Los Angeles - November 3, 2009 - Virtual Iris, the fastest platform for creating and viewing rich media content, has announced that its patented technology is now iPhone compatible. iPhone users can view and interact with websites, games, banner ads, presentations, and other multimedia content created using Virtual Iris.

"No other technology displays multimedia content on the iPhone faster than we do," said Virtual Iris Founder and President, Gary Kramer. "Some of the most prominent platforms, like Adobe's Flash®, can only access rich media content though applications. Apple doesn't support runtime plug-ins like Flash Player on the iPhone. We don't require plug-ins so access to content created using Virtual Iris isn't restricted to applications."

Virtual Iris has gained traction in the rich media marketplace not only because of the speed it displays dynamic content, but also because of the ease of rich media display ad creation. "I'm not exaggerating when I say that Virtual Iris has changed our business," says Jim Waltz, President of comScore Top 10 ad network Traffic Marketplace. "Virtual Iris has vastly improved the speed at which we can deliver and display high quality, interactive content. The platform's iPhone compatibility will make it that much more attractive, opening up access to a new, large, and tech savvy audience."

Virtual Iris is a "next generation" interactive design tool with advanced features such as 3-D rotating effects, video, and the use of existing Flash-created content in an easy to use "drag and drop" menu-driven format.

About Virtual Iris
Founded in December 2003 and headquartered in Los Angeles, California, privately-held Virtual Iris enables businesses for the first time to automate the volume production and deployment of Rich Media, instantly transforming static digital images into dynamic, multi-dimensional product displays that stimulate increased sales, streamline the buying process and provide a visceral "in store" experience online. To learn more about Virtual Iris, please visit www.virtualiris.com.

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

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Palo Alto - October 26, 2009 - In a move to bridge the gap between online and mobile advertising, Mobclix (www.mobclix.com) today announced its strategic partnerships with Advertising.com and Traffic Marketplace, enabling these two leading online advertising networks to provide direct access to mobile audiences. Through this approach -- lead by Mobclix -- the mobile industry is breaking new ground by creating more competition in the marketplace, resulting in higher eCPMs for developers. By introducing more premium ad campaigns, Mobclix further solidifies its status as the industry's largest mobile ad exchange network.

"For the first time, online ad networks have instant access to mobile inventory and can provide a one-stop shop for digital media buys. In creating a simple and seamless solution, we hope to encourage more advertisers and agencies to make mobile an integral part of their campaigns," says Krishna Subramanian, Mobclix co-founder. "Opening up the Mobclix marketplace to online ad networks is just another part of our commitment to help developers earn top ad dollars for their apps."

KEY BENEFITS FOR DEVELOPERS

Higher eCPMs -- By introducing more advertisers to the marketplace, the bidding prices for existing mobile inventory will increase, which allows developers to further maximize their revenues.

More Diversity -- Working with leading online ad networks allows Mobclix to serve more premium ad campaigns from well-known consumer brands.

KEY BENEFITS FOR ADVERTISERS

Seamless Buying Process -- Creates a streamlined one-stop shop for digital media that allows advertisers to buy both online and mobile ad inventory from one vendor.

Seamless Reporting -- Consolidates the return on investment metrics from multiple campaigns into a single report that advertisers can use to quickly gauge their audience reach and conversion rates.

Instant Mobile Reach -- Allows online advertisers to immediately expand the reach of their campaigns from the Web to mobile audiences.

"The mobile channel presents tremendous potential for our existing and future clients -- though many have put it off simply because of the added layer involved in purchasing," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "By teaming up with Mobclix to offer this inventory to our clients, we're removing the added barrier that has been a deterrent to the growth of mobile advertising until now."

Availability
Mobclix's mobile ad inventory is currently available via Advertising.com and Traffic Marketplace. Advertisers and agencies interested in mobile media buys for their upcoming advertising campaigns should contact their respective account managers or check out www.mobclix.com for more information.

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

About Mobclix
Mobclix is the industry's largest targeted mobile ad exchange -- the first open marketplace for mobile developers, advertisers, ad networks and agencies. The Mobclix ad exchange provides complete transparency and visibility for developers to manage their ad inventory and maximize revenue and for advertisers to increase campaign performance. Mobclix is a privately held company headquartered in Palo Alto, Calif. The company was founded in September 2008 and has since been named an AlwaysOn 250 winner and won the ad:tech Limelight award.

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New York — October 23, 2009 — Online Intelligence, Inc. (OI), a wholly-owned monitoring and protection subsidiary of Epic Advertising, today announced a set of new and innovative tools to drive automatic fraud prevention and monitoring.

These SaaS tools are used by OI to examine sources of traffic through proactive Web crawling. By monitoring ad campaigns in real time, OI quickly identifies dangers such as malware, incentivized traffic, negative keywords or off-brand ad placements.

"Epic Advertising's Online Intelligence division delivers unparalleled protection and fraud prevention for our thousands of clients to maintain the integrity of each brand," explained E.J. Hilbert, Online Intelligence's President.

Don Mathis, Epic Advertising CEO, added: "With development of these new tools and urgently-needed technology, we are increasing fraud protection measures while reinforcing our decade-long dedication to elite service for advertisers and publishers."

OI's Admin Interface arranges both proactive and reactive Web crawls of search, Web/display and email traffic. With Search Interface, users make impromptu queries against crawled or indexed pages based on traffic or other criteria. Violations Interface facilitates timely tracking and validation of violations found by said tools. With this offering, users write custom queries against scheduled crawls and violations that result from the queries are flagged and displayed automatically. Flagged violations are stored in a database, reviewed and acted upon immediately. Finally Site Watch allows OI to look at web sites to determine changes to a web page on an hourly basis, a tool particularly useful when comparing sites to ensure compliance changes are being maintained and brand infractions are not occurring.

For more information, log on to www.epicadvertising.com/onlineintel.

About Online Intelligence:
Online Intelligence (www.epicadvertising.com/onlineintel) provides proactive Web-crawling, spidering and brand protection throughout the entire advertising process, arming advertisers with transparency and traffic metrics. With this information, Online Intelligence protects clients from click fraud, negative keyword searches and off-brand placements. It builds on eight years of Epic's driving industry compliance and integrity procedures across their global network of more than 45,000 publishers.

About Epic Advertising:
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and over 45,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and targeted, worldwide online reach.

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LOS ANGELES - October 7, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace today announced the launch of MarketInsight™, reporting powered by the leading digital marketing intelligence firm comScore. MarketInsight™ is a comprehensive suite of campaign reporting products that quantifies and qualifies the impact of advertiser campaigns on the online and offline behavior of consumers and allows advertisers to make more effective and advantageous marketing decisions. MarketInsight™ will be available exclusively to Traffic Marketplace advertisers.

Blending data from sister company FirstLook's half a million domains and comScore's audience measurement capabilities derived from an audience panel of more than 2 million Internet users, MarketInsight™ will offer advertisers a comprehensive data driven view to analyze the success of their campaigns. The suite of MarketInsight™ products will include:

• inliten ™ - Reports how effectively an advertiser's target has been reached. This data includes how many consumers were reached, as well as their demographics, age, income and ethnicity.
• inliten+™ - In addition to the inliten™ data, this report reveals a campaign's impact on consumers' online activity providing brand insight into consumers' actual website visitation, search activities and click-throughs.
• influence™ - This survey-based report tells advertisers how much their campaign influences exposed consumers. Using comScore's proprietary panel-based technology, it uncovers consumers' awareness of the advertised brand, attitudes toward the brand and their intent to purchase the brand.
• inmarket™ - A breakthrough solution that marries the monetary effectiveness of an online campaign to the offline world.

"MarketInsight is the most insightful reporting product available by any ad network today," said Jim Waltz, President of Traffic Marketplace. "With the backing of comScore, the leaders in online audience measurement, MarketInsight will give our advertisers all the tools they need to measure, optimize and make more money from their Traffic Marketplace advertising campaigns."

