<img src="https://www.exchangewire.com/wp-content/uploads/pt.gif"The Google Acquisition And How It Impacted The Invite Media Offering

Not too much has changed in terms of what we offer our clients – we’re still 100% focused on delivering the best DSP technology with a market leading professional services offering. Obviously since the acquisition there’s been a huge amount of interest in Invite Media, which is great for the business. Of course, moving forward clients can expect to see continued significant investment in the development of the platform, with the added advantages of Google’s ability to scale technology globally. Over time, we’ll also be integrated heavily with DoubleClick and other Google technologies, which will provide many benefits and features to clients to improve workflow efficiency and performance.

The Big Developments In The Display Market This Year

Well, a lot of people are now talking about DSPs. In terms of what’s actually changed, from a European perspective, there have been exciting developments and new entrants in both sources of inventory and new data sources (which we’re integrated/integrating with). I do still think this market is very nascent and a lot of people are still confused about what is a DSP and what isn’t a DSP. In my mind there really aren’t that many true technology DSP based offerings. A lot of the ‘noise’ in the market is coming from service oriented solutions that white label technology or don’t have any technology at all. There’s still a long way to go but when I look at what some of our clients are doing, and what we’re developing, I’m really excited about the future.

Has There Been Enough Tech Innovation In The Space This Year?

As alluded to above, not enough. We see a lot of press releases and PR around various other offerings but honestly we haven’t seen any true technology development and advancement beyond what we’re currently providing clients. One of the great things about being part of Google is that we’ve cemented our position as being at the forefront of driving innovation in this space – there are literally no boundaries and our clients and future clients should be very excited.

The Growth Of The European DSP Market

It’s certainly been the year of talking about DSPs. A lot of Agencies still feel that they should use a DSP because they’ve read about it and people are talking about it but it takes time for true DSP-based strategies to develop and gain adoption. We spend a lot of time educating clients on the true value of owning the buying process and then help them execute against this goal. Unfortunately we still see a lot of ‘mis-selling’ where clients and prospects have invested significant time and resource in to solutions that aren’t up for the job. This can be frustrating as it leads to negativity around DSPs within the Agency and also means the client is less likely to allocate resource against a true DSP solution.

Addressing The Challenges Of Automated Ad Trading In 2010

Invite addresses some of the core challenges associated with buying intelligently and at scale online – notably transparency and control. It takes time but in most cases there’s that ‘lightbulb’ moment when the client sees the success of their first campaigns on our platform, when they begin to understand the value of having all of their data (1st party and 3rd party and performance data) in their own system and can in turn start to deliver consistently excellent results to the advertiser. There is no “black box” problem when working with us. The challenges associated with buying online will continue – hidden margins, misleading business models and a lack of control but we’re confident we will continue to offer a leading solution that addresses these issues and more. Another initiative we’ve taken now that we’re at Google is local staff given how important education, training and service is for clients entering this ecosystem. As such, we have and will continue to aggressively hire dedicated Invite professionals in Google offices across Europe.

Is 2011 The Break-Out Year For RTB In Europe?

I don’t think 2010 has been too bad! What we expect is that we’ll continue to see the growth of our client base (across Europe – we’re now live in France, Germany and Netherlands) and increased budgets from existing clients. In Europe new inventory sources, private ad slots and an increase in the number of 3rd party data providers will help drive this growth. When executed well RTB works brilliantly – all I’d say is that if you’ve tried it and it hasn’t worked so well in 2010 you’ve probably not used the right solution!

The Big Opportunities In 2011

As mentioned, continued education on the benefits of buying via RTB. As our platform develops we’ll offer clients further functionality around new channels of inventory and new targeting tools. We can’t say too much at this stage but some of the tools we’re developing will really move the market on to the next level. We’re also extremely bullish on new mediums being accessible through the same platform, which is already happening in a small way in the US, such as rich media / expandable’s, video, and mobile.