• by Erik Sass  @eriksass1, July 18, 2007

Radio ad rep firms are scrambling to expand their online ad serving capabilities, with the latest deal coming from Ronning Lipset Radio, which announced Tuesday that it has partnered with Corstarr to use its Adcor technology for delivering Internet radio ads. The Lipset announcement comes a week after Katz Radio bought Net Radio Sales (renamed Katz Net Radio Sales) from Aritaur to gain control of its online ad-serving technology.

Lipset hopes the strategic partnership with Corstarr will make Internet radio more accessible to advertisers by dealing with various issues such as scheduling, customer service and performance reporting. Its performance reporting capabilities include data describing click-through rates on banner display ads that have been synced to the audio message.

Adcor, created by Corstarr co-founders Val Starr and Justin Corbett, allows broadcasters to set up multiple radio channels and deliver ads across one or all of them, targeting audiences by demographic characteristics and daypart. It also features an "intelligent" ad algorithm that delivers ads appropriate for these specific targeting goals. In the future, Lipset and Corstarr hope to expand the Adcor offerings with online video, social networking, and mobile functionality.

Last week, Katz Media bought Net Radio Sales in its biggest digital investment to date.

The acquired company allows advertisers to deliver ads across a variety of audio and Web-based platforms, including hundreds of station Web sites in its digital network. The company also provides a variety of interactive ads to station Web sites. Net Radio Sales already offers advertisers a choice of more than 1,000 Internet radio streams, including both broadcast and Internet-only stations, which reach a total 5 million listeners per month.

Internet radio measurements will be provided by Ando Media's Webcast Metrics. It will also handle the planning and placement of ads through its Campaign Management System, which allows advertisers to execute both targeted and run-of-network campaigns.

A recent report on Internet radio listening from Arbitron and Edison Media Research, titled "The Infinite Dial 2007: Radio's Digital Platforms," counted a weekly online radio audience of 29 million people in the United States. That represents 11% of the total population.

Plus, 16% of adults ages 18-34 have listened to Internet radio in the last week, and 55% of the listeners are male. Finally, online listeners are more affluent, with members of the cohort 40% more likely than the average population to have a household income that exceeds $100,000 a year.