"We believe that empowering advertisers with intelligence increases their chance to effectively reach and influence their most desirable audience," said Daryl McNutt, Vice President, comScore Marketing Solutions. "MarketInsight will help advertisers more comprehensively evaluate the effectiveness of their digital advertising efforts using tools that demonstrate the view-through impact of campaigns, including brand and sales lift."

"Traffic Marketplace continues to deliver relevance in online advertising by giving our advertisers what they want—products and solutions that optimize their online media planning and subsequent results," said Art Shaw, CEO of Connexus Corporation, the parent company of Traffic Marketplace. "Since the rise of the digital age, online advertisers have sought the ability to measure and analyze audience reach across multiple information sources. MarketInsight will arm our advertisers with more information than ever before."

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

About ComScore
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) is a global leader in measuring the digital world and preferred source of digital marketing intelligence. www.comscore.com.

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LOS ANGELES - September 23, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace announced today the launch of ™PSocial, a new division created to help advertisers reach consumers via social media and to assist application developers in generating revenue from their games and applications. ™PSocial is the first social media solution created by a comScore top ten advertising network, utilizing fully optimized behavioral targeting products, supported by a large sales team, and backed by hundreds of branded advertisers, to the social media environment.

"Social media is estimated to be a $2 billion a year industry—with most of the revenue-generating potential still untapped," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "Traffic Marketplace has the perfect combination of qualities to create a uniquely viable social media solution: advanced dynamic ad serving, a long and successful history in lead generation and promotions, and relationships with some of the largest advertisers and agencies in the world eager to dive into this new marketplace."

™PSocial offers a suite of advertiser and publisher products, including a display banner network, custom widget and application development, app link exchange and alternative payment solutions for social applications. ™PSocial clients can expect to receive the same benefits as Traffic Marketplace partners, including:

• esp™ targeting solution blending consumer interest, behavior, demo and psychographic information and data from more than 600,000 proprietary websites, publishers and market research providers
• Campaign reporting and analytics providing total impressions, click-throughs, conversions and payouts
• Direct and exclusive offers to ensure maximum percentage payout
• Fraud control monitoring with bot detection and lead validation
• Custom creative design and web development

"The social media space is the fastest growing emerging market in online advertising today," said Sheldon Owen, General Manager, ™PSocial. "The opportunity for change and innovation is exponential—look for new ™PSocial products that not only increase monetization, but integrate seamlessly into the social experience."

"For social media to continue to flourish, it will need new monetization models that work within the social media environment and drive quality results for advertisers, creating strong economic results for apps and social media publishers," said Art Shaw, CEO of parent company Connexus Corporation. "™PSocial is very much an organic extension of Traffic Marketplace's core capabilities, and is perfectly positioned to bring innovation, backed by a decade of expertise, to this new and exciting frontier."

For more information on ™PSocial, visit the new website, www.tmpsocial.com.

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We're taking another detour from our "Online Advertising 101" blog series to explain a hot topic among online advertisers, publishers and Internet governing bodies alike: Behavioral Targeting.

A broad explanation of this marketing technique is that practitioners collect non-personally identifiable information (PII), such as site browsing and searching activity, and select advertisements to present to the viewer based on this "non-PII" behavior. Behavioral targeting can be practiced by itself or in conjunction with other targeting techniques like contextual, geographic, or demographic targeting.

This practice is important to advertisers, publishers and ad networks simply because more non-PII information that is collected about the user's Web experience leads to more relevant advertisements being served to that individual. Proponents cite that this is advantageous for advertisers because it makes ads more efficient and intelligent, with a better likelihood for success. Ultimately, publishers can command a higher rate for their ad inventory on this basis versus ads which appear with no targeting or intelligence behind them.

For advertising networks like Epic, there is a multiplier effect. Collating data and using it across a broad range of affiliates and publishers gives ad networks a clearer demographic picture of many more users, faster, and provides them with better, more targeted ads.

For example, if I visit ESPN.com, click on a dating site featuring predominantly females, then visit a hunting site, one could potentially glean that I am a male who could be classified as a sportsman, who may also be single. Though there isn't 100% certainty of this, a network could begin serving ads that fit my potential profile and start to build a data file about what ads I respond to. As the process continues, the technology gets smarter about ads that might appeal to me, or might have the best chance to prompt an action, be it a click, sale or engagement.

The practice has not been without some controversy, primarily stirred up by advocacy groups concerned that this infringes upon user privacy. Ad networks (like Epic) are quick to counter these concerns through education, and in pointing out that data collected about a user is non-PII and that the technology driving behavioral targeting is predominantly "cookie-based"- whereby cookies are easily cleared or erased by the user. I should also remind you that it includes no personal data or identifying information about the user.

Those of us in the online advertising industry feel that the ability to better target advertisements serves to enhance the user's Web experience by eliminating any "noise" or annoyance from irrelevant ads. The ability to behaviorally target in a responsible way using data that does not infringe on a person's privacy is an example of the inherent benefits of the Web as a marketing platform and distinguishes it from other forms of media. Where other media cannot ensure relevance, the Web can.

Fundamentally, this point underscores the success of TiVo as an example which enables people to skip through the plethora of irrelevant, untargeted television ads.

We hope that this short summary has helped to clarify what behavioral targeting actually 'is.' It isn't a dangerous, invasive technology, but rather one that actually benefits the end user.

Michael Sprouse - Chief Marketing Officer, Epic Advertising

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LOS ANGELES - September 9, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace, the leading independent online ad network and a division of Connexus Corporation, today announced four key new hires: Ryan Becker, Charles Black, Darren Markovitz, and David Razavi.

Consolidating operations in its Los Angeles headquarters, Traffic Marketplace is bucking the recent trend of cutting back by increasing staff and bolstering its leadership team to capitalize on its expanding online advertising business.

"Traffic Marketplace is experiencing significant growth as we continue to invest and expand our business," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "Ryan, Charlie, Darren, and David each bring a distinct value and demonstrated history of success that will ensure Traffic Marketplace not only continues to grow, but also creates quality advertising solutions that our advertisers expect. We are proud to be forerunners in an industry that continues to lead the way in business innovation."

As Vice President of Publisher Development, Ryan Becker will acquire and develop relationships with branded publishers, growing the Company's premium inventory offering. Charlie Black, Director of Business Development, will create strategic partnerships to enhance the Company's core capabilities in targeting and inventory management, specifically focused on transitioning offline data providers to the online space, and creating new and rich data sources for more granular behavioral targeting.

Vice President of Technology David Razavi will develop products and manage projects that yield data-driven results, such as the unification of reporting platforms to generate more insightful business intelligence for Traffic Marketplace advertisers. Concurrently, in his role as Director of Social Media, Darren Markovitz will grow Traffic Marketplace's suite of social media products, developing innovative monetization solutions for advertisers and application developers.

About Ryan Becker
Ryan Becker joins Traffic Marketplace as Vice President of Publisher Development. Prior to joining Traffic Marketplace, Ryan oversaw the Publisher Development and Platform Sales businesses at ContextWeb, where he developed ADSDAQ exchange to become the leading independent advertising exchange. Ryan received his BA in Political Science from the University of Washington.

About Charlie Black
Charlie Black joins Traffic Marketplace as Director of Business Development from Specific Media, where he led Business Development. In addition to large-scale data acquisition initiatives, Charlie spearheaded efforts to improve publisher network efficacy and performance. Charlie holds a BA from Pepperdine University and a JD from Quinnipiac University School of Law.

About Darren Markovitz
Darren Markovitz brings extensive experience in social media to his new role as Director, Social Media. He has successfully pioneered two social media companies: Romark Designs, a viral application development firm and rawclix, an advertising network catering to Facebook application developers. Darren received a BA from the University of Colorado.

About David Razavi
David Razavi, Traffic Marketplace's new Vice President of Technology, has over 20 years experience in developing and managing technology companies. Most recently, David served as Vice President of Engineering at Experian Interactive and Executive Vice President of Engineering for LowerMyBills. David is a frequent industry speaker and member of several advisory boards working with Greylock, Accel Partners and Securent (Cisco). He has a BA in Computer Science and Applied Mathematics from University of California, Berkeley and an MBA from Duke University Fuqua School of Business.

