Feb/100
The Ads of Super Bowl XLIV (Who Cares About Football, Anyway?)
I won't try to presume you're a Colts or Saints fan, and I won't even presume that you know that those are football teams. That Super Bowl XLIV is this Sunday may be news to you. I can be reasonably assured, however, that at some point you will watch a Super Bowl ad on YouTube. In an age of partisanship and global conflict, YouTube, the great cultural leveler, has united the masses over adorable cat videos and embarrassing local news segments. And creative advertising and commercials rank right below bloopers, clips of pets, and Lady GaGa music videos in terms of popularity.
The Super Bowl is a fantastic opportunity for advertisers to showcase their creativity. With millions of viewers, expectations are high. And some of the past decades most memorable commercials have first aired during the Super Bowl (see: Waaaasssuuuuupp). So what can we expect for this year?
Photo by volov via Pixmac.com
As always, there will be beer commercial upon beer commercial. The site I4U News reports that Anheuser-Busch InBev, the owner of Budweiser, Michelob, Stella Artois, and basically every other beer that you drink, is this year's biggest Super Bowl advertiser with five total minutes of ads (which cost the brewery $30 million, no big deal).
And beyond the expected focus on brews, this year's selection of ads has been surprisingly political. Focus on the Family, an evangelical church organization, will show a pro-life ad that features Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow and his mother -- a development that has been made more controversial by CBS' rejection of an ad for ManCrunch, a gay dating website.
If you want a run-down of all the ads, the content, and the agencies responsible, check out AdWeek's comprehensive Super Bowl XLIV Commercial Players Chart.
Having taken on the totally arduous task of watching most of this year's Super Bowl ads (it's a hard job, but someone has to do it), I have a few favorites:
Feb/101
Successful Blogs: From Start-Up to Follow-Through
Photo by Sureash Kumar via stock.xchng
Don't lie, you've done it before: started a blog with the best of intentions, had the drive to write a few stellar posts... and then fizzled out. I am certainly guilty of creating at least two blogs that are now abandoned, floating out in the blogosphere, and I will never tell anyone their names because they are too embarrassing.
So how can you avoid the flash-in-the-pan blogging phenomenon? ProBlogging and Chris Brogan's site are fantastic resources for would-be bloggers, written by industry veterans who have years of experience forming their own strategies for building successful blogs.
We have done you the service of aggregating the most helpful advice for the two hardest tasks of blogging: starting a great blog that will attract readers and, importantly, maintain your interest, and then keeping it going with posts that don't feel like a chore to write.
Nathan Hangen of Making it Social provides great tips for the first task of starting a blog in his article 10 Things I Wish I Knew When I Started. Here are some choice pieces of advice:
Narrow Your Niche
This is something that took me a long time to understand. I thought that by covering a bunch of topics, casting a wider net so to speak, that I would attract more people to my blog. The problem with that strategy is that when you do attract new visitors, you throw them off if your content isn’t consistent. They’ll wind up leaving and you’ll have to recruit new readers for every single post. So, try fishing with a spear instead.
When You Have a Blog, You are the Authority
Own It! – We blog from behind a desk and see our lives as imperfect or incomplete. However, to a customer or new reader, you have an incredible amount of authority. If you have gone through the work of publishing content, then you need to step up to the plate and own that content. Take the authority and use it. You might be a 6 or 7 (on a 10 point scale), but to that new person, you are a leader.
Start Networking Early!
I cannot emphasize this enough. Use Twitter, comments, and guest posting as a tool to meet new people. The wider your reach, the easier it is to get noticed. Don’t wait for people to come to you…get out and network. People love personal connections! Go to conferences and shake hands with other bloggers. You never know which contact could turn into a great guest posting opportunity, a JV deal, or a new devoted fan
But what happens if you start a blog you love and then lose that loving feeling? David Turnbull of Adventures of a Barefoot Geek wrote an awesome post on How to Ease the Pressure of Blogging, the highlights of which are after the jump:
Feb/101
Publisher of the Week: Steal the Style
This week, Image Space Media would like to recognize Steal the Style as Publisher of the Week! Do you admire Beyonce's effortless fashion sense? Ever wonder how to dress like Drew Barrymore? Look no further, Steal the Style is a great site for dressing and shopping like a celebrity! This style blog shows readers how to pull off fabulous outfits worn by celebrity fashionistas without breaking the bank. The next time you are in need of some fashion inspiration be sure to check out this fantastic site!
Hungry for more celebrity fashion? Follow them on Twitter and Facebook!
