“There are few companies as admired, beloved and dominant in their industries as Amazon and Apple. So when the two ventured into the ad business (Amazon in 2008 and Apple in 2010), Madison Avenue took notice,” Kate Kaye reports or Advertising Age. “Advertising sales are a tough slog for both — and for a lot of the same reasons. Media buyers say they are slow, cocky and downright stingy. Both take too long to develop ad products. Amazon’s sales approach is too pushy; Apple is too reticent to foster relationships. Most frustrating: Neither is willing to cough up enough of the consumer data that attracts advertisers to them in the first place.”
“Perhaps the biggest issue hindering their ad growth is that advertising is an afterthought, a blip on the balance sheet. It’s still viewed by some as immaterial and potentially detrimental to the cash cows — an ad is an impediment if it distracts a consumer from the ‘buy’ button or mucks up a beautiful mobile app,” Kaye reports. “One exec told Ad Age that Apple doesn’t even have official sales targets for its ad business.”
“Cary Tilds, chief innovation officer for GroupM, said that Apple doesn’t have a big sales team. ‘It’s not their main focus to tell everyone in the world how amazing advertising in iAd is,’ she said. ‘It’s just not as loud,’ Kaye reports. “Since launch, both have rebooted their ad-selling efforts several times. Apple added iTunes Radio to its arsenal. And the two have also loosened up a bit on the data, though it’s nothing like what advertisers have come to expect from, say, Yahoo, which provides lots more data and metrics… One person familiar with the situation exec said Apple’s refusal to share data makes it the best-looking girl at the party, forced to wear a bag over her head.”
Much more in the full article here.
[Thanks to MacDailyNews Readers “Fred Mertz” and “OccasionalPoster1” for the heads up.]