"Ryan, Charlie, Darren, and David are crucial additions to the Traffic Marketplace Team," said Art Shaw, CEO of Connexus. "The expertise and diverse strength these new team members bring will contribute to our mission of delivering relevance in online advertising through better targeting and performance."

"Ryan, Charlie, Darren, and David are crucial additions to the Traffic Marketplace Team," said Art Shaw, CEO of Connexus. "The expertise and diverse strength these new team members bring will contribute to our mission of delivering relevance in online advertising through better targeting and performance."

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LOS ANGELES - August 18, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace today announced that it has become the first advertising network to partner with DoubleVerify, the leading online media verification provider. DoubleVerify's proprietary technology increases online advertising accountability and transparency with real-time tracking of advertising campaigns to verify compliance with an advertiser's insertion order terms, conditions and buying guidelines.

DoubleVerify's third-party ad inventory and placement verification technology will enhance Traffic Marketplace's powerful suite of BrandSecure™ compliance solutions currently offered to qualifying advertisers and agencies.

"The addition of DoubleVerify's accountability technology to our own suite of compliance tools confirms our commitment to brand safety- and we want independent, third-party reporting to prove it," said Jim Waltz, President of Traffic Marketplace. "Advertisers and agencies can rest assured that their dollars are well spent, that Traffic Marketplace is dedicated to 100% transparency, and that we hold ourselves accountable for ensuring campaigns are run in a credible and compliant manner."

Traffic Marketplace's BrandSecure™ compliance solutions consistently monitor and verify online campaigns to identify click or impression fraud, poor placements or questionable content. Advertisers and agencies may also elect to have DoubleVerify track campaigns operated on Traffic Marketplace's ad network in real-time to immediately identify any non-compliance between actual delivery and buying guidelines.

"One of the main reasons advertisers don't use ad networks more is lack of accountability," said Oren Netzer, Co-Founder & CEO, DoubleVerify. "This partnership proves that Traffic Marketplace is ready and willing to do everything possible to protect advertisers and provide them with full transparency."

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

About DoubleVerify
DoubleVerify is the leading provider of online media verification solutions, providing agencies, marketers, publishers and ad networks with the first fully-automated, fully-authenticated, third-party verification solution for internet advertising transactions. DoubleVerify helps increase advertising accountability by detecting and preventing waste or misuse of advertising budgets and by helping take proactive measures to maintain brand reputation and increase accountability. DoubleVerify monitors billions of advertising transactions per month for major Fortune 500 marketers. DoubleVerify is headquartered in New York City, with engineering offices in Tel Aviv, Israel. www.doubleverify.com.

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Shoot the monkey! Lose weight instantly! Low APR loans, no questions asked!

No wonder there exists a stigma on the online advertising industry. And why wouldn't there be? With suspect tactics and shady subject matter, bad apples are ruining the Internet as an advertising medium.

Epic Advertising intends to change that.

To complement its performance-based advertising work, the New York-based direct online advertising company designed an entire department around fighting those bad apples -an in-house compliance team that deliberately scans and follows each of its campaigns for unethical practices.

Epic CEO Don Mathis spoke with SmartPlanet about what's smart — and what's not — in the Wild West environment of online advertising.

SmartPlanet: What does Epic primarily do?

Don Mathis: Epic is a global online performance marketing company. We believe that online advertising represents the future of advertising — it's a combination of direct response and brand awareness — where Madison Avenue meets the direct response community. The data really provides an opportunity to provide actual measurable results. The difference between performance and non-performance in the online sector is that we're held accountable to a strict measure. It's similar to a magazine ad campaign.

SP: What are the pros and cons to a performance-based approach?

DM: The pro to performance-based marketing is that it's becoming much more of a science and less than an art. People who are rising to positions of authority now tend to have a measured, statistical approach rather than a finger-in-the-air approach. It really turns the age-old marketing paradigm of "50 percent of my advertising is useless, my problem is that I don't know which 50 percent" — John Wanamaker said that — it turns that upside down. The con is the big challenge for people who believe strongly that building a brand is building an emotional connection to a product. The biggest criticism is that because it's so compelling and easy to count, the science-oriented approach might miss less quantifiable aspects. We have a patent pending on a metric which measures a lift in brand awareness, online and offline. Television is still the most powerful medium for connecting to a brand, but it's hard to measure.

SP: How has the economic downturn changed ad strategy across the different media?

DM: There are two simultaneous shifts — one is the shift from offline to online, which is offsetting the overall declines in total ad dollars spent. In that sense , I'm happy I'm here — and not in, say, radio. The second shift is fewer dollars spent overall — of those dollars in the online ad environment, fewer are spent on brand awareness and more are spent on performance-based [campaigns]. The reason is because [a performance-based approach] provides the best measure of the effectiveness of that spend, and in a world of very constrained dollars, you want to make every one count.

SP: You hear a lot about the shift of ad dollars from the print world to the digital. What's the outlook?

DM: The total amount of global ads spent online is a fraction of what's spent in all the offline channels combined. There's a disparity there, and we have this interesting situation because more people spend time online than anywhere else, and yet more dollars are being spent in old channels. That's a positive, because that shift that's taking place is dictated by history — the way things have been historically. Companies are trying to be smart about it and approaching it very carefully. Strategies are weighted with tradition. It's a generational change, and we're still in the process of coming terms with a new medium. As they get comfortable with it, the dollars will more roughly mirror consumers' behavior.

SP: How is Epic combating the stigma on the online ad industry?

DM: We're still very much in the first inning in terms of comfort with the online medium. There has got to be control of the brand, where the ad will be seen adjacent to the right content. There's an increasing level of comfort with transactions online, but there are threats out there to that that will take advantage of consumers. There's got to be more done about that through the entire ecosystem. The very openness that characterizes the Internet as a powerful medium also renders it defenseless against people with ill intent. It's about means of distribution — adware, spyware. fraudulent and terrible ad copy. It hurts the advertiser and it hurts consumers being spammed. If you had, say, a performance-oriented campaign for Verizon Wireless to sign up for FiOS [fiber optic broadband Internet access], it would be illicit if the publisher used an iframe [H™L element] to cloak the terms of that ad and dupe consumers into thinking it's free or a lower price than it really is. From our perspective, we put an enormous investment in [fighting] it.

SP: What are some 'worst practices' in online ads?

DM: It's more about tactics that we wouldn't adopt: pop-unders and -overs, for example. E-mail marketing is difficult to police. We don't do this, and we're probably limiting ourselves. Co-registration, incentive marketing. We think all of that is in the category of sustainable marketing practices, and we probably forgo some revenue by not doing it. Most of it can be done legally and in a "white hat" way, but you're out of the realm of right and wrong and into the realm of potentially annoying to the consumer. We're going to take the long road. Some of this stuff can be done legally, but I don't think it can deliver a good customer to the advertiser. People are savvy. You need to cater to that savvyness. If you engage in switch-and-bait routines or any of that, people tune you out. The flip side to it is playing to the strength of someone being savvy. You want to say, 'Here's what's great about this product and here's what you're going to pay for it.' A lot of marketers have the sense that you should hold back on something like a price point until the actual sale. We have a different philosophy: be upfront, pursue integrated campaigns — such as search AND display — and grab the right customer at the right moment. A lot of marketing techniques out there are lazy. They're relying on tricks of the trade — making that match between a person and an advertiser is really what we can do online better than anywhere else. It's much more difficult to do it elsewhere.

SP: What strategies work, then?

