AdBrite Launches Marketplace for Ad-Targeting Technologies

AdBrite is taking a unique approach to online ad placement with the launch of its new Open Targeting Exchange (OTX), a competitive marketplace for algorithms and ad targeting technologies.

Instead of using a single algorithm to determine which ad should appear on which site, AdBrite will now use OTX to let different providers compete. The new service allows those providers to bid in real-time for the right to place AdBrite’s inventory.

“We expose our pages and ads and user profiles to our targeting partners, and they come back to us with what ads best match a given user and pageview,” said AdBrite VP Marketing Paul Levine. “We allow them to set their own margins, so they can get pretty aggressive and have a real profit motive.”

OTX will be integrated seamlessly into AdBrite’s network, said Levine, so the transition will not noticeably impact functionality for advertisers or publishers. The company is banking that it will mean higher revenues for both, however.

The service debuts with two launch partners, ad network Lucid Media (formerly Entrieva) and Personifi, a firm that provides ad targeting and optimization. Ajay Sravanapudi, CEO of Lucid Media, characterized OTX as a solution to the disconnect between networks and targeting technologies.

“Most large ad networks have reach but weak targeting technology, while most technology providers have great targeting but lack reach,” he said; hence, OTX would help advertisers and publishers get the best of both worlds.

AdBrite is currently reviewing applications from nearly two dozen other potential partners and plans to have several more on board in coming weeks, said Levine,

“Why tie yourself to one algorithm that may work great now but in a few years will be left behind?” said Levine. “As good an algorithm as one company can make, it’s always better to tap into many.”

This is not the first time AdBrite has taken an open approach to its network. Just last month, it signed deals with numerous other networks to sell inventory in its own marketplace. Networks such as Advertising.com, Burst Media, AdPepper Media, PrecisionClick and CPX Interactive now traffic ads with AdBrite.

AdBrite serves more than 50,000 Web sites, mostly small to mid-size, with nearly a billion page views a day, placing it fourth behind Google, Yahoo, and AOL’s Advertising.com, said Levine. In January of this year, AdBrite ads reached 85 million unique users, according to the company.