GumGum touts viewability as it brings its in-image advertising to Australia

In-image advertising vendor, GumGum, has launched its Australian operations with a new local publisher agreement and fresh VP for local sales.

The US-based company, which was founded in 2007, provides a digital marketing platform for targeting advertising based on images.

One of GumGum’s key selling points is its ability to contextually place in-image ads based on the technology’s analytics capabilities. These incorporate image recognition and text mining technologies, scanning images to recognise details such as facial features and hair colour, brand logo detection, semantic and contextual analysis and product features and details.

This information is then overlaid with audience data from primary and third-party sources and can be used to target ads on multiple levels.

The vendor also claims its targeted ad solutions offer high viewability, a growing concern for brands and publishers as digital advertising gains maturity. GumGum claims to deliver consistent viewability rates of 81 per cent, based on the IAB US definition of viewable ads, and 10 times better engagement than traditional display options. Its ads are only delivered when the image is fully in display in-browser.

To kick off its Australian operations, the company has struck an agreement with Bauer Xcel Media which will see GumGum’s advertising solutions made available across the digital division’s To Love women’s network, Beauty Heaven as well as WhichCar and Wheelsmag.com.au.

“The power of GumGum’s contextual placement will deliver higher viewability, engagement, and as proved by the success of the product in the US, a lift in brand metrics,” said Bauer Xcel Media digital commercial director, Peter Manten.

GumGum has also appointed Jon Stubley as its vice-president for A/NZ sales, with responsibility for strategic growth, revenue and team development. His first priority is building a sales and clients team to support local agencies and brands. Stubley was formerly group direct sales manager at Macquarie Radio Network.

Stubley told CMO that while viewability is a key metric for GumGum in terms of positioning its offering to brands and agencies, there was a lot more that needs to be done around understanding engagement with ads.

“Viewability is the tip of the iceberg – just because an ad has the potential to be viewed, it doesn’t mean it’s seen or measurable,” he said. “We’ve done some eye tracking studies in the US and as you’d expect, headlines and images get the most heat.

“We have to create ad units in the context of how people consumer content. If overlay ad that’s contextually relevant, you will get better results for all of those involved, whether it be the consumer, publisher or brand.”

As an example of how his company has worked with brands to date, Stubley said GumGum worked with L'Oreal in the US to deliver ads about its hair dye products by defining specific hair colour in images.

GumGum is initially offering several types of ad units, including rich media and video, full canvas advertising, and what it calls ‘runway’ ads. The vendor has also just started working with organisations in the US and UK on programmatically trading its ads.

GumGum has agreements with 2000 publishers worldwide and to be reaching 400 million visitors including 7.5 million in Australia and New Zealand. Brand clients include Disney, BMW, Toyota, LÓreal and McDonalds.

Stubley said the focus is initially on B2C publications and brands, largely because image-based advertising has proven most effective with FMCG and auto products to date. However, he didn’t rule out GumGum looking to do B2B publishing deals later down the track.

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