IAR Bits and Bytes

NetCreations, Lyris Team Up Against Spam

Opt-in email list provider NetCreations and email list management technology company Lyris Technologies announced a deal Monday to give NetCreations’ list members discounts on Lyris’ MailShield desktop anti-spam software.

Under terms of the joint marketing deal, NetCreations will offer the software to PostMasterDirect members when they sign up for certain lists and in some mailings. In return, Lyris will automatically clear PostMasterDirect marketing messages through MailShield.

“While its competitors waffle on opt-in and send out mail typically flagged as spam, PostMasterDirect stands out for its commitment to ethical opt-in practices,” said John Buckman, Lyris’ chief executive. “With this arrangement, we hope to promote the utility of legitimate, opt-in email, as well as block offensive and annoying spam.”

Lyris MailShield is software that blocks unsolicited messages before they reach a user’s in-box. The company claims to have over 3,000 licensees for the software and its ListManager email list-management product. NetCreations boasts an opt-in email database of 45 million names.

Coupons, Inc. Buys E-Mail List Provider JTA Media

Consumer-product coupon marketing company Coupons, Inc., announced Tuesday it completed the acquisition of email list manager JTA Media, giving the company access to 54 million email addresses.

The deal calls for Coupons, Inc., to gain control of JTA Media’s online marketing services, which include email list management, brokerage and appending. JTA Media boasts clients ranging from American Express to Liz Claiborne.

Financial details of the deal were not disclosed.

“Nine out of ten clients ask us to recommend a firm to help manage the customer lists used in their relationship marketing programs,” said Steven Boal, chief executive and president of Coupons, Inc. “We spent a considerable time surveying the field, and JTA was a perfect fit with our business.”

JTA Media will operate as a business unit under Coupons, Inc., the companies said. Tim Kane, formerly JTA Media’s chief executive, will remain with the company as a general manager of merchant and list services.

New Banner Format Makes European Debut

Two European firms, German online ad agency ADTECH and Italian Web network Adsolutions, announced they had teamed up to test a new Internet ad format, the crossbar banner.

The new format acts like a regular banner, except it remains at the bottom of a user’s browser window, resizing itself if the browser size is changed and staying at the bottom of the screen during a user’s scrolling. The companies said they rolled out the banner in a test campaign with Finnish cellular company Nokia.

ADTECH and Adsolutions said they plan to roll out other banner-ad formats this spring.