Behavioural technology (BT) engines are hitting Indian digital ad space. The latest tool comes from Yahoo India, which is introducing BT technology platform for select verticals?auto, retail, entertainment, finance, travel, telco and technology. It tracks a web visitors? browser clickstreams in these sectors to predict what the visitor may want in future, and target ads, content or products based on those past behaviour.
?India is the first emerging market where we are introducing our BT engine and we expect 30-125% improvement in clickthroughs and 5-40% CPM (cost per thousand impressions) improvement, depending on the industry? says Yahoo vice-president (emerging markets), Prashant Mehta. Yahoo, however, is not alone.
In a mad scramble to achieve better clickthroughs in the near-limitless inventory of ad space, many other portals are trying out similar engines. Rediff, for one, has already conducted a pilot to test BT technologies a few months back.
Along with contextual advertising, which is core to Google?s value proposition, behavioural targeting is promising to reshape the internet advertising landscape. Search advertisements are today estimated to account for about a quarter of the Rs 450 crore online ad market, thanks to contextual ads. And BT pioneers are eyeing the rest of the digital ad market. Mehta expects it could corner up to 20-40% of the non-search ad market in a couple of years. BT seems to be the next big thing globally, if you look at the amount (more than $10 billion) internet biggies like Microsoft, Google, Yahoo and AOL shelled out last year to swallow online advertising pioneers like DoubleClick, Tacoda and Blue Lithium.
To begin with, a BT engine on a portal like Yahoo monitors a number of user actions such as search items entered, content consumed, ads or banners clicked on and micro sites visited. All this information is then compiled over a period of time. The underlying technique is based on segmentation after observing user?s behavioural patterns on its network. Since most of the targeting uses tools like cookies, it is bound to raise privacy concerns.
?The idea here is not to target an individual. All the data we store is anonymous, it?s just to find patterns in likes, dislikes, shopping history and viewing,? Mehta tries to defend. As of now, it seems to be the hottest and latest way for content firms to connect buyers and sellers in a relevant way and make money.