SpotXchange's Blog

WESTMINSTER, CO (September 10, 2009) – comScore’s newly released Video Metrix numbers for July 2009 listed SpotXchange as a top video ad network reaching a potential of 47M unique visitors per month with its in-stream pre-roll video ad unit. As a result, SpotXchange ranked in the top 20 of Video Metrix when including potential reach of video ad networks. comScore also reported that SpotXchange’s combined potential reach for in-banner and in-stream video ads is 109M unique visitors per month.

“We’re very proud of the numbers comScore reported for SpotXchange,” said SpotXchange CEO Michael Shehan. “Joining comScore was an important first step in raising our profile in the media buying community. While we don’t believe our network is fully represented in the comScore numbers since we are just at the very beginning stages of working with them, this is still an especially proud moment for SpotXchange, as the Company has proven that superior technology, unwavering focus on our mission and a strong value proposition trump heavily financed competitors any day of the week.”

SpotXchange is a performance-based video ad network that operates an exchange-based marketplace where buyers and sellers of video ad inventory come together in a real-time environment. SpotXchange has never raised institutional funding, having supported itself through significant investment from its sister company, Booyah Networks, and a small round of angel funding from notable industry titans like Alex Bogusky co-Chairman of Crispin, Porter & Bogusky. SpotXchange enables advertisers to target video ad inventory using a variety of enhanced targeting technologies, and is the only video ad network to offer both retargeting and behavioral targeting technologies.

“I’m not surprised by SpotXchange’s success and growth,” says Alex Bogusky, co-Chairman of CP+B. “When you combine the best qualities of TV advertising with the most advanced interactive targeting methods and an efficient and accountable platform, you’ve suddenly made every marketer’s dream come true.”

About SpotXchange

SpotXchange is a performance-based video ad network that guarantees our advertisers generate a return on their video advertising investment. Combining the power of video with advanced targeting technologies and an efficient exchange-based marketplace, SpotXchange enables advertisers to achieve their campaign goals regardless of the metric – more sales, registrations, phone calls, web site visitors, interactions, brand lift, purchase intent, brand awareness, in-store visits, etc. The SpotXchange patent-pending online video advertising platform received the 2007 & 2008 Streaming Media Readers’ Choice Award for Best Video Ad Platform. The company was spun off from Colorado-based digital marketing and technology company, Booyah Networks in March 2007. Booyah Networks ranked 23rd on the 2006 Inc. 500. SpotXchange clients and partners include Reckitt, TVU, Mochi, RealGames, and Razorfish to name a few.

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Contact:

Erica Harte

303-345-6609

eharte@spotxchange.com

Online advertising of consumer products boosts sales at a higher rate and faster than comparable TV advertising, according to a recent study by comScore Inc. on behalf of DunnHumby USA, a marketing agency for consumer goods manufacturers and retailers.

ComScore monitored the online behavior of 200,000 members of its consumer panel, all of whom belong to supermarket loyalty programs, to determine how online marketing affected their purchasing.

Read the rest of the article here:  http://www.internetretailer.com/dailyNews.asp?id=31550

Small Businesses Finding Great Success With Online Video Ads Using SpotMixer’s Upgraded Online Video Advertising Service

SpotMixer 2.0 Loads New Features Into Its Industry-Leading Video Creation and Distribution Technology, Offers 30-Day Free Trial

SpotMixer

REDWOOD CITY, CA–(Marketwire – August 4, 2009) – Despite the challenging economic times, small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) across the country are quickly discovering that video ads are helping them target and win new customers more cost-effectively online. SpotMixer (www.spotmixer.com), an industry-leading online video and TV ad creation and advertising service, has added new features and functionality with its recent 2.0 release, providing businesses an even more comprehensive and affordable end-to-end DIY video advertising solution. As a result, SMBs across the country are reaping the benefits of video advertising — online and on television.

With this release, SpotMixer is making it even easier for advertisers to create high-performing video ads. Among other new features, the ad campaign management component of the service gives businesses the ability to target their customers by location, gender, income level and age. With these upgrades, SpotMixer reinforces its already-strong reputation as a leader in building ease of use into a powerful online service that helps businesses manage the entire cycle of online video ad campaigns — from ad creation and distribution to reporting of results.

SpotMixer recently partnered with SpotXchange, a leading video ad network, expanding its already robust video ad distribution network of thousands of websites where SpotMixer customers can place targeted video ads across all types of demographics.

Now, with a 30-day free trial, SpotMixer allows businesses to test-drive the basic features of SpotMixer’s video services, including adding a video to their website and having a hosted company video web page that features their video, a Google Map and/or Yelp reviews.

