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April 18, 2007

Big Media Invests in Niche Ad Network Player

GE-owned NBC Universal, GE Media, Communications and Entertainment and Time Warner Investments are among investors that just coughed up a total of $19 million in funding for niche ad network and management platform Adify.

It's not unusual for large media firms to invest in small ad-related firms. The New York Times Company, for instance, invests in video/ad platform Brightcove, which powers video on the NYTimes.com site and its About.com site.

Then there's the Gannett, McClatchy and Tribune triad, which are co-owners of CareerBuilder, Apartments.com and other online classifieds services.

What would NBC or Time Warner want through a relationship with Adify? Well, Adify powers ads on a blog network run by Washingtonpost.Newsweek Interactive. Media outfits like AOL (Time Warner) and NBC are recognizing the need to distribute and monetize their content in places outside their own properties. I suppose they'd be interested in a firm like Adify, which allows small and large sites to create custom networks and aggregate ad-supported content.

Some more insight comes via a comment in the Adify press release by NBC Universal President, Integrated Media Beth Comstock:

“We recognize that vertical networks – networks that combine content from or across a complementary group of web properties – are the next logical evolution for publishers seeking to expand their advertising solutions for customers....They are quickly becoming an important way to develop scale for our marketing clients.”

Posted by Kate Kaye at April 18, 2007 12:41 PM

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