Today I stumbled upon a great commentary piece, written by Donna Barrett and Randy Siegel, that appears in Editor & Publisher.  Since newspapers represent a substantial base of clients for NewsGator's Media & Consumer products, and since nearly every day recently we hear of another newspaper either on its death bed, or being shuttered all together -- along with some seemingly sounding the death knell of the entire industry -- I think what the authors have to say here is hugely relevant in the current climate.  The premise of their article is this,

"Sure, newspaper companies face serious challenges. But we also have serious opportunities to re-engineer ourselves as quality content creators for local print and online audiences that advertisers still desire."

The authors go on to say that,

"well-run newspaper companies will succeed by fighting hard, experimenting and evolving while tuning out those armchair critics who revel in the thought of a society without newspapers or news."

But what most caught my eye is one of their most important suggestions for how they believe newspapers can survive, and even thrive, in the future:

"Newspapers can increase their revenues and reach by investing in more content creation for different audiences, not less. The more compelling articles and information a newspaper and its website can offer, the longer readers and online users will be engaged. The longer consumers are engaged, the more exposure they will have to ads in print and online. The more attention the ads receive, the better the advertisers’ responses typically will be and the more those ads will be worth."

This description, almost uncannily, describes precisely what we're doing for media companies here at NewsGator!

First, by widgetizing content you are, indeed "investing in more content creation" and making this content highly portable across the entire social web.  Also, since widgets have been shown to enhance engagement rates, time on site, brand equity, etc. this fits right into the authors' point that the longer the consumers are engaged, then the more exposure they will have to ads -- which in turn helps newspapers' bottom lines.  And every single NewsGator widget is "advertisable."  In fact, we just announced our highly sophisticated Ad Burner optimization program that can seamlessly do just that.

Finally, two other product offerings from NewsGator also enhance content creation as well as reader engagement: our related content widgets, as well as our branded iPhone applications based off NewsGator's highly successful NetNewsWire application.

I encourage you to read their entire article here, but my take-away message here is that majority of the pertinent recommendations the authors make here in terms of newspapers enhancing & increasing content, enhancing readers' engagement with that content (which leads to higher ad revenue) are exactly what all of our offerings -- whether it be regular widgets, related content widgets, branded iPhone applications, our AdBurner program, or our data service offerings -- are designed to do.  There may be a down economy, and newspapers and media companies are no doubt struggling, but that just makes NewsGator products all the more important.      

Today NewsGator is announcing the creation of a brand new online advertising program called AdBurner.  AdBurner is a turnkey advertising solution, which optimizes ad placement, management, and revenue across any platform.  This program is the result of an impressive collaboration with the following partners: Technorati, Admeld, Gigya, Medialets, and Tremor Media.

Adburner is aimed at optimizing the CPM for, and process of, inserting and managing advertising into NewsGator's publisher products suite, including services as diverse as widgets, related content, and iPhone applications.  What makes this initiative especially exciting is that it's built around the best of breed advertising partners mentioned above.   

The premise behind our creation of AdBurner is the realization that a significant roadblock for media companies attempting to monetize social media and mobile applications has been the lack of process standards and optimization methods for inserting and tracking ad placements.  NewsGator's announcement today brings welcome relief to media clients struggling with explosive ad inventory growth and literally hundreds of online ad networks complementing their own internal ad sales efforts.

With AdBurner, NewsGator's premium publisher clients can choose to monetize via high value display ads, video pre-roll and overlays, widget ads, and iPhone display ads through an integrated process engine and a single management console.   And, in addition to managing ad units inserted into products that NewsGator provides to publishers, the process integration extends to unrelated online ad inventory. 

According to JB Holston, NewsGator's CEO, our clients have told us that "lack of inventory is not the problem they have, it's selling the inventory they already control along with the additional inventory we are creating for them."   He adds that, "what we're providing to them are pre-packaged integrated ad placement scenarios that can be used across a range of products, covers all of our inventory, and does so in a manner that is fully transparent and optimized to deliver the highest ad value per placement."

I'd like to pass along reaction from our partners on this AdBurner initiative:

• Technorati's CEO, Richard Jalichandra, says, "this initiative aligns Technorati's clients with news from a variety of sources across the tail to be delivered in innovative ways to their online readers.  NewsGator brings a top tier client list and proven media syndication technology that is a perfect fit for Technorati Media.
• Admeld's CEO, Michael Barrett, adds, "we are very pleased to be working with NewsGator and their high quality publishing partnership. [This] partnership will drive higher revenue for participating publishers."
• Gigya's VP of Sales & Biz Dev, Ben Pashman, says that "monetization is a major challenge for publishers of distributed content, so we're pleased to be working with NewsGator to deliver comprehensive widget monetization solutions to their publisher clients."
• Medialet's CEO, Eric Litman, says that "Medialets is excited to work with NewsGator on this program...and we're looking forward to providing the premier mobile advertising solution for NewsGator's clients."
• Tremor Media's CEO, Jason Glickman, explains that "Tremor Media & NewsGator have been working together to delieve rhigh quality, high value video pre-roll to NewsGator cleints" and that "this initiative builds on the success we have had with NewsGator around delivering video monetization for widgets and non-viral distributions by offering our respective publishers a compelling pre-integrated approach to monetization of their inventory."

Our AdBurner program is available immediately for existing NewsGator clients. 

As a final note, I'd like to say how delighted we are to be working with such an impressive group of ad partners as Technorati, Admeld, Gigya, Medialets and Tremor Media in creating AdBurner.