• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, October 4, 2005

In a move that seems to signal both the growing importance of behavioral targeting and the rise to prominence of advertising networks, aQuantive elevated DRIVEpm head Scott Howe to president from general manager, the company announced Monday.

"My days of flying under the radar screen are over," said Howe, who has led the ad network DRIVEpm since it was formed in April 2004.

Howe said that while DRIVEpm accounts for less than 10 percent of aQuantive's total revenues, the division is the "most rapidly growing" unit of the company, which includes the online ad agency Avenue A/Razorfish and marketing services unit Atlas.

Since launching last year, DRIVEpm's client roster has grown to more than 100 in the second quarter, Howe said. The company also works with between 60 and 70 publishers, almost all of whom are among the 250-most trafficked sites.

Most of DRIVEpm's behavioral targeting efforts are based on Web surfing behavior at marketers' sites, as opposed to publishers' sites. For instance, said Howe, if a user goes to the General Motors site and looks at a specific car, DRIVEpm might then serve that user ads for, say, Pontiacs, as opposed to other models.

At the start of the year, aQuantive forecast that its Digital Performance Media segment, which includes DRIVEpm and European-based MediaBrokers, would be in the range of $21 million to $23 million, out of the then-expected total revenues of $250 million to $260 million. In August, aQuantive revised its yearly revenue estimate upwards to between $288 million and $298 million.