Search Engine and Marketing News Roundup - AOL Acquires Tacoda
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As mentioned above by Cassidy, AOL has also been purchasing ad networks. The company recently completed its purchase of behavioral targeting network Tacoda. Tacoda joins several other ad networks that AOL seems to have acquired for their specialized markets. Third Screen Media focuses on mobile ads, while AdTech AG is an international online ad serving company based in Germany. Lightningcast, which AOL purchased in 2006, delivers ads for video content.
Clearly, this kind of diversity is AOL's goal. "Behavioral targeting is a fast-growing part of the advertising business, as marketers increasingly look to get efficient and measurable results from their advertising dollars," said AOL chairman and CEO Randy Falco in a press release. "Combined with our own network, our Advertising.com third party network, and our other recent acquisitions in the advertising space, AOL now has one of the most robust and sophisticated advertising platforms in the business."
Advertising.com boast about 3,000 publishers. Tacoda adds the New York Times and NBC Universal, among others, to the mix. Its list of clients includes Coca-Cola, Bank of America and General Motors. Like BlueLithium, Tacoda was clearly a very tempting acquisition target.
Like Yahoo, AOL must have felt that it needed to make this purchase to become more competitive. Market research company eMarketer noted that the behavioral targeting market was worth only $350 million in 2006, but expected it to grow to nearly $4 billion -- yes, with a "b" -- in the next four or five years. Even Google can't leave that kind of money on the table; the search engine giant launched a behavioral ad product in April, which it insists is not "traditional" behavioral targeting because it targets the user for only one search session. We'll see if AOL's purchases help it better serve its advertisers and customers, to say nothing of earning a respectable bottom line.
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