DM: Site-wide branding can be effective. There's also the question of whether it's done tastefully or annoyingly. The banner, the skyscraper, the footer, with a consistent theme — that's effective. But if the skyscraper blows up while I'm reading an article, I find that intrusive and annoying. This co-branding theme is sort of interesting. If you're looking at people who are really focused on old-world branded advertising being done in an online space, that's where the value of a co-brand might mean something. Take one of our clients, a large pharmaceutical company — our message to them is that they should find a person who's most interested in a particular drug, say for a specific allergy. You ought to target that person on his Facebook page or Yahoo! Mail or a blog he goes to, because that will be cheaper inventory than a premium site. That person will always be themselves, whether on a blog or a premium site. WebMD was rumored to be the most expensive ad space on the web last year. So why does our client insist on advertising there? Because they want to be associated with the WebMD brand, and that's indicative of that kind of tension. If you believe in free content that's ad supported, which we do, it depends on the consumer having a good experience with it.

SP: Tell me more about Epic's in-house compliance team.

DM: It's one part human forensic capability, and one part technology, making sure that distribution to copy is protected. We put so much into it, in fact, that we realized we could add value to third parties and level the playing field to the entire ecosystem. We've started doing that with the spinoff Online Intelligence, which is wholly owned by us but separately incorporated — and our first agent is a regulatory one: a state's district attorney office. The whole ecosystem has two halves: white hat and black hat, good empire and evil empire. There is a point in which we all share something in common, which means it matters to us what the black hats do. That commonness is the actual publisher itself. You can have a scammy advertiser or ad network — you normally wouldn't care, but they're buying inventory on sites that you'd also like to acquire, but you're blocked out of it because the guys breaking the rules are making a lot of profit. When the playing field remains that un-level, it really demand a cleanup. Everyone in this industry, this ecosystem, profits from that. At the end of the day, if we get it right, and others participate in the spirit of keeping the industry clean, everyone wins. If the Internet itself ever loses the confidence of the consumer, that has a tremendously traumatic effect on all of us.

SP: That seems to recall Epic's company slogan, "How the Web was won."

DM: We're happy to don the white hat and charge into battle if that's what it takes.

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New York — July 07, 2009 — Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com), a leading global online marketing firm, today announced that Mark Jung has joined as Chairman of the Board. With more than 20 years of senior management experience in technology and interactive media, Jung will help steer the company's management and strategic direction in near-future growth and expansion opportunities.

Previously, Jung was Chief Operating Officer of Fox Interactive Media, where he was responsible for running the day to day operations of the company's Internet properties, including MySpace, IGN Entertainment, FoxSports.com and AmericanIdol.com. Jung was also CEO and Co-Founder of IGN Entertainment, which he led to an IPO in 2000. In 2005, Jung was responsible for IGN's sale to News Corp, Fox Interactive Media's parent.

"Mark's expertise and veteran status is what we sought for Epic's expansion in the online marketing space," explained Don Mathis, Epic Advertising CEO. "His proven track record is a tremendous asset to us and we are thrilled to be working with him."

"Epic has a very unique opportunity and is poised for its greatest success yet as it drives industry-critical initiatives in one of the few growth sectors in the economy right now," stated Jung. "I am happy to now be an integral member of Epic's stellar management team."

For more information, log on to EpicAdvertising.com.

About Epic Advertising
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company providing advertisers and agencies with actual measurable online advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and over 40,000 publishers, Epic provides advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media plan

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New York — June 30, 2009 — Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com), a top global online performance marketing company, today announced the launch of wholly owned subsidiary Online Intelligence, Inc.

Online Intelligence provides proactive web-crawling, spidering and brand protection throughout the entire advertising process, arming advertisers with transparency and traffic metrics. With this information, Online Intelligence protects clients from click fraud, negative keyword searches and off-brand placements. This venture builds on eight years of Epic Advertising driving industry compliance and integrity procedures across their global network of more than 40,000 publishers.

Epic drafted E.J. Hilbert, notable compliance veteran and former director of Security Enforcement for MySpace and a counterterrorism agent for the FBI, to lead Online Intelligence. While at MySpace, Hilbert led a security initiative that reduced the amount of fraudulent and spam activities on the site by 98%, and with the FBI, E.J. investigated one of the largest computer intrusion cases in U.S. history.

"Founding Online Intelligence and this key hire reinforce Epic Advertising's global focus on compliance and integrity in advertising," said David Graff, General Counsel of Epic Advertising. "With our innovative, proven technology, we will drive clean, compliant and safe online advertising. E.J. Hilbert has an admirable track record, and we are confident he will lead Online Intelligence to great success."

E.J. Hilbert added, "Epic Advertising is steering online advertising in the right direction. The establishment of Online Intelligence is proof of the organization's long-term commitment to the most reputable online advertising. I look forward to working with clients to protect advertisers from the myriad of potential brand threats online."

For more information, log on to EpicAdvertising.com.

About Epic Advertising
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and well over 40,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and a targeted, worldwide online reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent Display and Search consumer web traffic. Epic scales its solutions through enormous internet reach, proprietary and patent-pending technology and unparalleled industry expertise.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

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By PETE BARLAS, INVESTOR'S BUSINESS 06/23/2009 06:44 PM ET

When search-technology provider Vivisimo launched a consumer search site called Clusty in 2005, the Pittsburgh firm had no illusions of challenging Google (GOOG) or even Yahoo (YHOO) for search traffic or ad dollars.

Clusty, which features ads from Google, gets a cut of the ad sales generated by the search giant. But because Clusty ranks below the 10 most visited search engines in the U.S., that doesn't amount to much, says Jerome Pesenti, Vivisimo's co-founder and chief scientist.

"The consumer piece was never more than 10% of our revenue and today it's more like 5% or even less," he said, describing Clusty as more of a test bed for new ideas for its enterprise business. "I don't think we ever really intended to compete with Google or Yahoo."

Good thing he didn't.

In this recession, many small search companies have to find other ways to survive as companies reduce their spending on online ads.

These days, Google owns more than a 60% share of searches in the U.S., followed by Yahoo with about 20% and Microsoft (MSFT) with roughly 10%.

Many advertisers dismiss search engines with less market share as ineffective — especially as ad budgets shrink, says Greg Sterling, principal for Sterling Market Intelligence, a research firm.

"Even an engine that has a 2% or 3% market share is not going to justify a search marketer's time," he said.

When it comes to search, advertisers like to stick with name brands like Google and Yahoo and little else, says Michael Sprouse, chief marketing officer for Epic Advertising. The global online marketing company helps companies advertise online.

"Is would say that a pretty high percentage of our clients probably do the old bypass on the other guys," he said.

Most advertisers believe they can limit their search ad spending to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Ask, a unit of IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI), and still reach the bulk of the Internet audience, says Andrew Lovasz, vice president of search marketing for Moxie Interactive, an interactive marketing agency. The company also helps companies advertise online.

"We haven't reached the point of diminishing returns within those top four properties," he said. "There is more than enough (ad) inventory on those top four without getting into the second- and third- tier engines."

Four years ago Relevad, an enterprise search and ad services provider in Silicon Valley, launched a consumer search service called Releton to challenge other search engines for consumer traffic and ad dollars.

Most advertisers believe they can limit their search ad spending to Google, Yahoo, Microsoft and Ask, a unit of IAC/InterActiveCorp (IACI), and still reach the bulk of the Internet audience, says Andrew Lovasz, vice president of search marketing for Moxie Interactive, an interactive marketing agency. The company also helps companies advertise online.

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New York, NY - June 23, 2009 - Epic Advertising won a Stevie Award for "Marketing Team of the Year" in The 2009 American Business Awards last night.

The awards were presented during ceremonies at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City. The ceremonies were hosted by Cheryl Casone of Fox Business Network and broadcast nationwide on radio by the Business TalkRadio Network.

In winning the Stevie, Epic Advertising beat out other finalists including Cessna and John Hancock. In accepting the Stevie, Michael Sprouse, Chief Marketing Officer, said, "We are incredibly proud and honored to have received this recognition against such worthy competition."

Stevie Awards were presented in over 40 categories including Best Overall Company of the Year, Executive of the Year, and Corporate Social Responsibility Program of the Year. More than 2,600 entries from companies of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted for consideration.

More than 200 executives across the country participated in the judging process to determine the Finalists and Stevie Award winners.