Businesses that have recently tried video ads are impressed with how effective video ads can be at generating quality traffic — just the right target customers — to their website. L.A. Minerals, an online cosmetics company, explored how to create video ads online and chose SpotMixer as its solution. Said Lorraine Pierce, CEO of L.A. Minerals: “We’ve noticed a traffic increase of about 50% since launching online video advertising through SpotMixer. This method provided us with a much better result than just regular TV ads or pay-per-click. I think using online video advertising is an effective strategy for getting your messages across to a specific target market — in our case it was females of a certain age range.”

Other customers accustomed to paying thousands of dollars to produce TV ad spots rave about the cost-effectiveness of SpotMixer’s TV ad creation capabilities. Cotton Blossom Flower Shop in Maricopa, Arizona created a video ad using the SpotMixer solution to advertise on cable TV. “I was intimidated about online video creation, but SpotMixer’s user-friendly software made making a dynamic video ad easy and extremely cost-effective for my small business,” said Cindy Dunn, owner of Cotton Blossom Flower Shop. “The value we got was obvious: we’re able to create video ads whenever we want, without the hassle of buying software or hiring an expensive agency.”

“SpotMixer is thrilled that businesses are seeing great results from our new and improved service,” said Kathleen Farley, SpotMixer’s vice president of Product Marketing. “Our goal is to make it as easy and affordable as possible for small businesses to successfully reach their target customers and get the most from their online marketing budget.”

About SpotMixer

SpotMixer, a service of One True Media, Inc., is an easy-to-use and innovative video creation and distribution service for small to mid-sized businesses who advertise online and on TV. The first and most respected name in Web-based video creation for consumers, One True Media has leveraged its technology and marketing expertise into SpotMixer to help businesses easily and cost-effectively create videos and advertise with video online and on TV. SpotMixer is a Google AdWords Authorized Reseller for video. Founded in 2005, the company is backed by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, DAG Ventures and NTT Finance, and is headquartered in Redwood City, CA. For more information about SpotMixer, please visit www.spotmixer.com.

As you’ve seen from our newly relaunched site, SpotXchange has a new logo, a new tag line, and new messaging.  We are all about performance.  We’ve always been about performance, but now we’re making sure our brand reaffirms our mission to our advertisers and publishers.

You might be asking, what is performance-based video advertising?  To us, it means several things.  First and foremost, it means our advertisers should always see a measurable return on their advertising investment.  While that means generating sales and leads for many customers; for many others, it means measuring and optimizing spend against other metrics such as clicks, % of how much of their video ad is viewed, brand awareness, purchase intent, coupon downloads, interactions and the list goes on.

To achieve measurable returns, SpotXchange has always had a focus on empowering advertisers to eliminate as much waste from campaigns as possible, while enabling them to optimize campaigns in real-time as performance data is revealed and analyzed.  SpotXchange offers a number of unique capabilities that enable us and our customers to focus on performance:

• Exchange-based Marketplace – Exchanges are one of the most efficient ways to buy and sell anything.  SpotXchange’s exchange-based marketplace allows publishers to set their asking price, and allows advertisers to easily purchase ultra-targeted inventory at the price that works for them.
• 25/7 Rule – SpotXchange only charges advertisers when 25% of the video or 7 seconds is viewed by the consumer.
• Real-time Optimization – Like sponsored search platforms, SpotXchange tools enable real-time changes to campaigns based on performance metrics.
• Full Client Services Free of Charge & 24/7 Self-Service Tools – SpotXchange will provide a dedicated client services team to manage advertisers’ campaigns at no charge.  Additionally, clients can access their campaigns any time to manage campaigns and check real-time reports through SpotXchange’s self-service advertiser tools.
• Fully Transparent Marketplace – SpotXchange is the only video ad network that allows you to target specific publishers within the marketplace.  Advertisers know exactly where their ads play and how many times their ads played on those publishers when targeting specific publishers.
• Advanced Targeting – Advertisers can also target across the SpotXchange network using a variety of highly advanced targeting technologies including behavioral, retargeting, de-targeting, geo-targeting, contextual, frequency capping, and day parting.
• Frequency Cap Management – Advertisers can set how many times they would like to show their ad to a specific consumer in any given period of time.
• No Ad Serving Fees - SpotXchange will serve advertisers’ video ads and banners for absolutely nothing.
• Third Party Ad Server Compatibility – SpotXchange can also serve video ads from any third party ad platforms such as DoubleClick and Atlas.
• Flexible Terms – CPM, CPC & CPA – A dynamic exchange-based marketplace gives SpotXchange the flexibility to accommodate any business model for advertisers.  Those that perform best will get the most traffic, and those that do not will receive less traffic.
• No Spending Limits – Purchase as much as or as little inventory as you want.  There are no spending minimums on SpotXchange.  Try it out and expand campaigns as they perform.
• No 24 Hour Out Clauses – We actually call it our 24 Second out clause.  Log into the tools, select the campaign, and deactivate the target that is not working for you.
• Direct Integration with All Publishers – SpotXchange is directly integrated with all of our publishers.  We rarely ‘rep’ a campaign.  This means we have control over every aspect of your campaign, which allows us to provide services like real-time optimization.
• Free Video Ad Creation Services - Securing appropriate video ad creative can be challenging for even TV advertisers. As such, SpotXchange will provide free video ad creation services to advertisers. Just send us all of your other creative like logos, banners, scripts, and other creative assets. SpotXchange will create a video ad complete with professional voiceover at no additional cost.
• Proprietary & Patent-Pending Ad Technology – Unlike many display and video ad networks, SpotXchange operates on own proprietary and patent-pending technology. Many ad networks use Atlas, DoubleClick or have a seat on the Right Media Exchange. Not SpotXchange. We own and control all of the technology. This allows us to drive our own product planning based on our customers’ needs. We aren’t dependent upon others to dictate what we can and cannot offer to our advertisers.

