BuzzLogic Builds Network, Hires VP Ad Sales
In its continued transition from social media monitoring firm to social media ad network, the company has hired former Google exec Peter O'Sullivan to build its national ad sales business.
There’s little doubt that data is the most valued commodity for advertisers online, but knowing is only half the battle. BuzzLogic is among the many firms branching out from simply organizing and supplying information to enabling advertisers to more readily employ it for ad targeting.
The company has hired a VP of Sales. Former Google exec Peter O’Sullivan is charged with building its national ad sales business, and promoting its growing blog-centric ad network to advertisers. O’Sullivan left Google in 2006, and since then has been consulting, including for online gaming network Mochi Media.
O’Sullivan started with the firm about six weeks ago and already has some “aggressive hiring plans,” he said. In addition to increasing operating efficiencies and promoting BuzzLogic’s conversational media and targeting offerings, he’s in charge of hiring east and west coast ad directors, account executives on both coasts, as well as an advertising support team.
The firm recently opened a New York office and plans to open an office in Los Angeles in addition to others in the future.
BuzzLogic has been on a new trajectory steering away from its original online conversation monitoring business toward developing an ad network comprised of the types of sites it monitors.
The company originally employed its ad system to target ads in partner networks, but has built up its own network inventory over the past year. Today, its network reaches 68 million unique users, and analyzes publishing patterns of around 12 million blogs, according to BuzzLogic CEO Rob Crumpler. He said the firm has increased its overall revenue 500 percent in the last two years since it shifted away from its original business model. Ad customers include HBO, Starbucks, and Microsoft, according to Crumpler.
“We’re now a full-fledged media company,” said Crumpler. The company no longer offers its on-demand monitoring software, but now employs insights gained through that system to target ads.
BuzzLogic acquired app developer Activeweave last year to better determine connections among popular blogs. Activeweave’s flagship product continuously updates links to stories based on a user’s preferences and the content he browses. With that information, BuzzLogic identifies topic opinion leaders and levels of engagement with particular subject matter or posts. Now, it uses that information to target ads.
The bulk of BuzzLogic’s network inventory is comprised of blog content in the entertainment, retail, CPG, and technology categories. However, O’Sullivan indicated the inventory offerings could expand. “There are plans to announce capabilities to do some retargeting with more mainstream properties,” he said.
The company introduced a media partner program in November, allowing advertisers to broaden reach of their campaigns to branded properties such as sites in the IDG TechNetwork. New “conversational” ad units are also in the works.
