Google introduces Gadget Ads

Google has introduced a new service that allows advertisers to measure audience responses to ad content.

According to the search engine, advertisers can now analyse the performance of an ad "by selecting from dozens of predefined interactions and [can] optimise based on those results".

The new ads can incorporate live data feeds, images, video and miniature websites in a single advertising unit, permitting users a choice in what they want to see, Reuters reports.

This would allow, for example, a car advertiser to combine a video ad for its vehicles with appropriate links to Google Maps, live traffic updates and even a customer sign-up form, the news agency adds.

Advertisers would then be able, through the search engine, to obtain information regarding whether an ad was viewed, how often it was watched and other features of audience behaviour.

Andrew Frank, an online advertising analyst with Gartner, told Reuters: "Gadget Ads is very far reaching. This is the platform that Google is going to build all their cross-media advertising services upon."

While other companies, including Microsoft and Yahoo!, offer various services that allow advertisers to show rich media ads like videos, they lack the breadth of the new Google service, he added.

Google recently expanded its AdWords product to allow advertisers who have created content for mobile phones to target users who browse the web while on the move.

www.bigmouthmedia.com Staff 2007-09-28