Click here to learn more about what it means to advertise on SpotXchange.

SpotXchange publishers benefit from a competitive marketplace as well.  By combining a competitive auction-based marketplace with powerful video ads, advanced targeting and real-time ad calls, publishers can maximize the value of their unsold inventory.  Click here to learn more about the benefits of becoming a SpotXchange publisher.

Over the past two years, we’ve run hundreds of campaigns for large multinational brands, to small local businesses.  In so many instances, our customers told us that SpotXchange performed the best for them.  We’ve sold tens of thousands of pizzas, subscribed thousands of people to satellite TV services, engaged tens of millions of housewives to interact with CPG ads, sent hundreds of thousands of young males to DVD release web sites, and the list goes on.  If you are planning a video ad campaign, no matter how big or small, you should contact a SpotXchange sales rep (sales@spotxchange.com) to see for yourself how your video ad campaigns can really perform.

Mike Shehan, CEO

SpotXchange

Mike Shehan spoke on a panel at the Casual Connect show in Seattle this past week.  He spoke about monetizing casual games.  Colin Campbell quotes Mike in his conference recap article titled “Opinion: Casual Connects.”

Mike’s quote:

But change is inevitable, and it’s fueling the growth of the casual games business. Mike Shehan, founder and CEO of SpotXchange said, “The money is moving in only one direction.” His company auctions video-based advertising on games sites, with, he said, theatricals increasingly keen on online because movies studios wants their ads to be seen by targeted audiences and “nothing targets as effectively as online games”. Portals are becoming ever more effective at knowing who is playing their games, and what sorts of products they like.

To read the full article, click here:  http://www.casualgaming.biz/news/28953/OPINION-Casual-Connects

SpotXchange launched a twitter feed today for SpotXchange publishers called SpotX4Pubs located at http://twitter.com/SpotX4Pubs.  SpotXchange is suggesting active and prospective publishers to follow SpotX4Pubs so as to receive updates about inventory requests (domestic and international), product releases, and network advisories.  Sign up today and be in the know!

SpotXchange CEO, Mike Shehan, is speaking at the Casual Connect conference in Seattle on July 21, 2009.  Casual Connect is organized by the Casual Games Association and is one of the most anticipated casual game events of the year.  Mike is speaking on the panel, “Make Money Off Your Games” along with representatives from Mochi, RealGames, Skyworks, and WildTangent.

Find out more here:  http://seattle.casualconnect.org/content.html#marketing

We have run on SpotXchange for our client, a large publically held company, for several months now and we are very impressed with the response (click rates) that the campaign has received. SpotXchange allowed us to see the real power of regionally targeted pre-roll video in an advertiser-friendly environment. We found SpotXchange’s targeting capabilities, reach, and efficiency to be an excellent fit with our client’s online media goals and we look forward to recceiving more proposals from SpotXchange in the future.

Brendan Jackson

Creative Alliance

The client services team at Spotxchange has walked us through each step of the way with a true understanding of our goals and needs as an internet retailer. We know we can rely on them to not only manage our campaigns, but to always keep raising the bar for the future. They work hard to meet performance goals tailored to suit our business and this attention to detail exemplifies the attentive nature of their team.

Einaras Graurogkas

SpotXchange consistently achieved really strong results throughout its duration and were extremely helpful in dealing with any queries we had. We will be looking to run with them in future campaigns.

Matt Taylor

i-level