Tinder Warms To Advertising

Though Tinder has had little promise for advertisers, they are now part of IAC, and are slated to begin generating revenue for the conglomerate. IAC executives reported today that they want the dating app to begin to generate revenue and are expecting to experiment with different types of monetization strategies in the near future. The obvious idea is to run ads on the service – it presents many intriguing prospects for differing ways of bringing content to different types of consumers specific to the platform. Indeed, Fox has already advertised on the service with fake profiles to promote their program “The Mindy Project.” IAC executives are making the pitch, in part, because of user numbers on Tinder, which continue to increase. It will be interesting to hear how they think of advertising on the platform, and is worth keeping an eye on. 

Aereo Raises 38 Million For Over-The-Air TV

There are not too many companies more disruptive than Barry Diller’s Aereo TV that grabs over-the-air television and sends them to user’s mobile devices and PCs over the internet. It’s a cord-cutters dream and a cable companies worst nightmare. Not surprisingly, the New York based company has had to spend a lot in court fees but a $38 million B round signals renewed strength from the web TV service with plans to expand in 22 more cities.

Yet another Silver “man” lining

Yet another Silver "man" lining (iStock)The departure of Ben Silverman from NBC has stirred up a lot of news chatter that this hammers yet another nail in the coffin of the traditional production company. As co-chair of NBC Universal Entertainment, Silverman was responsible for bringing the same programming flair he originally brought to his company Reveille, with such big hits as The Office and The Biggest Loser, translating many foreign hits into popular US shows. Silverman was also known for exploring new ad models. Now he’s leaving the company to start up a new venture in partnership with Barry Diller’s media and Internet company, IAC.

Anytime you mention “360” these days as a description for a new content model (which has been part of most of the press today), you have to raise an eyebrow and think, oh lordy, Silverman wants to be a cross platform cool kid. As my dear colleague, brand strategy expert Brian Seth Hurst twittered, “repurposed distribution does not a cross media value proposition make.” Continue reading “Yet another Silver “man” lining”