Chef serves up Food Ad Network
August 25, 2008 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
An Australian chef aims to link major brands in the food and beverage markets with specialist web sites that cater for culinary enthusiasts.
Benjamin Christie - one of the first people to make content available on the Joost peer-to-peer Internet TV network - has launched Gourmet Ads, a service to deliver targeted advertising to blogs and other web sites that deal with food, wine and beer.
Gourmet Ads is initially building a network in Australia, and intends to expand into the US during early 2009.
“Advertisers that work with Gourmet Ads can target consumers that value high quality food, beer and wine. This audience relies on long-tail culinary sites for recipes, ideas and other resources that satisfy their interests,” said Christie.
“Marketers need to reach them on the sites that they visit, while they are in the right frame of mind and are thinking about food.”
Gourmet Ads is powered by Adify, which already operates ad networks aimed at the travel, pet, arts and culture, technology, movie and entertainment, and home improvement markets, among others.
“Benjamin’s expertise as a television presenter, cookbook author and culinary educator has led to the creation of one of the most unique ad networks to date,” said Russ Fradin, president of Adify.
“Today, long-tail culinary sites are being sought due to the growing interest in cooking and food in general, which has not only hit the United States but other countries as well. With more individuals gravitating towards the kitchen table, an effective way of reaching them is through vertical ad networks that cater to the need of the culinarily engaged,” added Fradin.
Source : iTWire
Adify and Benjamin Christie Cook Up Food Vertical Ad Network
August 24, 2008 by Benjamin Christie · Leave a Comment
Australian Chef Benjamin Christie today launched Gourmet Ads (www.gourmetads.com), the first Australian vertical advertising network focused on delivering major brand advertising to food, wine and beer enthusiasts. Gourmet Ads is powered by Adify (www.adify.com), the premier vertical ad network management company, to harness culinary enthusiasts and enable marketers to reach this engaged audience. The network encompasses food, wine, and beer blogs and Web sites in Australia, with plans for expansion to the United States early next year.
With a lack of options in Australia to monetize Web sites, Christie saw a need for a gourmet vertical ad network to help advertisers fight growing fragmentation and reach the long-tail food, beer and wine sites, while helping those sites generate revenue from brand advertising. A highly sought after audience for marketers, food enthusiasts are typically high-income females 27 to 45 years of age. With most Australian marketers still focusing on this audience through traditional print and television media, opportunities in the online space remain untapped. Adify’s ad serving technology coupled with Christie’s expertise and relationships with publishers helps marketers reach an audience that generates over three million page views per month for Gourmet Ads.
“The market in Australia is much different than that in the U.S. and brand marketers continuously gravitate to traditional media outlets, forgetting how successful the Internet can be in targeting highly engaged audiences such as food enthusiasts,” said Benjamin Christie of Gourmet Ads. “Advertisers that work with Gourmet Ads can target consumers that value high quality food, beer and wine. This audience relies on long-tail culinary sites for recipes, ideas and other resources that satisfy their interests. Marketers need to reach them on the sites that they visit, while they are in the right frame of mind and are thinking about food.”
Adify is providing the Gourmet Ads network with the key network management services required to execute successful advertising campaigns, including ad management, tracking, reporting, billing, payment and technical support functions. This infrastructure is capable of delivering content sponsorships, video, image and rich media advertising for its various network partners. Gourmet Ads editorial board hand-selects publishing partners for the ad network and is currently representing a cross section of popular Australian food blogs and recipe websites.
“Benjamin’s expertise as a television presenter, cookbook author and culinary educator has led to the creation of one of the most unique ad networks to date,” said Russ Fradin, president of Adify. “Today, long-tail culinary sites are being sought due to the growing interest in cooking and food in general, which has not only hit the United States but other countries as well. With more individuals gravitating towards the kitchen table, an effective way of reaching them is through vertical ad networks that cater to the need of the culinarily engaged.”
Source : Reuters
