The 1 trillion images on the Web are Advertising's Next Frontier.
Pairing images with targeted ads is the Holy Grail for Advertisers. The reason: consumers rely heavily on images in search engine result pages.
The age of Visual Ad Targeting is just around the corner.
Google recently announced plans to begin matching images from its fast-growing Google Image Search with display ads. Presently, Google photos are indexed by text and other metadata.
But, a NYC startup called Milabra beat Google to the punch last year by launching the world's first contextual ad network with targeting based upon visual content. And, it's getting a lot of attention from major ad networks and digital chiefs at big ad agencies.
Milabra (www.milabra.com) uses cutting edge visual recognition software to see what's important in an image, and targets advertising based on that data. Visual media publishers simply add the Milabra tag to their site, and Milabra automatically segments and moderate their content into advertiser friendly "buckets", increasing their inventory value and improving their performance.
Why is visual recognition ad targeting so effective?
It actually connects with the hard wired patterns of the human mind to create a more effective advertising experience. It's the language of pictures. By connecting to our primary sense, sight, it connects with consumers on a more fundamental level than other forms of targeting.
Milabra has signed up a slew of Ad networks since it launched over a year ago.
Most of the leading digital chiefs on Madison Avenue have met with Milabra and are looking under the hood of its technology, developed by a Columbia University neuroscientist.
TechCrunch wrote a glowing post back in February after the startup raised $1.2m in angel investments. No ad trade or mainstream media coverage to date. Milabra was the talk of AdTech last week and recently premiered to rave reviews at the NY Video Meetup and AlwaysOnMedia.
