Founded just over a year ago, New York-based Traffiq this month launched its own ad exchange, which has a number of features it hopes will differentiate it from the competition, such as an auction system viewable by the public, a rating system, and a revenue share model that does not charge sellers of ads.

Traffiq, which closed a series A of about $7 million led by Court Square Ventures in September, 2006, offers its service for advertisers and publishers to manage the ad buying and selling process. The company also provides free ad serving.

Traffiq allows any member of the public to view inventory that is up for sale on the auction. A recent check found inventory from big publishers such as TimeOut New York, TV Guide, Whitepages.com, and Rolling Stone. This is contrary to many exchanges where it is necessary to become a member to view auctions.

Mark Kahn, Traffiq CEO, said this open information policy is in reaction to his experience with blind ad networks that give buyers little control over inventory and give sellers little control of their results.

“In an open market, market forces will rule the day,” Mr. Kahn said. “You get the truest value for the inventory that the market will bear. We democratized access to data so everyone will have the same data.”

Jupiter Research’s advertising analyst Emily Riley recently praised Traffiq, comparing it favorably to DoubleClick’s Atlas and MediaVisor tools. “If many good publishers choose to offer their inventory, [Traffiq] could improve the lives of media planners everywhere,” Ms. Riley wrote on her blog.

Traffiq also allows buyers and sellers to arrange sales of inventory far in advance, which differs from many existing exchanges, which often auction off inventory at the last minute before it appears online.

Selling in advance is more in line with how media buyers are used to doing business with other platforms such as television’s “upfront” market, Mr. Kahn noted.

Traffiq also auctions in advance because the inventory is normally premium inventory on major web sites, not remnant or unsold inventory that is often unloaded on many ad exchanges.

Most large publishers traditionally sell only about 20 percent to 30 percent of their inventory through a human sales force, and unload the rest at firesale prices to networks or exchanges, according to Mr. Kahn.

| Permalink | Trackback
Related Articles