excerpt from interview with Andrew Monfried, founder and CEO of Lotame Solutions]: “One of the biggest challenges is that the industry is trying to apply standard behavioral targeting techniques to the robust arena of user-generated content and social media. Emphasis is still placed on contextual relevance when, in reality, that metric doesn’t take into account true behavior and consumer interests. People are commenting, uploading, posting, viewing videos, and using widgets. The key is to leverage this data in a way that will drive performance. Contextual relevancy doesn’t capture those verbs or actions….One of the most critical things moving forward is understanding that within social media, click-through rates aren’t the most accurate measurement of success. A truly engaged user is more valuable than a click… The industry will need to embrace new ad units as well as leverage behavioral targeting as a new way to distribute content…Our technology gathers tremendous amounts of data inherent to user-generated content, and we use this to build targeted and customizable audiences as well as provide monetization solutions. For example, if a brand wants to target consumers who only like The Grateful Dead, we build that exact audience for them… Lotame allows advertisers to touch people and not pages….
Social Networking Meets Behavioral Targeting. Anna Papadopoulos. clickz. March 26, 2008