"As a first-time entry to the Stevie's this year, we are very humbled indeed to have received such a distinction," said Sprouse. "We take great pride in being a very small, yet powerful, team that is able to accomplish a great deal without zapping too many resources, both human and fiscal."

Details about The American Business Awards and the list of Finalists and Stevie Award winners are available at www.stevieawards.com/aba.

About Epic Advertising
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and well over 40,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and a targeted, worldwide online reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent Display and Search consumer web traffic. Epic scales its solutions through enormous internet reach, proprietary and patent-pending technology and unparalleled industry expertise.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

About The Stevie Awards
Stevie Awards are conferred in four programs: The American Business Awards, The International Business Awards, The Stevie Awards for Women in Business, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Honoring companies of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about The Stevie Awards at www.stevieawards.com.

Supporting sponsors of The 2009 American Business Awards include High Performance Technologies Inc., John Hancock, LifeLock, RCN Corporation, Softpro, and Ultimate Software. Media sponsor is the Business TalkRadio Network. Localization partner of the 2009 Stevie Awards is Lionbridge.

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AdExchanger.com: How has Epic Advertising fared during the economic downturn? Please share any strengths or weaknesses you're seeing. What types of client campaigns are thriving - or not? How is creative evolving?

Don Mathis: Epic Advertising has fared well due to our fundamental performance-based economic model, which centers specifically on CPA, or "cost per action". Our clients only pay us when a desired action, such as a sale or a subscription, takes place. This is clearly a more desirable way for advertisers to market their products and services during a downturn, as they avoid upfront costs. Specifically, Epic is seeing strength in our Health & Beauty, Casual Gaming and Entertainment categories at present. The Entertainment category, for instance, is up 20% year over year, and Casual Gaming and Health & Beauty are up astronomically. Over the last 12 months, our creative team has expanded their scope with multivariate testing, new advertising formats, and new custom applications. The landscape is more dynamic, and is continuing to grow in this direction.

With performance marketing as its focus, does this hurt the ability of Epic to expand into the brand awareness budgets? How can brand awareness marketers use Epic today? Any real world examples?

Epic Advertising doesn't believe there has to be a split between performance-based and brand-based marketing online. Brand-based advertisers are beginning to understand that having more data at their fingertips and a better ability to target their audience actually helps drive brand awareness better and more effectively, while realizing stronger ROI. We work with many more traditional "brand" marketers now than we did a year ago. In this scenario, Epic is delivering branding through our massive reach and network of 40,000 publishers, in addition to ROI due to our performance model.

Given all the talk of current and future regulation, is the lead generation business dead? Valueclick recently reported a decline in its lead generation business and an uptick in display in Q1 2009. Does this mean there is opportunity ahead for display?

There definitely are opportunities for display now and into the foreseeable future, with the key drivers being better technology, targeting and data. Lead generation is a lot more strategic than it used to be and is still a very effective practice for many advertisers and networks. Thankfully, Lead generation is no longer synonymous with the "win a free iPod" days, and a properly-executed campaign can still be very effective.

Will real-time bidding (RTB) offer strong improvements in ROI or is it all hype in your estimation? Will Epic build RTB capabilities or work with partners?

Epic is familiar with RTB and some of the companies who have made strategic decisions to invest in it. We don't believe it's all hype, and in fact the byproducts of these enhanced capabilities are a faster and more efficient marketplace for online media buyers. This is positive for the entire online advertising ecosystem. Epic is currently evaluating the "build" or "partner" question.

Azoogle is your well-known affiliate business. Are ad exchanges "good" for the affiliate business? Why? Any challenges?

We don't view ad exchanges as competitive to our efforts or inhibiting us relative to our publishers. It is another tool for affiliates and networks to use in order to obtain inventory. The volume of networks and exchanges speaks to the tremendous amount of web inventory and the potential to tap into the inventory in a wide variety of ways and techniques. We're somewhat agnostic in terms of how we get inventory for our advertising clients and exchanges are certainly one aspect. There are many industry related challenges. There is confusion among advertisers and agencies trying to decipher differences between networks and exchanges. There needs to be a great deal more education.

Do you think ad networks and online marketing companies such as Epic have the potential to disintermediate media agencies? Is Epic working with direct advertisers today? If so, which ones?

We don't believe companies like ours will replace or sidestep media agencies. At Epic, we in fact work collaboratively with agencies as well as directly with advertisers. Clearly, there are a lot of advertisers who are clients of major agencies, and are expanding further in the online medium. We want to be there to help agencies handle those requests from their clients. For advertisers not represented yet, yes, we work quite effectively with them too. A few of our clients we work direct with include Netflix, IAC, Real, and Match.com just to name a few of the hundreds.

Are view-through conversions applicable in Epic's business? Or is the last click still the only click that matters? How is Epic solving attribution for its clients?

Epic has invested quite a bit in this area. Late last year, we announced our own patent-pending solution called pCPM, which means performance CPM. Our competitors call this "view-through" or "engagement mapping". We're focusing on this because attribution for advertisers is increasingly complicated yet important. What we aim to do with pCPM is to score any and all factors surrounding an online ad campaign beyond impressions, clicks or actions. Epic will continue to hone these technologies on behalf of our clients as the demand for clearer attribution increases.

Many publishers feel ad networks and exchanges create channel conflict and diminish the value of their inventory. In your estimation, beyond hiring a yield optimizer, what can publishers do today to improve their yield - i.e. revenue potential?

It has been documented that a handful of publishers feel this way,and feel that networks and exchanges are the cause of the diminishing value of their inventory. The right way to look at it, though, is if a publisher has excess inventory or inventory that simply can't be sold, which today is largely the case. In this scenario, they probably had 1) an inflated view of the value of their inventory to begin with or 2) improper means or resources to sell it. Simple supply and demand economics is starting to bring inventory values into line. Networks and exchanges fill a necessary, and growing, void in the marketplace. At Epic, we feel it would be wise for publishers to work closely with networks to improve ROI, as networks have more advanced optimization technology and a wider array of advertisers and advertisements for publishers to choose from. Overall, networks can often offer etter and faster analysis and measurement.

Is placement and context still important? Or is it all about audience in online media buying and selling?

This is the crux of what differentiates online marketing from other traditional ad platforms. Epic is beginning to see an online shift, with advertisers now taking a more audience-centric approach versus a site-or ad placement-approach. We firmly firmly believe in the importance of reaching the right audience for advertisers first and foremost -- in the most efficient and economical way, supporting advertisers' sales and branding goals.

To read this interview on AdExchanger click here.

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New York, NY - May 20, 2009 -- Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) was named a Finalist today in four categories in The 2009 American Business Awards, including "Management Team of the Year", "Marketing Team of the Year", "Advertising, Marketing & Public Relations" (for their corporate website), and "Best Home Page" (for their corporate website home page).

The American Business Awards are the nation's premier business awards program. All organizations operating in the U.S.A. are eligible to submit entries to the ABAs - public and private, for-profit and non-profit, large and small.

Stevie Award winners will be announced during the annual gala on Monday, June 22 at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York City. Six-hundred executives from across the U.S.A. are expected to attend. The ceremonies will be broadcast on radio nationwide by the Business TalkRadio Network and hosted by Cheryl Casone of Fox Business Network.

More than 2,600 entries from companies of all sizes and in virtually every industry were submitted for consideration in more than 40 categories, including Most Innovative Company, Best Management Team, Best New Product or Service, Best Corporate Social Responsibility Program, Best Corporate Environmental Responsibility Program.

"We are proud and honored to be recognized as Finalists in four categories in this year's Awards," said Michael Sprouse, Chief Marketing Officer for Epic Advertising. "Being designated as a finalist is an important achievement for us, and is consistent with the work we have done to distinguish ourselves in an ultra-competitive sector. We would like to congratulate all the finalists for their terrific achievements and look forward to honoring them on June 22."

Members of the Awards' Board of Distinguished Judges & Advisors and their staffs will select Stevie Award winners from among Finalists in final judging that will continue through June 3. Finalists were chosen by business professionals nationwide during preliminary judging in April through early May.

