• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, June 9, 2008

Instant-messaging Web site Meebo is launching a set of new ad formats designed to encourage social interaction among IM users for the benefit of marketers.

The new units span rich media, applications and sponsored links intended to help drive online word-of-mouth about products and services.

Meebo has attracted a group of high-profile brands as launch partners for the ad initiatives including Havaianas, Sony Electronics, Universal Pictures and the band Weezer.

The centerpiece of Meebo's ad offerings is its MediaBar, a standard leaderboard appearing at the bottom of a user's screen that expands to a 900 x 400 unit to deliver video, games, applications, news and other types of interactive content. Universal, for instance, will launch a campaign this week that lets people use the MediaBar to view a trailer for "The Incredible Hulk," opening June 13.

After watching a movie clip or other digital media, users can share links with friends through an icon that appears in their IM client. Clicking the sharing icon will bring up a list of the last five pieces of content accessed by a user within Meebo to ease pass-along to IM buddies.

The goal is to help marketers take advantage of the potential viral effect within Meebo's community of 35 million users who share 75 million links each month. "We're allowing people to become brand ambassadors," said Carter Brokaw, chief revenue officer at Meebo, which provides remote access to the IM services of AOL, Yahoo, MSN and Google, as well as its own.

Separately, the company is also unveiling SparkAds, text ads containing links to drive traffic to a brand's site from Meebo.com or Meebo Rooms--where visitors can gather to chat and share media around a given topic--on other sites. (Weezer's Meebo Room, for instance, has 40,000 members.)

Brokaw said Meebo's new ad formats will gradually become more highly targeted and relevant, based on users' interaction with the units. "Over time, the system will get a lot smarter about what peoples' tendencies are and which brands they actually want to engage with," he said.

Through the new content-sharing features, in particular, Meebo hopes to target influencers who can help spread brand messages among other users. "As we get more intelligent about identifying who those people are, we can really get them into the DNA of the conversation," Brokaw said.

Meebo will sell the MediaBar on a CPM basis that also adds in a CPA component depending on what kind of response a marketer is trying to drive. It could be anything from watching a trailer to playing a game to participating in a promotional contest. At launch, Brokaw said the unit will carry a $12 CPM.

SparkAds will be offered on a cost-per-click basis.

In addition to Universal's "Hulk" promotion on Meebo, campaigns on behalf of the other brands in among the initial group of marketers using the new ad formats will start in the next few weeks, Brokaw said.

Previously, Meebo's main ad option was an overlay unit allowing users to select branded background "skins" and buddy icons, watch and share videos, and access related chat rooms.