• by Tyler Loechner  @mp_tyler, June 2, 2014

The rise of Big Data and the promise of personalization hasn’t stopped some in the industry from trying to make it even easier for advertisers to reach their intended audiences by way of niche ad exchanges.

The Gay Ad Network has done just that, as the company on Monday announced the launch of its own niche exchange, which will feature gay and lesbian digital properties operated by Gay Ad Network as well as inventory from select premium lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) publishing partners, according to Mark Elderkin, the company’s CEO.

It will be a private exchange and will support display, video and mobile inventory. The new exchange will also feature DealID technology.

The Gay Ad Network first launched as a vertical ad network in 2007 that allowed advertisers to purchase access to a set of LGBT Web sites at a flat CPM rate, Elderkin explained.

“Through direct buys, we handled the delivery, placement and optimization by booking campaigns on behalf of our buyers,” he said. “Now, we are still hyper-focused on our vertical market, but we have much deeper knowledge of our LGBT audience.

“In addition to direct buys at the site level, we also allow advertisers to buy access to our audience programmatically, using their own buying platforms at the audience level,” Elderkin continued.

In other words, the focus of the Gay Ad Network has not changed, but the way in which it lets advertisers reach audiences has.

Buyers will be able to use their first-party data on the exchange, as well as Gay Ad Network’s first-party data to create audience segments.