Apple hires former Yahoo executive to join iAd team
Apple has reportedly bolstered its iAd mobile advertising team with the hiring of Jessica Jensen, a former Yahoo executive.
Jensen's departure from Yahoo was confirmed by the company to Kara Swisher of All Things D. Citing anonymous sources, she added that Jensen is taking a Job at Apple.
In the iAd division, Jensen will work for Todd Teresi, a former Yahoo and Adobe advertising executive. Teresi was hired by Apple early this year, replacing the position vacated by Andy Miller, who left the company in August of 2011.
During her time at Yahoo, Jensen was in charge of Yahoo's women-oriented site, Shine. She also oversaw the company's lifestyles and health content businesses.
"At Yahoo, Jensen was the point person on its critical women's initiatives, including Shine, which is among the top such sites in the U.S.," Swisher wrote, "so her departure is a blow to new CEO Scott Thompson's efforts to push forward its media businesses."
The addition of Jensen comes as Apple is believed to be revamping its iAd service to increase interest in the mobile advertising network. Recent changes made include a reduction of the minimum campaign amount, an increase in developer revenue share to 70 percent, and adjustments of the service's fees.
Currently, advertisers can spend as little as $100,000 to initiate mobile campaigns, down from a $300,000 threshold the service had last July. The current minimum is a fraction of the $1 million minimum Apple implemented when iAd launched in 2010, as well as the $500,000 price seen last February.
Jensen's departure from Yahoo was confirmed by the company to Kara Swisher of All Things D. Citing anonymous sources, she added that Jensen is taking a Job at Apple.
In the iAd division, Jensen will work for Todd Teresi, a former Yahoo and Adobe advertising executive. Teresi was hired by Apple early this year, replacing the position vacated by Andy Miller, who left the company in August of 2011.
During her time at Yahoo, Jensen was in charge of Yahoo's women-oriented site, Shine. She also oversaw the company's lifestyles and health content businesses.
"At Yahoo, Jensen was the point person on its critical women's initiatives, including Shine, which is among the top such sites in the U.S.," Swisher wrote, "so her departure is a blow to new CEO Scott Thompson's efforts to push forward its media businesses."
The addition of Jensen comes as Apple is believed to be revamping its iAd service to increase interest in the mobile advertising network. Recent changes made include a reduction of the minimum campaign amount, an increase in developer revenue share to 70 percent, and adjustments of the service's fees.
Currently, advertisers can spend as little as $100,000 to initiate mobile campaigns, down from a $300,000 threshold the service had last July. The current minimum is a fraction of the $1 million minimum Apple implemented when iAd launched in 2010, as well as the $500,000 price seen last February.
Comments
I hope Apple can kick some life into iAd. If Apple TV and / or Apple... um... TV aka iTV takes of iAd may just become a lot more relevant.
Quote:
Originally Posted by paxman
I hope Apple can kick some life into iAd. If Apple TV and / or Apple... um... TV aka iTV takes of iAd may just become a lot more relevant.
I don't want crap pop-up ads on the bottom of my content. I don't want ads on my content at all. I want an iTunes Store-style system where I own the content.
Give me ads for streaming live news channels on Apple TV, sure! That's fine. Just not for content.
Quote:
Originally Posted by AppleInsider
[...] The addition of Jensen comes as Apple is believed to be revamping its iAd service to increase interest in the mobile advertising network. [...]
Probably not just for the mobile advertising network. I strongly suspect that Apple intends to incorporate iAd into its HDTV solution, which may not sit well with Madison Avenue. But if Apple does manage to disrupt the television industry, traditional TV ad agencies will need to adapt or die.
I wouldn't mind a few advertisements playing occasionally if the price for content in iTunes is reduced significantly. Cable subscribers already pay large monthly subscriptions and must suffer frequent advertisements. The cable subscription model has created a large subculture of people who record content and watch later skipping the advertisements. I don't understand why advertisers still use such an outdated model.
If AppleTV had advertisements that allowed users to select an advertisement to view more content with interaction and allowed purchases directly from AppleTV they could likely reduce the price of content so low that there would effectively be no barrier for consumers.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SockRolid
Probably not just for the mobile advertising network. I strongly suspect that Apple intends to incorporate iAd into its HDTV solution, which may not sit well with Madison Avenue. But if Apple does manage to disrupt the television industry, traditional TV ad agencies will need to adapt or die.
That would be pretty cool and you can bet those TV ads would be highly interactive and provide far more user data than the traditional ad.
That would probably require sharing of your viewing / purchasing / browsing habits and history, probably with outside parties, something many Apple users here have indicated is an intrusion on their privacy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Gatorguy
That would probably require sharing of your viewing / purchasing / browsing habits and history, probably with outside parties, something many Apple users here have indicated is an intrusion on their privacy.
Such information can be anonymized and still provide a treasure trove of data to advertisers.
That's supposedly the type of data Google uses in ad delivery. Anonymized or not many Apple users here still don't like it. Perhaps the majority wouldn't even realize what they're agreeing to anyway, so it wouldn't be an issue for most. The most active members here certainly aren't typical users, nor as ill-informed.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
Such information can be anonymized and still provide a treasure trove of data to advertisers.
Correct. This is what Google does, and one of the reasons their ad business does so well.
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpamSandwich
Such information can be anonymized and still provide a treasure trove of data to advertisers.
Works for iOS devices because they aren't shared among family members as often as a TV is. Targeting ads based on purchasing preference or browsing habits quickly becomes irrelevant when multiple family members are using the TV. The only useful metric in that case is what they already do in TV advertising. The ads will be based on the type of content and not user preference information.
iAd was a massive miscalculation by an over zealous Apple.
It's the most restrictive form of advertising possible.
Regardless of how good their platform is - having a somewhat ad-free environment is why people like the iPhone experience. If ad's start to be more 'in your face' then your better off with the Android experience that have way fewer restrictions and advertising is a fraction of the price of iAd. That's where the advertising money will go and that's where it is going.
iAd says "only multinational's and mega corporations need APPLY"
Android says "all are welcome"
iAd slowly coming back down to earth - but it has a long ways to go yet before attracting media and advertising buyers as a solution for their clients.
Apple just buy Yahoo and grab their tech and IP already!
Yahoo! connected TV is right up the alley: http://connectedtv.yahoo.com/
Other projects too.
We're not going to see the end to ads in apps. Especially free apps. Developers should allow users to pay to remove the ads though (I do).
However, it would be even better if Apple built this ability directly into the iAds solution and just require developers to specify the price point for ad removal.
I think if Apple were to do this then more users would be happy and developers would be happy.
Btw iAds pays developers way more than AdMob etc. (the only limitation has been inventory but that has improved lots in the past 6 months) so iAds isn't going to go away anytime soon.