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LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

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Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#11

Post by corford »

gcb wrote: post #5

So you don't have to go thru "enterprise sales people" to get onboarded, does that means the company can't afford ad review? If they allow rich media for every one with 2cents, i can't think of a better platform to distribute malware.

I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff?

Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it).

Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publishers?

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#12

Post by kposehn »

zorked wrote: post #9

Is there any way that a small ad buyer (a few hundred thousand dollars a month) can participate in the auctions directly, bidding in real time rather than going through a middleman that does the work for him (which is what LeanMarket seems to do)?

You can pretty easily at that size. OpenX and AdBrite are both easy to get started with, let me know if you want an intro.

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#13

Post by CyrusL »

zorked wrote: post #9

Is there any way that a small ad buyer (a few hundred thousand dollars a month) can participate in the auctions directly, bidding in real time rather than going through a middleman that does the work for him (which is what LeanMarket seems to do)?

On the larger exchanges, not really. This would be like a retail investor wanting access to NASDAQ or NYSE rather than Schwab or E-Trade. Some of the 3rd-tier exchanges may be exceptions.

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#14

Post by CyrusL »

kposehn wrote: post #10
CyrusL wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true that the vast majority of demand-side platforms are bidding on the same impressions, so the differentiation really comes from technology, service, and usability. For example, the main component of building a campaign on SiteScout is scrolling through a really long list of websites and entering individual CPM bids. Between LeanMarket's slick category-targeting UI and auto-optimization, I think we handle this…

Ok, I'd love to give it a shot. Auto-optimization has always been a pain point for me, especially with lower impression/higher EPC campaigns. How soon will you be sending out invites?

No real invite system, I'm just trying to make sure any advertiser's campaigns seem like a good fit for RTB before I push them to test a campaign that probably won't succeed. Can you please reach out through the contact form or email first name @ company domain dot com? Thanks!

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#15

Post by CyrusL »

CyrusL wrote: post #13
zorked wrote: post #9

Is there any way that a small ad buyer (a few hundred thousand dollars a month) can participate in the auctions directly, bidding in real time rather than going through a middleman that does the work for him (which is what LeanMarket seems to do)?

On the larger exchanges, not really. This would be like a retail investor wanting access to NASDAQ or NYSE rather than Schwab or E-Trade. Some of the 3rd-tier exchanges may be exceptions.

Oops, I just saw you said few hundred thousand. I read "a few hundred" at first. Then yes, absolutely.

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#16

Post by calbear81 »

corford wrote: post #11
gcb wrote: post #5

So you don't have to go thru "enterprise sales people" to get onboarded, does that means the company can't afford ad review? If they allow rich media for every one with 2cents, i can't think of a better platform to distribute malware.

I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff? Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it). Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publish…

Haven't touched ad servers for a while but do most ad serving platforms correctly track HTML 5 rich media? I know most of them are setup to correctly hook into Flash (Actionscript) and be able to automatically catch plays, replays, hovers, and other actions.

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#17

Post by chaseideas »

CyrusL wrote: post #4
kposehn wrote: post #3

Interesting. I'm wondering how this will differentiate from companies like SiteScout, which provide the same basic service. If the optimization engine is just that good, I'm definitely going to push more of my budget to it.

It's true that the vast majority of demand-side platforms are bidding on the same impressions, so the differentiation really comes from technology, service, and usability. For example, the main component of building a campaign on SiteScout is scrolling through a really long list of websites and entering individual CPM bids. Between LeanMarket's slick category-targeting UI and auto-optimization, I think we handle this…

Sounds great! Looking forward to checking it out. Very curious to see how the auto-optimization does compared to our current systems.

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#18

Post by corford »

calbear81 wrote: post #16
corford wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff? Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it). Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publish…

Haven't touched ad servers for a while but do most ad serving platforms correctly track HTML 5 rich media? I know most of them are setup to correctly hook into Flash (Actionscript) and be able to automatically catch plays, replays, hovers, and other actions.

I'm out of date as well so I don't know. Hopefully someone more current can enlighten us :)

Re: LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

#19

Post by chaseideas »

corford wrote: post #11
gcb wrote: post #5

So you don't have to go thru "enterprise sales people" to get onboarded, does that means the company can't afford ad review? If they allow rich media for every one with 2cents, i can't think of a better platform to distribute malware.

I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff? Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it). Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publish…

Yeah, either way it's spun... seems like a pretty good arrangement for their platform, and should work out well for all involved. Seems to solve the problem of ad exchanges having heavily-manual interfaces, or having to setup a 3rd party tracking system for helping optimize spends.

The system sounds pretty slick, and if does what it says it will, I think their UI will go a long way towards helping them gain traction with the smaller firms.

If it truly makes things as easy as it wants/claims to, it should find a pretty solid base of users fairly quick.

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