"Despite very tough economic conditions, many organizations and individuals continue to perform well," said Michael Gallagher, founder and president of The Stevie Awards. "The results of the 2009 ABAs thus far are a testament to the resilience, creativity, and hard work of American organizations, executives, and workers."

Details about The American Business Awards and the list of Finalists in all categories are available at www.stevieawards.com/aba.

About Epic Advertising
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and over 40,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, and branded marketing campaigns with a targeted, worldwide reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent Display, Search and Social Media consumer web traffic. Epic scales its solutions through its enormous internet reach, technology and unparalleled industry expertise.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

About The Stevie Awards
Stevie Awards are conferred in four programs: The American Business Awards, The International Business Awards, The Stevie Awards for Women in Business, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service. Honoring companies of all types and sizes and the people behind them, the Stevies recognize outstanding performances in the workplace worldwide. Learn more about The Stevie Awards at www.stevieawards.com.

Supporting sponsors of The 2009 American Business Awards include High Performance Technologies Inc., John Hancock, Lifelock, RCN Corporation, Softpro, and Ultimate Software. Media sponsor is the Business TalkRadio Network. Localization partner of the 2009 Stevie Awards is Lionbridge.

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WILMINGTON -- May 19, 2009 -- The Performance Marketing Alliance (PMA) is pleased to announce that Epic Advertising has joined as a corporate charter member. The PMA is a new professional organization representing performance marketing professionals. As a charter member, Epic Advertising will be instrumental in funding and participating in the formation of the organization. Charter membership is a two-year membership, and includes a vote for the charter board of directors, and the opportunity to run for a charter board seat.

"Epic Advertising is an innovator and leader in performance marketing, and we're thrilled to have them on board," said Rebecca Madigan, founder of the PMA. "Their team has supported our formation efforts with recruitment, and provided guidance to our ongoing grass-roots efforts in a variety of areas."

"Becoming Charter members signifies that we think it is fundamentally important for online performance marketing, in particular, to have stronger leadership as the industry continues to grow," said Michael Sprouse, Chief Marketing Officer for Epic Advertising. "Performance marketing is an increasingly critical component of online advertising, and an important one as most advertisers and publishers have come to understand. We see immense value for us and everyone involved in performance marketing to get behind a professional organization whose goal is to provide a stronger and more unified voice."

Individual and corporate Charter membership is open through June 1, 2009. For more information, visit www.performancemarketingalliance.com.

About Performance Marketing Alliance
The Performance Marketing Alliance, Inc. is a new industry association for performance marketing professionals. The goal of the Performance Marketing Alliance is to raise the visibility and credibility of performance marketing. Members include industry leading advertisers, publishers, networks, agencies and solution providers.

About Epic Advertising
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and over 40,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, and branded marketing campaigns with a targeted, worldwide reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent Display, Search and Social Media consumer web traffic. Epic scales its solutions through its enormous internet reach, technology and unparalleled industry expertise.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

US Media Contact:
Anne Rothrocke
Project Coordinator
Performance Marketing Alliance, Inc.
anne_rothrock@performancemarketingalliance.com

Epic Contact:
Cherilyn Earl
Senior Marketing Manager
Epic Advertising
cherilyn.earl@epicadvertising.com

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LOS ANGELES - May 15, 2009 - Banking on the continued growth of the web world's population and advertisers' increasing interest in reaching the ultra funky teen/tween residents of the burgeoning virtual world of Urbaniacs, Brandissimo! has increased its ownership stake in the online social community and game site. Additionally, Brandissimo! named Traffic Marketplace as the exclusive advertising network for the comic book world come-to-life.

Sparked by spectacular growth in the virtual game community since first partnering with Urbaniacs creators Josh Fisher and Barry Collier in 2007, Brandissimo! is increasing its ownership position by more than 50 percent. In the past two years, the unique, award-winning virtual world of Urbaniacs has attracted more than 150,000 resident members and boasts over 250,000 game plays every month.

The agreement with Traffic Marketplace enables the online ad network to serve as the exclusive advertising network to sell advertising and sponsorship opportunities on Urbaniacs.com.

"Urbaniacs is a great opportunity for brands to reach a vast community of Internet-savvy kids aged 13-18," said Jim Waltz, President of Traffic Marketplace. "Our advertising partners love that the citizens of Urbaniacs are active, passionate and loyal."

Commenting on these latest developments, Urbaniacs' leading political figure, Mayor DaMan, gave "mad props to my homies at Brandissimo for their vision and support," and added, "we welcome all advertisers to experience the fun and funky side of life with super powers, arch-enemies and sidekicks. Bring it ON!"

"We certainly mirror Mayor DaMan's comments and share his enthusiasm for the future of Urbaniacs," said Brandissimo CEO David Snyder. "Creatively, it's just such a fun world to work in and especially rewarding to watch it grow as we nurture its continued success. On the business side, Traffic Marketplace is a perfect partner to exploit that success and tap into the huge potential manifested in such a loyal fan base."

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LOS ANGELES - April 20, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace today announced the launch of Livemarkets Lite, a quick-to-market version of Livemarkets' revolutionary click-to-chat technology that enables consumers to engage in a live chat session and interact directly with advertisers via any banner ad. Livemarkets Lite allows advertisers to use Livemarkets click-to-chat without integrating a call center.

Livemarkets Lite features Chat Assist, an innovative intelligence technology that answers up to 95% of consumer questions by referencing an intelligent database. Powered by Upsellit.com, the Chat Assist database dynamically answers a wide spectrum of common questions tailored to each campaign. Livemarkets Lite also provides advertisers greater insight into market perceptions by providing detailed chat activity analysis and reporting, including the type of questions commonly asked by consumers.

"Talking with your customers is different than talking to your customers," said Tom Kogler, President and CEO of Upsellit.com, the technology provider for Chat Assist. "Engaging in a two-way conversation allows advertisers to create a deeper connection between consumers and their brand. The combined capabilities of Livemarkets and Upsellit.com will help advertisers of all shapes and sizes create a dialogue and let consumers participate in the brand experience."

"Livemarkets Lite takes all the work out of adding chat capability to ads," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "The only thing agencies or advertisers need to do is customize a standard chat script for their campaigns—we do all the rest."

With Livemarkets and Livemarkets Lite, consumers don't have to interrupt their website visit to interact directly with brands and advertisers. Enhanced consumer engagement increases ad response, brand recall and awareness.

Traffic Marketplace originally acquired Livemarkets in 2008, and has since been offering Livemarkets' Click-to-Chat as a free service to advertisers running campaigns through the Traffic Marketplace network. Livemarkets Lite is the latest in a string of acquisitions/partnerships with new technology providers, as Traffic Marketplace continues to invest in technologies that allow businesses to connect with audiences in more relevant, effective and engaging ways.

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

UpSellIt
UpSellit is a performance-based ecommerce and emarketing solution utilizing proprietary virtual-chat technology to engage proactively and personally with customers at predetermined points of action, resulting in increased sales, additional promotional opportunities and improved customer support. Using natural language parsing and approved company messaging, UpSellit's virtual agents take on the personality of a company's top employee with the ability to interact simultaneously with 10 to 10 million customers. Headquartered in Camarillo, CA, UpSellit was founded in 2005 as a division of USI Technologies. For more information, visit www.upsellit.com.

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Dear Adotas readers,

My letter today could just as well be titled "Why Advertising is Not Failing on the Internet".

This letter is in direct response to an increasingly controversial post on a notable technology blog entitled "Why Advertising is Failing on the Internet".

The author in that piece draws on four major arguments to support his point about why internet advertising, today, is failing and will continue to fail. He says: People don't trust ads; People don't want ads; People don't need ads; and there is no shortage of places to put ads.

I disagree with his conclusions and the logic that supports them. I wanted to address these topics head-on, however, because perhaps you have all heard these myths, too, or had someone try and convince you of these assertions.

The facts (but not according to "vast literature" that the author repeatedly cites) are that online advertising is certainly not failing today and some areas of it are actually thriving and growing, and will present opportunities in the future for every player in the ecosystem.

