Bridging the (Imaginary) Chasm Between Online And Branding

There seem to be daily additions to the growing call for online advertising (and for display, specifically) to address the gap between how it sells/measures itself and how brands want it to be sold and measured. Today’s call is from an AdExchanger.com update. In an interview, Digitas Executive Vice President, Norman de Greve, addresses some of the hurdles on both sides of the seeming chasm between digital advertising and brand marketers.

Clearly, from one side of the chasm, the digital/interactive online space must begin to wean itself from speaking only in terms of technology, math and metrics. These may be the terms that the industry is used to using in establishing its bone-fides. They are not necessarily the terms in the forefront of the mind of the brand marketer, reviewing the RFP responses, in hopes of finding the silver bullet that will get him/her carried around the room. In describing a campaign metric tracking philosophy that would truly resonate with that side of the divide, de Greve says,

It needs to start by connecting to the metrics marketers are already comfortable with – the general funnel metrics – awareness, favorability, consideration, sales, and loyalty.

But what is the responsibility of those on the brand side? What is the evolution that must come to pass if brand marketers are ever to be satisfied that this upstart medium has the chops to be the game changer it has been promising to be? De Greve describes the varying levels of sophistication between those that are likely to make the jump and those that will have a harder time with the transition.

Some marketers look at display as, “How do I get more impression volume for my ad?” While others are asking, “How do I use display to create deeper experiences and more value for the platform idea I’ve developed?” Those are different levels in the evolution of digital sophistication.

As I mentioned before, this conversation is not happening in a silo. It is simmering across the industry on both sides of the equation. And it is exactly the kind of self- analysis that needs to keep happening for us to get to the promised land where digital is seen as an equal part of the marketing mix and can be understood to magnify the brand goals…not detract from them.


For our part, CPX Interactive continues to start these conversations throughout our ongoing industry roadshow/panel/event/ that we call ‘Strategy is the New Creative’. For more info on the initiative and how you can become part of the conversation, VISIT US HERE.



Your metric is the Only X

Flip throught the book below (by clicking on the bottom right corner of each page) to see the evolution of our Xads, and be sure to check out CPX's new splash page: nameyourmetric.com

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CPX Interactive Opens Manhattan Office

CPX Interactive now has an office in New York City, the most recent addition to a list of offices that includes the company’s Westbury, NY headquarters, West Coast presence in Los Angeles, CA, and three international offices in Spain, Italy, and Turkey. The new office is home to CPX's Marketing, Business Development and Publishing teams, and was opened with the goal of better engaging the large number of digital agencies in New York. For more information on our new home, check out the official press release.

CPX CEO Mike Seiman Named Finalist for Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year

CPX CEO Mike Seiman has been named as a finalist for Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year in the Metro New York region. Mike is one of 36 finalists selected by an independent judging panel. This is the 23rd year that Ernst & Young will be recognizing entrepreneurs for their achievements and contributions. An awards gala will be held on Thursday June 25 at the Mariott Marquis in Times Square. Read the official CPX Interactive press release for more information. Congratulations Mike!

CPX Interactive Sponsors Opening Reception at iMedia Brand Summit

By Dana Posner
Marketing Manager, CPX Interactive

CPX Interactive helped kick off the iMedia Brand Summit Sunday night at the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point Resort & Spa in Bonita Springs, FL. Brand Summits bring together brand marketing executives, and provide the opportunity to connect with peers and solution providers, share ideas and insight on how to deal with the issues surrounding the integration and application of interactive media in their overall marketing plans.. As a regular sponsor of iMedia events, CPX threw the opening reception, and it was a great success!

A light breeze complimented the clear night sky as a slew of Brand attendees, from companies like Coca-Cola, Procter & Gamble, Zappos, Nestle, Disney, Capital One and A&E (to name a few) began to crowd around the colorfully lit poolside terrace.

The buffet style dinner was nothing less than tantalizing and delicious. The stations were nicely arranged and creatively named, including “Wok on the Beach,” stir-fry woks with all the fixins, “Sushi by the Shore,” a variety of savory sushi, “Tropical Infusion Salad,” a create-your-own salad station, and of course dessert – “Breezy Berry Delight,” moist and sweet cakes, filled pastries and fruit compote. As with most CPX cocktail parties, the signature drink was once again a hit, the CPX Chillaxer...not only tasty, but simply a fun drink to order.

If the dishes and drinks didn’t capture people’s attention, the looping video that glimmered through the flowing waterfall certainly did. We put together a fantastic compilation showcasing the various creative assets our in-house team designed throughout the past few years. As it was a Brand conference, this was a nice tie-in for all attendees to appreciate.

After being introduced by Kurt Indvik, iMedia Communications General Manager, Stephen Shearin, CPX Interactive’s VP of East Coast Sales, welcomed guests to the reception. With the conference theme, Bottom Line or Flat Line: It's Time for Digital Marketing to Prove Itself, in mind, Stephen spoke about the continued success we have experienced despite difficult economic times.

Many appreciative thanks were given to the CPX team on site including Stephen Shearin, VP of East Coast Sales; Matt Cohen, Director of Sales, Agency Group; John Rieselman, Director of Sales, West Coast and myself.

