Former "WSJ" Publisher Joins Advisory Board of Peer39

by Jennifer Saba

April 2, 2009

The New York-based company scans copy for the meaning of an article and then suggests serving advertising related to the subject.

"Semantic advertising seems to be a real game changer at a time when we need game changing," Crovitz said.

Essentially, Peer39 takes text, analyzes the entire meaning beyond key words and allows publishers to more effectively capture higher rates. The idea is to take content that is harder to sell against -- typically general news, opinions, and politics -- and make it more relevant to advertisers.

"What we have accomplished," explains Peer39 CEO Amiad Solomon, "is a system that works with the largest news companies to find more available inventory in high-yield categories."

For example, an article about President Obama's political agenda might be tagged as politics. However, Peer39 can ascertain, in real time, the agenda covers alternative energy. The publisher, in turn, can sell that content to an advertiser such as General Electric.

Peer39 "reads" content by implementing pixels on a page that calls back to Peer 39 servers. The servers interpret the context and then send a message back to the publisher's ad server with the appropriate tags.

"Our goal is for publishers to have less remnant advertising," Solomon said.

High-demand online advertising can go for several tens of dollars, whereas remnant advertising -- advertising that is sold at the last minute -- fetches cents.

Crovitz said he agreed to a role with Peer39 because he is interested in new advertising methods that go "beyond behavioral targeting. Contextual targeting allows information to be found and tagged in a more sophisticated way.

"What I hope to be able to do is help explain to my former colleagues in the online media industry how semantic advertising works and what added value it can bring to a Web site and advertising," Crovitz added.

Crovitz also serves on the board of directors of ProQuest and Blurb and is on the board of advisors of early stage companies including SocialMedian, UpCompany, Halogen Guides, YourNoodle, and Clickablity.

Peer39 is working with 10 newspaper companies.