The author claims that people don't trust ads. I'd like to see this literature and who wrote it. It begs the question: why, for decades, have companies poured so much money into advertising if so many consumers do not trust it? Advertising is as much about establishing an emotional connection and/or value proposition with a consumer, and successful advertising harbors trust. If advertising fails to establish that emotional connection or does not offer a value proposition, it fails. Because of the interactive nature of the web, it is actually easier to establish a connection with a target audience, and yes, there are companies successfully doing it today.

The argument that people don't want ads does not hold water either. Has the author watched the Super Bowl in recent years? Does he realize that even the worst performing ads on the web still get clicked? Just because people in front of a TV happen to turn the channel more often during commercials than during programming doesn't mean consumers don't want ads; historically, they might just not have wanted them at that very instant or they may not have been targeted properly. The internet through its measurability, by the way, helps solve this in a way no other medium can.

The author's point about people not needing ads is pretty subjective. I happen to believe people do need ads; to educate, inform, establish emotional connections with products or services, and engage with brands. If the author doesn't think that millions of kids who have bought Happy Meals at McDonalds didn't establish their connection through some form of advertising, he is mistaken. I'm living proof of that; I would say as a consumer, I have always relied on advertising and welcomed it.

That there is no shortage of places to put ads is true. There isn't a shortage. But this is what makes online advertising more effective and more efficient, creating a more powerful marketplace. It puts control back towards the advertiser, allowing the advertiser to come to market faster, pay only for performance, target customers better…all vast improvements over what one can do through offline media. More choice is better for everyone, in my book, and fosters innovation and creativity by publishers.

Why did I feel the need to respond to these assertions? Because the author's final conclusion is that over time online advertising will be "smaller than it is today". Perhaps many of you have heard these very same arguments from people, especially during this recession.

The fact is, many companies - like Epic and several others we know well and work with - are harnessing the web by making it more efficient and profitable for the entire advertising ecosystem, and creating better experiences for the consumer. When naysayers, who clearly exhibit little knowledge of online-specific ad topics, try and talk about how internet advertising is failing, it is simply incorrect. There are companies that operate entirely in the online ad ecosystem not named Google who are doing well even in this down economy. The viewpoints expressed by the author referenced above, and maybe by others, are incredibly short-sighted and inaccurate. I wanted to set the record straight.

We welcome you to contact us at Epic for more information on how to "win the Web".

Best regards,

Michael Sprouse
Chief Marketing Officer
Epic Advertising
michael.sprouse@epicadvertising.com

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March 19, 2009 -- Epic Advertising (www.epicadvertising.com) was named one of the worlds most effective rebrands in the fifth annual ReBrand 100® Global Awards. ReBrand 100 is the highest recognition for brand rebuilding and redesign in the business arena, and is the only global, juried program of its kind. Epic Advertising's rebranding encompassed an entire corporate website redesign which included added functionality, better messaging and use of technology and expansion of pertinent information. The rebranding occurred on the heels of the company's office renovation in New York City, which was completed in early 2008.

"With the value of branding no longer a secret, the world becoming borderless, and the rate of information travel unbounded, assessing brand distinction and leadership is no easy task. The range of excellence in this year's global pool was inspiring, and demonstrated the value of effective rebrands and the global commitment evident in solutions." said Thebe Ikalafeng, CEO of South Africa-based Brand Leadership Group and 2009 ReBrand 100 juror.

To select winners, jurors reviewed the work which was required to transcend cosmetic changes. In addition to specific review guidelines they followed, strong consideration was given to execution and strategies that made an emotional connection, and met the stated objectives and needs of the identified target market. In true democratic fashion, a one-person entity had as much opportunity to be selected as did global organizations, since jurors were unaware of the brand strategist's name and size when reviewing the projects.

Over 40 industries and 21 countries are represented among the 2009 winners. Some of the world's best known branding consultants such as Interbrand, The Brand Union, DDB Canada, and more competed, as did in-house teams, small agencies, and representatives of multinational corporations. The jury panel, new each year, consists of a multidisciplinary mix of prominent, international, industry experts. The 2009 panel of 10 included CEO for InterbrandHealth Jane Parker, Burt Helm of BusinessWeek, and Creative Director of Australia-based Principals, Simon Wright.

"I am thrilled for our company in receiving this well-deserved honor," said Michael Sprouse, Chief Marketing Officer for Epic Advertising. "When we re-branded the company and embarked on development of our corporate web presence, we had the singular goal of making the site itself the best, most informative, sleekest, easy-to-navigate B2B site in the industry. To have our names alongside some of the world's most respected brands speaks volumes about the job we did in achieving our goal."

Unique among other awards, "before" and "after" scenarios of each brand transformation are reviewed with details of the accompanying write-up on the approach. The rebrand could have been an enterprise-wide effort, a change in a single brand component, or a brand extension. Winning rebrands are showcased for inspiration and learning at www.rebrand.com.

About Epic Advertising:
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers and agencies with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending technologies, and over 38,000 publishers, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, search engine marketing, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and targeted, worldwide online reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent Display, Search and Social Media consumer web traffic. Epic scales its solutions through enormous internet reach, technology and unparalleled industry expertise.

The company has achieved several industry accolades, including being named an AlwaysOn Global Top 250 Company as one of the top private companies in the world, a comScore top-50 ranking in internet reach (Ad Focus), a 2008 Inc. 5000 company, and a 2009 ReBrand 100 winner.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

About ReBrand™ and the ReBrand 100® Global Awards:
ReBrand is the global, online resource for case studies on the most effective brand transformations: the repositioning, revitalizing, and redesign of existing brand assets to meet strategic goals. Featured in such media as The Wall Street Journal, CNN Money, BusinessWeek, and Yahoo! Finance, ReBrand's leading program, the annual ReBrand 100® Global Awards, has entry deadlines in late September of each year. To view winning case studies or to learn how to enter, visit www.rebrand.com.

All trademarks, service marks and company names are the properties of their respective owners.

Press Contact:
Epic Advertising
Cherilyn Earl
212.308.8509
Cherilyn.Earl@EpicAdvertising.com

For ReBrand™:
Andrea Walker
401.277.4877
evolve@rebrand.com

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LOS ANGELES - MARCH 11, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace, the leading independent online advertising network, announced today a new strategic distribution agreement with ARTISTdirect Internet Group, Inc. ("ADIG"), making Traffic Marketplace the exclusive advertising and sponsorship sales agency for ARTISTdirect.com and the ARTISTdirect Internet Group Network.

With one of the web's deepest and broadest catalogues of content, covering every genre of music and film, ARTISTdirect has established itself among the top online destinations for 24/7 in-depth coverage of entertainment. ARTISTdirect features one of the largest selections of free music content that ranges from over 10,000 music videos and 7 million albums, tracks and samples to millions of artist pages, as well as news that includes behind-the-scenes interviews, reviews and exclusive artist content with everyone from 50 Cent to Bruce Springsteen.

As the 5th largest Entertainment - Music network property on the Internet according to comScore, the ARTISTdirect Network attracts more than 12 million unique visitors per month. ARTISTdirect's user demographic is characterized as young, net-savvy and extremely mobile--a highly desirable segment among national advertisers.

"The addition of ARTISTdirect further enhances our rich audience profiles and increases our network's reach, notably among the teen demographic," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "Beyond the additional reach, our advertisers will gain exclusive access to a dynamic network of popular sites and an extensive variety of advertising packages. This new partnership with ARTISTdirect continues our commitment to invest in products, services and relationships that give our advertisers visibility and innovation that no other ad network can offer."

The ARTISTdirect Network inventory is now exclusively available to Traffic Marketplace advertisers. In addition to display banners, Traffic Marketplace and ARTISTdirect will offer customized advertising solutions including sponsorships, audio ads, video or audio player pre-roll, custom skinning, and wallpaper opportunities.

