Nuads: Reaching for Better Branding

A Digiday interview with Frank Holland, Microsoft's VP of online ads suggests the Redmond Behemoth has a few additional ad product tricks up its sleeve, presenting a few hints.

Among them

• Holland said to expect something coming out in six months that likely involves a social experience that is more "real-time" than the typical post-and-check-back behavior seen today on Facebook.
• Something that will make the social media participants themselves more of the voice of the marketer.
• Its Nuads format will likely continue to evolve to bring a better branding experience.
• Integration in ad campaigns between Microsoft platforms such as Bing, Xbox and the Windows 8 operating system will have more to do with shared identities and data than ad formats.

And, somewhat exceptionally, Microsoft says that its current experimentation with realtime bidding robotic market buying has not resulted in a relative depression of media price. "It’s an interesting way to buy rather than having to lockup at the last minute," Holland said. "Now they can go in and buy in at a premium in an automated way."

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