Facebook is opening up its API to developers of 3rd party applications. If you are involved in social media, now is the time to shine. If you haven’t been paying attention to social media marketing, you should…
Facebook is giving an unprecedented amount of access to developers. The API would allow, for example, a third party to recreate Facebook Photos, the most used photo application on the web. Users could then remove the default Facebook Photos and install the third party version instead.
Even the European advertising space is heating up. I received a press release a few moments ago about the acquisition of the Zanox network being acquired for 214 million Euros (or about 288 million US Dollars).
From the press release…
Axel Springer AG and PubliGroupe AG acquire online marketing services provider ZANOX.de AG
- Investment in rapidly growing market of performance-based online marketing (multichannel commerce)
- Access to new ways to market online sales
- Expansion of digital business activities
- Strengthening of zanox’s international growth efforts
- Development of new products and technologies and acquisition of new customer groups planned
Berlin/Lausanne, May 22, 2007. Axel Springer AG, Berlin, and PubliGroupe AG, Lausanne (Switzerland), are jointly acquiring Berlin-headquartered ZANOX.de AG. The acquisition of this leading service provider for performance-based online marketing (multichannel commerce) is a move by Axel Springer and PubliGroupe to expand their activities in internet-based sales through innovative products and to secure access to a high-performance, established technology platform in a rapidly growing market segment.
The total purchase price for 100% of the shares of ZANOX.de AG is €214.9 million plus a success-dependent payment, with Axel Springer paying 60% and PubliGroupe paying 40% of the total. The sellers are the three founders of the company, an Asian financial investor and individual minority shareholders. The acquisition will take effect retroactively on January 1, 2007 and is subject to the approval of the cartel authorities in Germany, Switzerland and Austria. It has been agreed that in a next step worldwide markets will be served by two companies under the brand name of zanox. Axel Springer and PubliGroupe will each hold a majority stake in one of the companies and a minority stake in the other. The companies will be consolidated accordingly into the financial statements of the shareholders. The three founders and management board members of ZANOX.de AG, Thomas Hessler (CEO), Jens Hewald (CTO) and Heiko Rauch (COO/CFO), have a long-term commitment to zanox and will run the two companies.
zanox offers advertisers, e-commerce companies and online shop operators an internet-based platform for the effective marketing of products and services through various channels. The core of business operations is a rapidly growing international network of more than 1 million sales partners in over 180 countries. This network can be used by companies for their marketing and sales efforts. Companies can use zanox’s powerful infrastructure and extensive range of services in over 30 countries to target appropriate sales partners. zanox participates with a commission at every successful transaction generated through its platform. zanox has subsidiaries in nine countries. The company’s online marketing services comprise affiliate marketing, search engine management, e-mail marketing, online shopping and customer loyalty programs. The strategic sales channels of zanox are used by more than 1,800 international companies such as Allianz, Amazon, Axa, Citibank, Daimler, Expedia, Jamba, Lycos, Procter & Gamble, Quelle, Sixt, Staples and Vodafone.
ZANOX.de AG was founded in 2000 and currently has over 275 employees worldwide. The rapidly growing company has been profitable from the very beginning. During the 2006 financial year pro forma revenues climbed to €107 million from €59 million for the previous year, while pro-forma EBITDA grew from €4 million to €8 million. The company also maintains its rapid growth in 2007. zanox’s first-quarter revenues increased 86% to €38 million (previous year: €20 million) with EBITDA climbing to €4 million (previous year: €2 million).
The bottom line is that a potential buyer doing their due diligence on ValueClick will likely stumble upon the Think Partnership comparisons. With the price tag of a ValueClick acquisition likely pushing well into the $4 Billion + range - one could surmise that they might consider investing $500 million - $600 million instead?
New York, NY (PRWEB) May 21, 2007 — NETexponent, a leading online ad agency specializing in affiliate program management and pay per click search marketing services, announced today it has become the first agency to partner with Tumri, the world’s first integrated merchandising and advertising network that intelligently delivers targeted products to online customers.
