PubMatic: Ad Optimization
I noticed this article about Pubmatic today on TechCrunch, and I found it interesting. It includes a video of Amar Goel, founder and CEO, presenting at TechCrunch 40. They were a 2007 TechCrunch 40 finalist, and the company is based in India.
Pubmatic is an ad optimization service. Think of it as aggregating the different ad services out there (Google Adsense, Yahoo Publisher Network, etc.) in order to maximize the return you get on your ad space. While it seems mostly targeted at publishers - people who want to display advertisements on their own site - they also provide some features for those of us who want to place ads.
For publishers, the idea behind Pubmatic is simple. They automatically pick and display the highest paying, highest converting advertisements out of the major ad networks, allowing the publisher to increase their ad revenue.
It certainly sounds like something I could use, but how does Pubmatic make money? For now, the service is free to their beta users, but eventually they’ll need to take a cut or have some sort of fee. I’ll have to keep tabs on this service and similar services and see how they develop in the future.