Jan/100
Online Advertising in Plain English
With acronyms like CPA, CPM, CPC, web marketing jargon can get confusing really fast. Understanding online marketing terms is especially challenging for publishers since most info on the web is tailored to advertiser needs and interests.
Photo by Carlos Zaragoza via stock.xchg
In light of this, we'd like to help publishers like you demystify these terms so you can make the best advertising revenue decisions for your blog. Here are some of the most commonly used terms in online marketing:
Affiliate Marketing. Affiliate marketing is a web-based revenue sharing practice between advertisers/merchants (affiliate merchants) and online publishers, whereby compensation is based on performance measures, typically in the form of sales, clicks, registrations, or a hybrid model. In a traditional affiliate network the merchant usually has a direct relationship with the publisher.
Jan/100
Welcome to Image Space Media’s Newsletter for January 2010, the Happy New Decade Edition!
| IMAGE SPACE MEDIA News for January 2010  thanks to www.allbestwallpapers.com for the lovely strawberry cocktail Happy New Decade 2010! Your input helps us develop every aspect of our technology, from the layout to the content of our ads. Please keep it coming! If you have any comments or questions, please contact us at info@imagespacemedia.com. in this issue:
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Jan/100
Publisher of the Week: Car Pictures
This week, Image Space Media would like to recognize Car Pictures as Publisher of the Week. Their mission is "to have the greatest car pictures and automotive stock photography on the web." Car Pictures has images of all different car makes from Dodge to Lamborghini. They also categorize their car photos into two different sections - car make and the kind of car (sedan, truck, etc.) to make browsing easier.
Click here to check out Car Pictures!
Jan/100
MetaCurators Scour the Web So You Don’t Have To
Where do you go to find the most interesting internet news? Are you a traditionalist who just reads the New York Times? Or - like a new generation of media consumers, do you rely on the host of internet personalities with thousands of Twitter followers to find the best of the web?
Nick Bilton wrote today about the best of the web metacurators for the Nytimes.com Bits blog - people like Atul Arora and Maria Popova who spend hours every day culling and aggregating interesting links for their friends, family, and thousands of semi-anonymous readers across the web.
Maria Popova aggregates some of the most interesting and thought-provoking links on her Twitter account (aptly titled BrainPicker). She describes her process of content discovery as "controlled serendipity." What did I learn from checking out her Twitter? Some pretty awesome stuff:
From the blog Giladon-line, a visualization of the spread of a Twitter hashtag, #CheeringForTheYankeesIsLike. Check out the two videos, and see how Twitter really is one big network of funny people. RT @abcdude #CheeringForTheYankeesIsLike pulling for Regina George in “Mean Girls.”
The Inhabitat blog breaks the news that the Olympic Stadium being built in London for the 2012 Olympics will be made out of recycled guns and knives! What will those crazy environmentally-friendly architects think of next?
And finally, the site Universe Today links to an audio recording of Saturn's rings picked up by the Cassini spacecraft - proving yet again that outerspace is pretty creepy.
Bilton writes that metacurators like Maria Popova are a part of the new philosophy of sharing content: "Great content going viral isn’t new. But the sharing mentality is no longer confined to the occasional gems. It’s for everything we consume online, large or small."
Who are the influential metacurators in your life? Whose Twitter is particularly interesting, or whose blog has the best content? Let us know in the comments!
Jan/100
Publisher of the Week: Future Derm
This week, Image Space Media would like to recognize Future Derm as Publisher of the Week. The site's webmaster, Nicki Zevola, is a second-year medical student at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. She writes articles based on primary research from scientific research journals.
Nicki states that "Dermatology is my passion, and I love to learn as much as about it as I can. I hope that my blog will give me the opportunity to regularly learn and share my findings with others, and to learn from their inputs as well." She is also going to medical school full-time, conducting research part-time, and maintaining this blog!
Due to the highest traffic levels ever, as a thank-you to its readers, Future Derm is having the 'Biggest Giveaway Ever: Skinceuticals CE Ferulic & Phloretin CF and a Dermal Roller!' (giveaway items pictured) To enter the contest, click here to visit the Future Derm site and enter a comment on the giveaway post. One reader will be chosen at random on February 7 at noon (don't forget to leave your email address!)
Click here to follow Future Derm on twitter & click here to join the Facebook fan page.
Jan/100
We’re Funded!
It is with great pride that we announce our Series A. Our growth has been so astonishing thanks to all of our great publishers. It's time to really blow it up! Thanks for your help so far and we're looking forward to working with you all for a long time.
The round was led by New Atlantic Ventures. Mike Gordon, co-founder of Limelight Networks, also participated and will be joining the board. Full release is below.
