Macromedia Delivers Flash Ad Kit for DoubleClick DART Motif; Kit Brings Features for Advertising Agency Professionals to Flash MX 2004, Streamlines Ad Production Workflow

Business Wire, Feb 9, 2004

Business Editors/High-Tech Writers

SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 9, 2004

Macromedia (Nasdaq:MACR) today announced the availability of the Macromedia(R) Flash(TM) Ad Kit for DoubleClick's DART Motif(SM), a joint solution between Macromedia and DoubleClick aimed at simplifying the often-complex rich media ad campaign process. Flash has long been the tool of choice for creating rich media ads, and the advertising kit adds functionality to Flash aimed at helping ad agency professionals efficiently create error-free rich media ads with in-depth tracking capabilities.

DART Motif leverages these features with a streamlined departmental workflow and advanced campaign reporting, including DoubleClick's Audience Interaction Metrics, delivered in one unified system. The combined solution allows ad agencies to better service their clients through faster campaign turnaround and centralized in-depth rich media campaign results. For more information, or to download the Flash Ad Kit, visit http://www.macromedia.com/go/flashadkit/.

"Macromedia wants to ensure advertisers can leverage the power of the Flash format to deliver effective online advertising," said Jeff Whatcott, vice president of product marketing, Macromedia. "The Flash Ad Kit introduces a set of features that removes a lot of the procedural hurdles agencies face when creating rich media campaigns for their clients, empowering them to focus on creating great advertising and branding experiences with Flash MX 2004."

"DART Motif has been adopted by customers because it dramatically reduces complexity in the rich media advertising process with a single, streamlined workflow," said Doug Knopper, senior vice president and general manager of advertiser and publisher solutions, DoubleClick. "The new Flash Ad Kit will only make it easier for designers to create their campaigns in DART Motif while benefiting from the most in-depth reporting available."

The Flash Ad Kit includes authoring templates for standard rich media ad types including floating ads, expandable ads, in-page ads, pop-ups, or a combination of these ad types. Ad creators can have confidence that their ads will work properly by assigning pre-built ad functions built into Flash, such as expand, pop up/pop under, or by easily defining or changing ad properties like windowless mode, scroll bars, alt tags, page positioning, and display time.

The integrated solution saves time by reducing common debugging cycles between the design and trafficking departments. Creative functionality can be previewed and tested from within the Flash Ad Kit before handing off the ad. When the ad is trafficked, ad properties and tracking events are automatically populated in DART Motif and can be modified on the fly.

"We always recommend rich media to our clients, including Hyundai, Macy's, and Radio Shack, because it is more effective and gives us more options to deliver interesting creative," said Karim Sanjabi, executive vice president of creative and technology, Carat Interactive. "Building rich media specific functionality into the Flash authoring tool is a huge win for agencies because it gives us tighter campaign control and more time to focus on non-technical issues."

Advertisers will benefit from a new dimension of campaign results with pre-built tracking actions that are assigned in Flash and tracked in DART Motif as Audience Interaction Metrics. DART Motif tracks metrics such as ad display time and interaction time as well as more than 30 additional events including mouse-overs, click-through, load movies, and custom timed events. For more information on DART Motif, visit http://www.macromedia.com/go/dartmotif/.

Rich media ads have been proven to be more effective, with up to seven times better click-through rates and improved brand uplift, according to DoubleClick and Dynamic Logic. According to Jupiter Research, rich media accounted for $376 million in spending in 2003, or eight percent of total media spending. By 2008, Jupiter predicts that number will reach $2.8 billion, or nearly 25 percent of total media spending.

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