Business Services Industry

Accipiter Signs cars.com to Multi-Year Online Ad Management Deal; Classified Ventures, in Partnership with Gannett Co, Inc., Tribune Company, and Knight Ridder, Inc., Migrates from Competitive Solution

Business Wire, June 28, 2006

RALEIGH, N.C. & LONDON -- Accipiter Solutions, Inc., an online advertising technology innovator since 1996, today announced it has signed online classified advertising giant Classified Ventures as its latest AdManager Hosted customer. As the developer of leading comprehensive web sites in the automotive, rental, and real estate markets, Classified Ventures offers advertisers a cost-effective medium to reach out to consumers in these categories.

Cars.com recently ramped up its 2006 media campaign with a new online brand promotion valued at more than $100 million, which is expected to reach more than 200 million consumers. This promotion will complement existing online marketing initiatives aimed at traffic generation. Cars.com needed an ad management solution that could support expected increases in online consumer traffic, while supporting the migration of existing online ad data.

Cars.com migrated all of its existing online ad data into pre-defined campaign templates using AdManager's XML Integration Module. Almost 2,000 ad campaigns were bulk-load imported in addition to nearly 2,000 ad creatives, more than 650 user data entries, as well as other targeting elements. AdManager's integration technology also allowed them to easily integrate the new ad management system with its existing sales performance analysis reporting tool.

"The migration to AdManager Hosted using the XML Integration Module was easier than expected given the massive amount and complexity of data that had to be transferred," said Mark Delude, Director of Web Site Production for cars.com. "With Accipiter's experience and expert customer support team, we have saved a great deal of time and operational costs getting our new system up and running."

Cars.com cites AdManager's flexible targeting and inventory forecasting capabilities as an additional motive for migrating from a competitive solution to Accipiter. The company required a solution that would allow them to target ad campaigns at a highly granular level. Currently, the cars.com site targets by affiliate network, zip code, and other user-selected categories such as new vs. old car as well as make and model of vehicle.

"Once additional sites within our network are live with AdManager, we expect to be serving over 500 million ads per month," commented Keri Needham, Ad Operations Manager. "Accipiter's AdManager will help us meet our projected monthly ad campaign growth of 10% across our entire site network."

Cars.com has also taken advantage of AdManager's Revenue Management features including campaign optimization by implementing three main ad campaign tiers. The site network will be using these three tiers to ensure optimized delivery of advertisers' campaigns by defining layers of ad campaign prioritization. Targeted campaigns are prioritized based on the affiliate advertiser in the first tier, campaigns sold by cars.com in the second tier, and run-of-affiliate campaigns in the third tier.

"Cars.com is taking full advantage of our unique Revenue Management features that have provided them with more opportunities to increase their online ad sales," said Brian Handly, Accipiter CEO. "Using AdManager's real-time inventory forecasting and campaign optimization features, we fully expect they will meet their projected aggressive ad growth goals."

Accipiter's AdManager is available as a site-side licensed ad management solution (AdManager Licensed) or as an outsourced ad management solution (AdManager Hosted). AdManager allows publishers to increase targeting capabilities, speed ad delivery, and monitor and control inventory projections in real-time, leading to higher CPMs and less unsold inventory. For more product information, please visit http://www.accipiter.com/solutions/solutions.php.> About cars.com

Partnered with more than 200 leading metro newspapers, television stations and their websites, cars.com is the most comprehensive destination for those looking to buy or sell a new or used car. The site lists more than 1.2 million vehicles from more than 10,000 dealer customers, classified advertisers and private parties to offer consumers the best selection of new and used cars online, as well as the content, tools and advice to support their shopping experience. Recently selected by Forbes.com as a Best of the Web site for car shopping, cars.com combines powerful inventory search tools and new-car configuration with pricing information, photo galleries, buying guides, side-by-side comparison tools, original editorial content and reviews to help millions of car shoppers connect with sellers each month.

Launched in June 1998, cars.com is a division of Classified Ventures, LLC, which is owned by six leading media companies, including Belo (NYSE: BLC), Gannett Co. Inc. (NYSE: GCI), Knight Ridder (NYSE: KRI), The McClatchy Company (NYSE: MNI), Tribune Company (NYSE: TRB) and The Washington Post Company (NYSE: WPO).

About Classified Ventures

Classified Ventures, LLC is a strategic joint-venture 100% owned and funded by six large media partners whose objectives are to collectively capitalize on the revenue growth in the online classified advertising categories of automotive, apartments, and real estate.


 

BNET TalkbackShare your ideas and expertise on this topic

Please add your comment:

  1. You are currently: a Guest |
  2.  

Basic HTML tags that work in comments are: bold (<b></b>), italic (<i></i>), underline (<u></u>), and hyperlink (<a href></a)

advertisement
advertisement
  • Click Here
  • Click Here
  • Click Here
advertisement
Click Here

Content provided in partnership with Thompson Gale