Maven Networks isn’t exactly recreating online video advertising, but the Internet TV Advertising Platform it launched last week offers a number of innovations that will open some new doors for the publishers who use it.
The five-year-old company, which launched a media player in March, started focusing on video advertising, “so our customers could monetize video on their own sites,” said Maven’s VP of marketing Kristen Fergason.
The new platform offers three features that will help publishers and advertisers run effective video campaigns–a variety of new ad formats; an insertion engine that will enable ads to be placed in the best position in the videos; and a series of inventory management and prediction tools.
The new formats include versions of overlays, videos and sponsored skins that aren’t unique to Maven but offer some novel features, such as an interactive fulfillment panel that plays at the end of a video that enables the user to play an additional video or request information, such as the address of a local dealer or a brochure that will be sent by e-mail. After users go to a video ad from an overlay, they can be offered additional videos, which appear in a separate box on the right side of the media player.
The new insertion engine is based on a variety of metrics that enable publishers to play ads at different times while the video plays. Everything from the user session time to the video clip length to the average view time and the popularity of the video clip are factored in to provide a “cue point insertion,” which is the best time to insert an ad while the video plays.
The cue point insertion tool is part of the inventory management system that will govern the frequency and type of ads that are played with the videos.
The ability to play an ad at different times during the video creates a wealth of new inventory, as much as three times more, Fergason said. “When the user is playing a video, 15 seconds in you have an opportunity to play an ad, it’s a second ad in a stream. Those placements didn’t exist before, so it offers a new opportunity with a higher CPM.”
Maven has been testing the new ad platform with publishers in closed trials. This week, it will test it with consumers who will be asked to comment on the new ad formats. The results of the tests will be published in November, Fergason said.
The company has also created a forum of publishers, agencies and tech providers who will collaborate on developing the platform. The publishers are Financial Times, TV Guide, Fox News, Scripps and 4 Kids Entertainment; the agencies are Ogilvy and Digitas; the tech providers are DoubleClick and Atlas.
The goal of the platform is to help Maven’s publishing partners upgrade their video advertising. “We want the publishers to use the new forms of advertising,” Fergason said. “The industry is so stagnant. We want to help people kick it into gear. There hasn’t been much innovation during the last five years, but we hope to increase video advertising inventory and revenue.”
Supreme Court Allows Multibillion-Dollar Class Action Lawsuit To Proceed Against Meta
The Supreme Court is allowing a multibillion-dollar class action investors' lawsuit to proceed against Facebook parent Meta, stemming from the privacy scandal involving the Cambridge Analytica political consulting firm.
The justices heard arguments in November in Meta's bid to shut down the lawsuit. On Friday, they decided that they were wrong to take up the case in the first place.
The high court dismissed the company's appeal, leaving in place an appellate ruling allowing the case to go forward.
Investors allege that Meta did not fully disclose the risks that Facebook users' personal information would be misused by Cambridge Analytica, a firm that supported Donald Trump 's first successful Republican presidential campaign in 2016.
Inadequacy of the disclosures led to two significant price drops in the price of the company's shares in 2018, after the public learned about the extent of the privacy scandal, the investors say.
Meta spokesman Andy Stone said the company was disappointed by the court's action. "The plaintiff's claims are baseless and we will continue to defend ourselves as this case is considered by the District Court," Stone said in an emailed statement.
Meta already has paid a $5.1 billion fine and reached a $725 million privacy settlement with users.
Cambridge Analytica had ties to Trump political strategist Steve Bannon. It had paid a Facebook app developer for access to the personal information of about 87 million Facebook users. That data was then used to target U.S. voters during the 2016 campaign.
The lawsuit is one of two high court cases involving class-action lawsuits against tech companies. The justices also are wrestling with whether to shut down a class action against Nvidia.... Read More