CPX greatly appreciates our relationship with iMedia, and we are looking forward to working together again at the iMedia Agency Summit in Austin, TX, 5/17-5/20.

Visit our Vox Blog to check out an awesome slideshow of photos from the event, and check out the video we created for the event on YouTube!

10 Reasons Why Internet Advertising Revenue is Growing

By Michael Fleischman, EVP of Business Development at CPX Interactive

There are a number of factors that lead us to believe that there is significant growth ahead for the internet advertising sector. Some of these factors include:

1. Worldwide Internet penetration continues to rise.

2. Newspaper and magazine businesses continue to lose ad market share while dependence on mobile and Internet use increases.

3. Failure of newspapers to manage their existing cost structure, making their business model unsustainable in the future.

4. Increased dependence on the Internet medium for breaking news.

5. Emergence of blogs as a trusted news source and opinion provider.

6. Growing broadband penetration is a catalyst for more robust commercial Internet activity.

7. Growth of online retail is closely related to increasing broadband penetration.

8. Over the past five years, performance-based advertising has gained market share over the CPM based model.

9. Advertisers placing higher value on clear ROIs; hence, a shift to performance-based models is likely to accelerate in this recessionary environment.

10. Brick & Mortar retail bankruptcies, and especially store closings, should lead to pricing pressure, and thus margins pressure on the survivors in both online and offline retail.

CPX Interactive's DOMAINfest Experience

The Internet is a constantly changing medium, and in late January, members of the domain industry gathered in Hollywood, CA to discuss how they can best anticipate, confront and conquer these changes. The venue was DOMAINfest 2009, a conference created in 2006 by DomainSponsor as a way to bring industry professionals together to learn, network, and develop business relationships. CPX Interactive was one of three Gold Sponsors for this year’s event, and hosted the opening party at Universal Studios. A section of the park was closed down to the public, and several rides were opened especially for attendees. CPX provided food and drinks, and everyone had a great time.

According to the DOMAINfest website, there are over 168 million domain names currently registered. This conference attracted “domainers” large and small, as well as marketing and advertising companies of every variety. Panel discussions covered topics such as: “Domaining 2.0—what does the next evolutionary phase of our industry look like?” “What Can We Expect from the Legal and Regulatory Environment?” and, “The Google Perspective: Winning over the Advertiser and Optimizing Site Performance through Analytics.” The Keynote Speaker was Steve Wozniak, Co-Founder of Apple. Wozniak spoke on initiating change in the Internet space, and maintaining an entrepreneurial spirit despite facing challenges.

For many, an invaluable aspect of the event was the networking opportunities it provided. In addition to “structured networking” periods after panel discussions, sponsors and exhibitors set up “pods” which provided a space for constant discussion. Yael Klein, Publisher Relations Representative at CPX Interactive, and Chris Brennan, Senior Sales Director of Publishing at CPX, attended the conference, and found that they spent most of their time in the pod meeting people and making new connections. Brennan emphasized the importance of forming new partnerships in an industry that has until now been an untapped resource. He feels that CPX is a valuable partner for domainers because we can offer domain by domain tracking statistics that no one else provides.

CPX Vice President of Publisher Acquisitions, Mike Zacharski, also attended the event, and echoed this sentiment; he sees a lot of growth potential for CPX in the domain space. Zacharski explained that CPX sponsored and attended this show in order to better understand the needs and sentiments of the domainers as well as evaluate how CPX can be a leader in developing new tools and bringing new ideas to the domain space. DOMAINfest provided these opportunities and more, and CPX Interactive is excited to continue work on releasing new products for the domain space in the near future.

Ten Things You Should Know About CPX Interactive

1. Privately held ad network that has been profitable for over 7 years.

2. Corporate offices in New York, Los Angeles, Milan and Madrid with Istanbul coming soon

3. Approximately 90 employees to date …and growing

4. Serving over 1 billion global ad impressions, daily

5. A network of over 3,500 quality websites with over 200 million monthly unique visitors
6. Significant international traffic in over 65 countries across the globe

7. Largest buyer in Yahoo!’s Right Media Exchange (RMX) – supplying approx. 30% of exchange traffic

8. Major player in DoubleClick’s advertising exchange and marketplaces including Openx, Rubicon, Pubmatic and Admeld

9. Ranked 15th on comScore’s list of largest ad networks by monthly US unique visitors, 5th by monthly US page views

10. Differentiates itself from other ad networks through global footprint, campaign targeting and optimization skills and industry leading campaign development services

About CPX Interactive

As a progressive online ad network and global marketing company, CPX Interactive is redefining the online advertising landscape. By layering the development and execution of cutting edge online strategies on top of its own global distribution model, CPX ensures advertisers success on any metric while efficiently monetizing 100% of its publishers’ inventory…from premium to remnant. Advertiser and Publisher offerings include Reach, Content and Premium Networks.

CPX Interactive delivers more than 30 billion impressions to more than 200 million unique users in more than 60 countries every month and has recently been named #71 on Inc. Magazine's list of the 5,000 fastest growing private companies in America.