Image Space Media Receives $2.9 Million In First Round Financing from Leading Media Industry Investors
Funds Will Support Publisher Network Growth and Development of Leading Edge Technology
New York, NY, January 19, 2010—Image Space Media (www.imagespacemedia.com), the leading provider of in-image advertising for the Internet, has received $2.9 million in first-round financing led by New Atlantic Ventures (NAV). Michael Gordon, Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer of Limelight Networks, Inc. (LLNW), will also join the Board of Directors.
“Publishers are constantly seeking effective methods for monetizing their site content. Image Space Media’s ad overlay platform provides a source for incremental revenue that doesn’t compete with other revenue sources,” said Jesse Chenard, CEO, who most recently co-founded leading online video advertising network, Tremor Media. “Given the huge numbers of images across the Internet, the potential for scale is just incredible.”
With more than 34 million unique visitors each month, Image Space Media places relevant ads on the lower fourth of 7.5 million images across the Internet and serves hundreds of millions of impressions per month.
"Site visitors consistently engage with site images and rarely view banners anymore. Image Space Media has identified a solution to banner blindness and is getting great performance from their ads,” said Scott Johnson, Managing Partner at NAV. "Publishers need incremental revenue now more than ever so we are extremely bullish on the Company’s prospects."
Publishers gain incremental revenue through relevant, precisely targeted ads. The transparent ads are user-controlled and only appear when the site visitor mouses over an image. "Image Space Media’s advanced platform is delivering outstanding results for an expanding group of publishers and advertisers and is poised for even more significant growth,” said Gordon. “Website images represent a significant untapped revenue opportunity for publishers and a new, high-engagement opportunity for advertisers."
About Image Space Media
posted by Thomson on The Design Mag
Image Space Media is the leading provider of in-image advertising for
the Internet. Image Space Media reaches more than 32 million unique
users worldwide each month with its ad overlay solution. Image Space
Media superimposes relevant advertisements over more than 7 million
images across the Internet and serves hundreds of millions of
impressions per month. Image Space Media provides publishers with a
method for adding incremental revenue to their sites and advertisers
an additional pipeline to reach their customers. Founded in 2008 and
headquartered in New York, Image Space Media maximizes web
advertisement space without compromising content integrity. For more
information please visit www.imagespacemedia.com, follow
@imagespacemedia on Twitter.
About New Atlantic Ventures
Leigh Taylor Photography from yeeeeee
New Atlantic Ventures is a leading early-stage venture capital firm
targeting investments in technology companies in emerging mass
markets. Through its offices in Cambridge, MA and Reston, VA, NAV
targets companies in the Eastern United States, while also pursuing
select opportunities nationwide. The NAV portfolio includes
investments in Pontiflex, Stitcher, GateRocket, Mpowerplayer, TVU
Networks, Koofers, Secure Command and FashionPlaytes. For more
information, visit www.navfund.com.
Jan/100
Clean your ads!
Dailybloggingtips.com's article, titled, 'Preventing Ad-blindness on Your Blog' focuses on the topic: "common and problematic pay-per-click (PPC) advertising myth is that more ads = more clicks."
Place high interest elements near your ads. These include category lists, popular articles lists, posts, inspiring quotes and so on. Attention has a radius – it will be focused on what’s important and leak into the surrounding area. A note, though: never place your ads so close to another element that a reader might accidentally click the ad when meaning to click something they else. The reader will feel tricked.
Image Space Media serves ads on relevant photos, based on the photos alt tagging. our innovative taxonomy engine that matches relevant ads to your images, providing higher CTR and CPC rates. To take advantage of our technology, we recommend tagging your images with good, descriptive terms. So... what exactly are good and descriptive tags? Here is an example: 
When you're writing a post for your website and you post an image, you have the option to tag that image through our Image Manager or through the "alt" tags in your html code. Check out an example of "alt" tags used in a recent blog post of ours (highlighted). These tags are words or terms, separated by commas, that match our image of a working mother with one of our ads. To see how that works in matching ads to images, check out the finished blog post here. In general, the tags are meant to create the most relevancy between ads and images.
Clean up your act!
De-cluttering can improve the performance of your ads
Readers have a definite amount of attention to give. Simplifying down to your blog’s essential, important elements will mean readers can divide their attention up into bigger portions. More attention given to PPC advertising will mean more clicks, as the reader needs to take in the message of the ad before they’ll be compelled to click it.
Image Space places unobtrusive ads on your site; the relevant ad appears only when a user mouses over them. The ads are simply overlays, which keep your site clean and uncluttered.
Want neat and innovative advertising on your images? Register with Image Space Media at: imagespacemedia.com/publishers/register