Tumri’s patent-pending technology combines offer intelligence and targeting to deliver a relevant set of products, as well as an interactive ad unit called the Tumri AdPod designed to convert browsers into buyers. By providing an engaging experience that increases interaction from site visitors, publishers can experience conversion at a higher rate, with its ability to deliver the right product, to the right audience at the right time.
What if Google does buy FeedBurner? This is something we discussed a while back on one of Molander’s podcasts and I believe I was called “silly” for saying this could happen…
I have just heard from a VERY trusted source that Google is buying Feedburner in order to get into the rapidly evolving RSS Ad market. The delay in announcing the deal, I am told is solely due to the delay in closing out the DoubleClick deal.
As I state over on AFC, I do consulting work for Kowabunga, but not on this project and Jonathan (Trust) was the first to tip me that the program had launched (via Twitter).
Twitter isn’t private, so it’s not exactly like eavesdropping, but it is personal. These days on the Internet we’re experimenting with various mixtures of private and public, subscriptions and ephemeral connections. Almost no one watches the main Twitter page, yet that’s probably where most of the reviewers go.
Perhaps the reason marketers are so quick to scoff at Twitter or similar social platforms is because we don’t know how to do marketing if it doesn’t fit into a neat and tidy CPA/C/M box in the first place.
Jon is reporting on his WickedFire forum that PrimaryAds may be having some internal troubles…
PrimaryAds, a ThinkPartnership Company (AMEX:THK) is going through one hell of a storm right now. From what we’ve been their Affiliate Managers left in full force yesterday over an issue about not being paid their bonuses that were promised to them. Today, the two founders of PrimaryAds quit as well, because they were told by their parent company, ThinkPartnership that they were not going to be paid for not being able to hit their targets.
Simple: affiliate marketing is not easy to learn or to stay up-to-date in terms of the latest tips.
Affiliate Fortune Cookies is a blog where we’re going to be throwing out quick and easy tips, tricks and hacks to help out both newbie’s and old pro’s alike.
So, the experience level required to understand posts will range from absolutely none to fairly advanced understanding of algo’s and CJ inner workings. However, there will be something here for every affiliate marketer looking to stay up on the latest tips.
I really believe in affiliate marketing and know that it provides the best platform for everyone to spread messages about things they find interesting or relevant. That’s what affiliate marketing is all about.
Affiliate Fortune Cookies is about lowering the currently high threshold that keeps many people out of our industry.
I’ll be blogging less and less here over the next few weeks and starting June 1, I’ll be blogging exclusively at Affiliate Fortune Cookies. I hope you make the transition with me, because it’s going to be highly educational for everyone.
So, check out AFC and let me know your thoughts here or there. I’m looking forward to creating something really beneficial for the entire community.
Does your program use shopping cart icons? This is a must see (even for those who don’t use shopping cart icons)…
We’ve collected over 100 “Add to Cart” buttons from the top online retailers of 2006 to give you some design inspiration. And we’ve summarized some usability guidelines that you can apply to your own “Add to Cart” buttons. Ok, there are actually 111 buttons, but 107 just looked cooler.
Truemors is a web site that enables you to “tell the world”—within the bounds of good taste and the law anyway. You can post your rumors, news, and sightings, and anyone with web access can read and rate them within minutes. We wish to acknowledge the pioneering and inspiring work of Twitter, BoredAt, Digg, PostSecret, PopSugar, and HotOrNot in this field.
What Not
You can read our Terms of Use for more detail, but simply stated we’re not interested in crap. Some crap is easy to recognize: profanity, pornography, bullying, libel, slander, and advertising.
Even though it says no advertising (it doesn’t say marketing!), I’m sure that if Truemors catches on, it will have plenty of people driving traffic and page rank via “rumored” marketing announcements.
That’s a HUGE “if,” though. Althought I’m a fan of micro-chunking content, I don’t see this going very far beyond the celebrity gossip niche.
