Blinkx Unveils Cutting Edge Ad Platform
Blinkx, the growing video search engine, recently launched an ad platform, AdHoc, that would place ads beside or in videos based on what it "hears" in them. This speech-recognition technology is the first of its kind in the video realm.
Essentially, the platform enables advertisers to purchase words spoken in videos in addition to video categories that would be derived by an analysis of their content. "The ads–pre-roll, mid-roll or post-roll -will then be delivered to videos appearing on a publisher’s site, selected from their own advertiser inventory, that of an ad network, or blinkx," according to Gavin O’Malley at MediaPost.
Blinkx CEO, Suranga Chandratillake, makes it clear that this is not a direct jab at Google. "AdHoc is a technology platform rather than an ad network. It’s built to improve Google’s, or an existing ad network’s, efforts."
However, in the AdHoc announcement Chandratillake stated what appears to be a slight gibe in Google’s direction. He said, "Until now, online video advertising was a kind of Frankenstein’s monster – an attempt to cobble together technology that was built for Text Web banner advertising and apply it to an entirely new medium."
Chandratillake is probably right. Up until now, online video has been a slippery fish for anyone hoping to cash in big time. The potential for the medium’s viewership and monetary growth is agreed upon by many, and Blinkx’s AdHoc platform could be just what advertisers have been waiting for.
Of course this depends wholly upon the system’s performance.
Blinkx, which is based in the U.K., has had big success in recent times. On Monday, the same day that AdHoc was unveiled, the video search engine announced partnerships with Real Networks and InfoSpace and its stable of brands, which include Dogpile.com.
It powers video search for AOL, Ask.com, and Lycos, among other Web properties, and claims that its partnership with Microsoft’s Live.com has made it the largest video search engine on the Internet. That statement, if true, shows how far Google’s video search has to progress if it wants a leadership position similar to its search engine.
Google has been preoccupied with copyright protection software for YouTube, and that has probably cost them precious time and resources that could have been devoted to advertising and search improvements for the video-sharing site.
Blinkx is not done with big unveilings. It plans on introducing broadband television similar to offerings by Joost, Veoh, and Bablegum. The site would feature Blinkx’s video search product on its frontpage.
Sources:
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=
Articles.showArticle&art_aid=62871
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/06/25/blinkx_adhoc_
contextual_ads/
