Here's an online advertising success story you may be interested in. The Keebler Company, marketer of Cheez-It brand crackers, today announced the results of a promotion they're running with ActiveBuddy, which delivers content via instant messengers. With close to 100 million people now using instant messaging software, according to industry estimates, many companies are itching to take advantage of what they consider an untapped market. And, it seems, with good reason. According to Keebler, results are impressive. For the month of September, test results showed that out of 120,000 total impressions, there was an impressive 6.5% click …

Start-ups are infamous for their way of spending money in the past, but now it looks like they've changed their ways. According to the latest findings of Launch Pad, a San Francisco-based high-tech marketing consulting firm, and Blanc & Otus, a high-tech communications company, dramatic reallocations have occurred in the marketing budgets of business-to-business high-tech start-up companies recently. Despite the economic conditions they now face, these start-ups have - drum roll, please - INCREASED marketing spending in absolute dollars from $2.2 million in 2000 to $2.8 million in 2001, though marketing spending as a fraction of total expenditures fell …

Don't ask me why, but something from an interview I did a couple of years ago with CondeNet really stuck with me. We were talking about an upcoming custom-tailored, integrated ad campaign for one of CondeNet's ad clients, which included online, print and broadcast components. The phrase was, "The idea is to surround your target audience." A marketer's dream, right? I heard that phrase again today, this time from New York Times Digital, which is ready to launch an ad concept they call "surround sessions." The idea is for a single advertiser to accompany a single viewer …

The doldrums of summer seem to have passed and here are some numbers to prove that the web is full of activity these days. Nielsen//NetRatings reports that anticipation of the third season of reality TV show "Survivor" drove traffic to the Entertainment Weekly website following the October 4th "Survivor" television special which introduced the members of this season's cast. EW.com skyrocketed 158% during the week ending October 7, as surfers logged on at-home to get bios and facts about the new cast members before the show's October 11th premiere. According to another web traffic tracker Jupiter Media Metrix, …

Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but today is full of negativity. First, the ad world woke up to the news that Boston-based Digitas laid off 350 employees worldwide yesterday as it reported disappointing third-quarter financials and revised downward its revenue forecast for the fourth quarter. The agency reported revenue of $51 million for the quarter ended Sept. 30, compared with $76 million for the same quarter a year ago. For the first nine months of 2001, revenue has dipped to $189 million, compared with $209 million for the same period a year ago. Then, the Wall …

For mid-size ad agencies around the U.S. and around the world, the events of Sept. 11 in the U.S. were shocking and traumatic, but for the most part it's been business as usual. At least that's the finding of a survey among the ICOM network of independent agencies, which has members in more than 45 countries. "Although at first it was surprising that there wasn't more disruption to day-to-day business, when you think about our membership and mid-size agencies in general, it's understandable," said Gary Burandt, ICOM executive director. "Mid-size agencies generally have a broad client base. Unless an agency …

Since the beginning of streaming advertising, many volumes have been written on the negative aspects of re-purposing television ad campaigns online. The usual argument is that the two media are so different in almost every aspect that ads made for television could not possibly amount to anything good on the web. The Ad Council seems to disagree. A public service TV spot celebrating America's extraordinary diversity, created by The Advertising Council and GSD&M in response to the September 11th tragedy, will be spread to the email accounts of over a million Americans during the next week, thanks to resources …

The Emmys have been cancelled, the Wall Street Journal is raising ad rates and the Monster Meter from Monster.com says that the majority of Americans do not feel confident about their job security. That, and the nation is at war. But people are still interested in travel. At least online. Nielsen//NetRatings today reports that traffic to travel sites rebounded during the week ending September 30, as audience levels to travel sites surpassed pre-crisis audience levels reported for the week ending September 9. "With several travel sites recently posting considerable traffic gains, as compared to the three weeks prior, …

And the CPMs have it. I counted up the responses to yesterday's minute on the pros and cons of Cost per Action (CPA) pricing models and so far it looks like the age-old method of buying impressions by the thousand is preferred by our readers (or at least those who took the time to weigh in on the issue). Interestingly enough, most of the responses I got were from web publishers. Not a single advertiser - and we've been told time and time again that advertisers LOVE performance-based pricing models - went to bat for the technique. Everyone …

Before I get into the biggest story of the day, a quick housekeeping item. As you probably know from an email we sent on Tuesday, MediaPost's MEDIA Magazine is hosting a Forecast 2002 event on October 25 in New York City. We have just a few spots still open, so if you'd like to join us, please click here to register. That said, the biggest story of the day is the announcement from Interep's Winstar and Cybereps divisions, who declared today that they will no longer accept any Cost Per Action campaigns unless there is a minimum cash …