Leading European Online Advertising Exchange Connects with Digital Element to Improve Customer Response Rates by More Than 50 Percent
Scenario
When Satish Jayakumar and Michael Stephanblome co-founded AdJug in 2007, they clearly recognized the need to connect advertisers and publishers directly with each other; thus improving the way advertising was bought and sold through ad networks. Little did they know just how much of a need actually existed.
Named as one of Europe’s “most promising tech companies” this year byRed Herring, London-based AdJug quickly grew from two people to 67 employees. The online advertising exchange currently manages 600 to 800 monthly campaigns between the United Kingdom and Germany and produces between 1.6 and 1.8 billion impressions a month. And, the company is still growing.
Seeking to make AdJug Europe’s leading online advertising exchange, Jayakumar is constantly looking for ways to foster growth by helping advertisers segment online audiences and tighten the scope of their campaigns. Unfortunately, the off-the-shelf geotargeting solution the company used was not providing the city-level granularity or accuracy that AdJug required for its customers.
“In the United Kingdom, being able to geotarget online is imperative because of the small size of the country,” Jayakumar said. “We need to ensure that we have the best technology solutions for our growing exchange. And, that means taking advantage of online innovations that offer our customers more effective ways to deliver relevant ads— targeted with pinpoint accuracy—that produce better returns on investment and increase revenues.”
Jayakumar not only wanted a geotargeting solution that was highly accurate and deeply granular, but also one that could handle the explosive growth AdJug was experiencing.
Solution
The foundation of AdJug’s success is built on the company’s ability to connect buyers and sellers of online advertising and provide them with transparency, control and choice. Jayakumar wanted technology that allowed publishers to take control of their online inventory to increase earnings and let advertisers run better campaigns because they would more accurately know where conversions and traffic were coming from.
Finding the right technology meant evaluating all the major players in the geotargeting space. After conducting a thorough evaluation among competitors, Jayakumar selected Digital Element’s NetAcuity® IP Intelligencetechnology.
“During the evaluation process, Digital Element demonstrated an unmatched level of confidence in its technology and data as well direct customer experience with companies in our industry,” Jayakumar said. “In the United Kingdom, geotargeting technology is the standard by which online advertising is delivered. However, the quality and depth of data is a different issue. Until we were introduced to Digital Element, AdJug did not have a solution that could handle more local, city-level targeting or work with streaming media.”
The implementation of NetAcuity only took a few weeks and went very smoothly. “Things only come to my desk when they’re not working,” Jayakumar said.
AdJug uses Digital Element’s patented technology to analyze data in real-time and ensure that the most relevant ads are served based on the location of the person viewing the page—down to a city level. The technology also provides advanced ad targeting, such as rich streaming video ads, based on a user’s connection speed and ISP.
The following examples demonstrate how AdJug’s customers are taking advantage of these new advanced geotargeting capabilities:
- Airline client ran fare specials in Glasgow and London;
- Hotel client advertised vacancies in different locales;
- Business client targeted users being served by certain broadband companies in order to deliver ads using streaming media;
- Newspaper client delivered local ads across a number of different sites; and
- Government promoted “quit smoking” and “healthy heart” public-service campaigns in areas with high rates of smokers and heart disease.
Success
According to Jayakumar, with 90 percent of AdJug’s customers employing NetAcuity, the level of response has increased by more than 50 percent. He credits Digital Element’s unparalleled accuracy, high quality of data and exemplary service as contributing to AdJug’s success.
“Digital Element has really changed how we target advertisements,” Jayakumar said. “We can now deliver relevant ads to specific audiences, which reduces wasted impressions and increases click-through rates as well as message reach for our advertisers. We are taking the lion’s share of rebookings. Businesses are spending more with AdJug because they are getting results through our exchange.”
Jayakumar also mentioned that AdJug has never had to call Digital Element with a problem. “The level of support we get has been outstanding,” he added.
Buoyed by the success in servicing the United Kingdom and Germany, AdJug plans to expand to France in the very near future. Jayakumar also looks forward to taking that next step down in granularity to the postal code level with NetAcuity Edge. He said, “That will really revolutionize how customers target advertising and how consumers react to those messages.”