filling out offers, signing up for a service or some other pay-per-action type service. Incentive based advertising is probably one of the most hated, yet needed systems in the industry and perhaps its time for a frank discussion.

Click to read more ...

I wrote a few weeks ago about the issues with performance marketing and display networks, especially with the focus of cost-per-action and cost-per-lead campaigns. As mentioned, I’ve been involved in both the CPA affiliate marketing business and the interactive brand marketing business and know both of them inside out. Also, as mentioned I see the benefits of both, but see that performance based marketing is the future of our industry, and all agencies need to wake up and start learning about this part of the industry immediately.

Click to read more ...

It was revealed that Facebook, the mega social networking site, had topped over $800 million in revenue for 2009. Since it is not a public company, they have not publically revealed this, but according to my source over there, this number is accurate and that the revenue number for 2010 is already trending at what could be a $1.4 billion dollar year. However, he did point out (since he is a reader of my blog) that there is some sign that the revenue for the last half of the year might actually be less than the first half of the year based on the enormous policy changes that Facebook has had in its relationship to Affilaite Marketing. As I’ve pointed out before, Facebook has taken a very aggressive stance on Affiliate marketers, and I might know why.

Click to read more ...

If you read the comments from my friend Rob Cotter @ FixionMEdia, a boutique music ad network you’d get that he’s not a “huge fan of the CPA model, as marketers are vying for free advertising. If I’m reading The Economist, I don’t clip out a BMW ad and send it to their corporate HQ so they can pay The Economist for the lead. It’s ridiculous.” On the other side, we have Evan the CEO of Experience Advertising, who says that “Any media rarely backs into the target CPA… better focus on putting together CPA partnerships.” They are both going back into the whole debate of CPM vs. CPA, in which publishers will demand premium prices for their inventory, but marketers and a growing amount of agencies want accountability. Is it really CPA vs. CPM? Are the two worlds really that far apart? From the comments, you’d think that the two sides are at war and can’t come together.

Click to read more ...

As the former owner of a Comscore rated display ad network, and now the manager of a major performance marketing network, I seem to have unique insight into how networks and performance/affiliate companies work. Before owning the major network, I was actually a multi-million dollar affiliate of my current company. I’ve a great deal of experience in making CPA-based campaigns work on “brand CPM” inventory – and the real issues in dealing with running CPA/Performance marketing campaigns on CPM display inventory. Thus, as part of my tireless mission to inform and educate the public with my brilliant analysis, here is the first of a two part series on the issues of CPA campaigns and display marketing. Read on!

Click to read more ...

Over the last few weeks, despite only posting once in a while, IndustryPace.com has grown larger than many of the major performance and brand marketing publications. Ranked in the top 100,000 of US websites, I must say, is pretty damn spectacular for a personal blog by a writer who barely has time to read his own blog, let alone write in it. That being said, it’s obvious that with over 40,000 readers a month, I’m hitting the nail on the head and forcing some people to think (or change their business models?).. or at least writing well enough that some people find it interesting. I’d like to challenge readers to work with me on brainstorming topics and more importantly, solutions and partnerships in brand and performance marketing. This will be a perfect opportunity to feature your company, what you do exactly and how everyone in the industry can work with you—and more importantly, how we can all work together.

Click to read more ...