Clearspring is announcing today at ad:tech in New York a new service called “Clearspring for Advertisers” that will deliver advertisements in the form of interactive widgets.
The announcement does not bring anything particular new to the web, since companies such as Sony Pictures Entertainment, The CW Television Network, Comedy Central, DreamWorks Animation, and Warner Brothers have already distributed ad widgets through the service. We’ve embedded a widget below that was used to advertise the movie Superbad.
The arguments in favor of widgets over regular banner ads depend on the increased engagement levels they provide and their viral nature (fans of a product can embed the widgets in their blogs and social network pages).
More information about the service can be found here on Clearspring’s website.
The only thing that might appeal to me is the fact that the ad is viral and therefore fans can help promote and distribute it amongst hundreds or thousands of site.
This is a great opportunity for brands to market their products and make better engaging ads to appeal to their fans.
The only downside is that you cannot really control where these widgets will be displayed, am I right?
http://www.octabox.com
Soon widget will get blocked, what is required is creating ads which satisfy user needs, why the hell any sane minded and ethical blogger waste the money of a company by using it as a payment gateway to gratify good content. Maybe people should start using donate for good content and pay for good content buttons as valid payment gateways.
http://tekno-world.blogspot.com
Adam hit the nail on the head. Compared to placing standard banner ads, it’s the viral sharing capability of ad widgets that give you more bang for your media buck. And Clearspring makes it very easy for these widgets to be shared across social networking platforms. As for control, Clearspring offers the ability to precisely track widget placements by domain.
Why would anyone pay for this when you can build it for free with Google?
http://code.google.com/apis/gadgets/index.html
What’s the pricing model for this? Impression-based with an upfront fee?
Since I completely ignore ads, it doesn’t matter if the ad is interactive or not. Web advertising need to really change to get my attention.
re: the pricing model. I use clearspring for some widgets i’ve created and the service is a free platform. You are responsible for creating and hosting the widget - once you’ve done so you can grab a script which you can embed into any webpage. I don’t see how this will be different with clearspring ads so i don’t think a price applies. You are responsible for for getting your ad distributed. I think this is just a marketing spin on top of an already existing product but i can’t be sure. maybe someone knows for sure?
Read this here. http://www.clearspring.com/advertising/faq
“Who does the media planning and ad serving of a Clearspring ad widget?
Media planning and ad serving are done the same as with non-widget online campaigns. The advertiser or agency purchases the desired media. Clearspring will provide redirect tags to the publisher’s or agency’s ad server, redirecting the browser to Clearspring’s servers to fetch the widget.”
Widgets will transform online advertising. But, they have a long way to go. Companies like Clearspring, Gigya and WidgetBox are building the necessary infrastructure to support the distribution, marketing and analytics.
I think the widgets are a great idea. No need to leave your current page to see if you are interested in a product.