GET IN THE DRIVERS SEAT

Advertisers traditionally have very little control over online ad campaigns. We think that’s a mistake. That’s why we let you determine targeting, inventory selection, placement and more. The result is a tailored campaign that aligns with your brand, budget and schedule.

Exact Drive designed and developed its self-serve advertising platform to provide small to mid size ad agencies (and Independent Resellers too) with an advertising platform that provides a turn-key solution to Plan, Manage, Traffic, Analyze, Report, and Optimize Digital Display campaigns for their clients.

  WE BUILT A SIMPLE AND TRANSPARENT SELF-SERVE ADVERTISING PLATFORM

If you are just beginning to research online advertising and what it can do for your business, one of the essential questions you need answered is: What is online advertising? At  Exact Drive, we realize that not everyone is familiar with the domain of advertising and abbreviations (people in online advertising love abbreviations), so we are headed back to the basics to give you a quick overview of the wonderful world of online advertising.

Exact Drive defines its available inventory (websites) into main categories and sub-level categories. Any categories (main or sub-level) can be included or excluded together within a campaign. Category targeting places display ads on sites that are categorically relevant to your industry and customers’ interests. Available inventory categories can include include entertainment, e-commerce, technology, health and travel.

Soon we will share a list of prohibited inventory content and why they are prohibited inventory sources (websites), which basically boils down to Exact Drive reasonably believing that the inventory content is likely to be in violation of any applicable law, regulation, or court order.

Banner ad requirements are important to know and understand. There are few technical requirements imposed on banner ads (if they are dynamic ads, static or anything in between) by Exact Drive. As an initial requirement, a single banner ad must render properly multiple times during the audit process, regardless of any parameter or restriction assigned. Therefore, frequency capping or geo-targeting set outside of Exact Drive will interfere with the audit process. Please have geo-targeting and frequency capping parameters from third party ad servers turned off during our audit process. The most popular Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standard banner sizes Exact Drive works with are: 728×90, 300×250, 160×600 and 300×600.

Banner Ads Can Be Rejected For The Following Reasons

Banner ad requirements are important to know and understand. There are few technical requirements imposed on banner ads (if they are dynamic ads, static or anything in between) by Exact Drive. As an initial requirement, a single banner ad must render properly multiple times during the audit process, regardless of any parameter or restriction assigned. Therefore, frequency capping or geo-targeting set outside of Exact Drive will interfere with the audit process. Please have geo-targeting and frequency capping parameters from third party ad servers turned off during our audit process. The most popular Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) standard banner sizes Exact Drive works with are: 728×90, 300×250, 160×600 and 300×600.

Banner Ads Can Be Rejected For The Following Reasons

- The ad does not display at all
- The ad is wrong tag size
- No privacy policy on landing page that requests personal identifiable information (PII)
- The banner ad intermittently does not display
- For expandable banner ads or other banner ads with interaction, the banner ad attempts the interaction but does not function properly.
- The banner has multiple versions with different brands under a single ad tag
- A single banner ad represents and clicks through to multiple different brands’ landing pages
- For video ads, a pre-roll ad for a different brand plays before the actual offer
- banner ads with multiple brands must link to landing page(s) having the same single consistent brand.
- The banner ad is clicked and does not open a landing page
- The banner ad is clicked and a landing page opens but no content loads
- The banner ad does not display a brand
- Clicking on an ad must not initiate a download of any type of file
- The banner ad’s landing page loads in the same page instead of opening a new window or tab
- The banner ad loads the entire landing page into the frame
- The banner ad has no discernible brand or offering
- The banner ad displays a brand but it is not sufficient notification

The online advertising industry is strong and here to stay. However, as 2012 comes to a close, many articles are written that outline the “predictions for 2013,” “top advertising stories of 2012,” “five reasons why the online advertising industry will fail in 2013,” and so on and so on. These articles are fun to read and some are even useful and insightful. Instead of pretending that I have some secret insight into the future of the online advertising industry or a knowledge base significant enough to accurately outline what’s to come in 2013, I would rather share a couple suggestions. Online advertising is a fast-moving, ever-changing industry and sometimes we are moving a little too fast to stop and reflect on why we think what we think and why we do what we do.

Media Buyers Are Media Buyers, Not Creative Directors

Oh, the fun of cash flow in the World of digital media. I recently had a conversation with FastPay’s founder and CEO Jed Simon. FastPay is a tech-enabled finance platform that helps digital businesses with monthly revenue greater than $50,000 overcome the struggle of long, receivable cycles by providing specialized credit lines up to several million dollars. Jed began his career in the investment banking new media group at Morgan Stanley & Co. in New York providing IPO, debt finance, and merger and acquisitions advisory services prior to joining DreamWorks SKG in 1996.

Tim Nichols: What are some of the biggest challenges that digital media businesses face?

I recently had the privilege to have a conversation with Chad Little, co-founder of his new company called Adhesive, which will be focused on show-stopping CPC ads that generate exceptional performance. Mr. Little has had a long successful history as a serial entrepreneur, including his last company Fetchback that was acquired by GSI Commerce in 2010.

Chad Little is a successful serial entrepreneur who is considered one of the early, leading forces in the Internet arena with strong capital raising and M&A experience. He founded FetchBack, a pioneer in the world of site retargeting, in May of 2007. FetchBack was quickly recognized as a leader in the space and was acquired by GSI Commerce in 2010. Shortly thereafter, GSI was acquired by eBay in 2011. Now Chad is launching a new company called Adhesive, which will be focused on show-stopping CPC ads that generate exceptional performance.