"Advertisers are always looking for new and innovative ways to tap into the young adult target," said Dimitri Villard, CEO, ARTISTdirect, Inc. "In addition to getting more visibility with some of the biggest advertisers in the world, Traffic Marketplace provides us with the market know-how and expertise to integrate advertiser messages into our content in a holistic and compelling way that engages consumers."

According to comScore Media Metrix, Traffic Marketplace reached 147 million unique users, or 77 percent of the U.S. Internet audience, in January 2009.

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

About ARTISTdirect Internet Group, Inc.
Headquartered in Santa Monica, CA, Artist Direct Internet Group controls some of the Internet's leading consumer music and entertainment information properties. Its flagship website www.ARTISTdirect.com is the premier destination for all things related to music and film and their artists. Through its rich, multimedia repository of contextually relevant information and entertainment, the company creates deep connections between artists and fans that deliver benefits to both the entertainment consumer and the entertainment industry. ARTISTdirect.com receives over 3 million unique visitors per month while the ARTISTdirect Network, a family of related Web sites, draws more than 12.4 million monthly unique visitors. Featuring the latest hit videos, streams, free downloads, breaking news, in-depth interviews with musicians, actors, filmmakers and film score composers, a huge data base filled with biographies and discographies plus hard-to-find information, as well as CDs, concert and movie tickets for purchase, ARTISTdirect.com is the ultimate resource for anyone with an appetite for finding new and interesting content about their favorite artists and their music and films. ADIG's other properties include the legendary Ultimate Band List, www.UBL.com, one of the web's first music properties.

About Artist Direct, Inc.
ARTISTdirect, Inc. (OTC BB ARTD - NEWS) is a publicly-held holding company with two operating subsidiaries: ARTISTdirect Internet Group, Inc., which operates one of the largest destination sites on the Internet for music and motion picture news, information and streaming music. ADIG also operates an ad network that is currently ranked 5 in comScore's ranking of music sites. MediaDefender, Inc. provides intellectual property protection and business information services to major motion picture studios, record labels, television networks, gaming companies and software publishers and Internet marketing services to advertising agencies and other clients.

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LOS ANGELES - MARCH 5, 2009 - Traffic Marketplace has acquired fbExchange, a proprietary advertising exchange that monetizes social media applications. The fbExchange platform makes it simple and scalable for application developers to derive ad revenue from their applications, and provides advertisers with an opportunity to target and engage users of some of the latest social media applications.

With its purchase of fbExchange, Traffic Marketplace adds social media inventory to its growing list of leading display and lead generation offerings. Through a series of acquisitions and exclusive partnerships, Traffic Marketplace continues to aggressively pursue its mission of delivering relevance in online advertising across multiple distribution channels.

"Social media is changing the way consumers interact with content," said Jim Waltz, President, Traffic Marketplace. "The fbExchange technology will allow our advertisers to engage consumers through the vast network of social media applications and leverage the most advanced targeting available to reach their ideal audience, all in a safe and controlled advertising environment."

This acquisition will position Traffic Marketplace as one of the first ad networks to expand directly into social media, instantly extending its reach across a vast network of applications. "Our vision is to make advertising on social networks as compelling, interactive and socially relevant as the applications themselves," said Sheldon Owen, Vice President, Traffic Marketplace.

Founded in 2007 by the For Friends Network and developed by 83 Degrees, fbExchange is a web-based software application that acts as a link exchange and advertising network for third-party social media applications on sites such as Facebook. fbExchange, which generated billions of advertising impressions in 2008 to more than 40 million Facebook members, was developed to fill the growing demand for application marketing.

"The fbExchange platform, combined with Traffic Marketplace's high profile and diverse advertiser relationships, will provide much needed revenue opportunities for application developers," said Narendra Rocherolle, Co-founder, 83 Degrees. "It will also be a perfect fit for advertisers seeking new ways to reach social media users via unparalleled reach, granular targeting and one-on-one engagement with consumers."

About Traffic Marketplace
As the premiere B2A™ (Business-to-Audience) online ad network, Traffic Marketplace delivers relevance in online advertising by connecting advertisers with their target audience. Reaching more than 127MM unique users monthly, Traffic Marketplace generates in excess of 30 billion advertising impressions each month, delivering more than 20 million leads and customers a year through its targeted display advertising, lead generation, co-registration, email and custom hosted solutions.

About For Friends Network LLC
For Friends Network, LLC is the investment arm of software development shop, 83 Degrees. Their projects currently include the critically acclaimed online calendar, 30 Boxes, as well as their most recent hit, Power Twitter. www.83degrees.com.

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New York, NY, February 24, 2009 -- Epic Advertising (www.epicadvertising.com), New York-based online performance marketing firm, today announced two key appointments within its executive suite. The announcement comes on the heels of a wave of recent positive news for the company, including the opening of its London office and strong 2008 revenue growth and business expansion.

The first appointment is the naming of Charles Nowaczek to the position of Chief Operating Officer. In this role, Mr. Nowaczek is responsible for Epic Advertising's global business operations, including product development, program management, Sales support, facilities and administration, and oversight of the organization's strategic and tactical initiatives. Additionally, he has successfully led the company's first-ever Management Training Program, which has resulted in other key employee promotions internally. Previously, Mr. Nowaczek was the Senior Vice President of Operations for the company, and has been with Epic since March 2006. He is based in the New York City headquarters.

The second appointment was the naming of Young Kim to the position of Senior Vice President of Finance. In this role, Mr. Kim is responsible for all aspects of the company's accounting and finances. Under his direction, he has overseen the group's improvements in operational, budget and process efficiencies, the implementation of new projects and the support of the company's international expansion. Previously, Mr. Kim was the Vice President of Finance for the company, and has been with Epic since 2005. He is based in the Toronto, Canada office.

The two appointments further solidify Epic's senior executive team following a successful 2008, and will provide further momentum to its prospects for further growth in 2009. The company sees the appointment of Mr. Nowaczek and Mr. Kim as crucial in its ability to maintain flawless organizational execution and commitment to its product growth and corporate strategy roadmap.

"We are extremely proud of both Charlie and Young for their dedication, commitment, and achievement," said Don Mathis, CEO of Epic Advertising. "They have each earned deep goodwill and respect from their peers, and solidifying these two well-deserved appointments was important overall for our company, covering its most important functions. We wish Charlie and Young well in their roles and have the utmost confidence in their contributions going forward."

About Epic Advertising:
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending contextual and behavioral targeting technologies, and the over 38,000 publishers in its highly-acclaimed network AzoogleAds, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and a targeted, worldwide online reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent display and search consumer traffic. Epic scales its solutions by leveraging vast quantities of data, enormous internet reach and unparalleled industry expertise.

The company has achieved several industry accolades, including being named an AlwaysOn Global Top 250 Company as one of the top private companies in the world, a comScore top-50 ranking in internet reach (Ad Focus) and being named a 2008 Inc. 5000 company.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in London, San Francisco, and Toronto. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

Press Contact:
Cherilyn Earl
Epic Advertising
212.308.8509
Cherilyn.Earl@EpicAdvertising.com

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Dear Adotas Readers,

A few months ago, our CEO Don Mathis wrote a letter to this very same audience. In it, he wrote about the potential online marketing and media professionals have in 2009. He detailed some of the positive signs that exist in our industry. Of course, the macroeconomic news is not any better at this time than it was at the end of last year. But specifically, in our sector, what are we seeing and what can we expect to see the next few months?

We are very clearly seeing three major shifts taking place right now. These shifts, we expect, could be a little more permanent in their effects to the advertising landscape in general, and specifically in online advertising, compared to similar industry changes which may have occurred in the past. In relative chronological order:

The first is the movement of offline advertising dollars towards the online medium, which has been going on for a few years to some extent, but more recently has accelerated. There is no need to discuss the difficulty that most offline vehicles have had in securing advertising dollars; they've been well documented. As the calendar year changed, we've seen a more drastic migration towards Online with more and more advertisers and agencies seeing the inherent value in this medium in terms of efficiency, cost-effectiveness, scale and better targeting capabilities.

The second shift we are seeing is in the "direct response movement". This is very closely tied to the economy at large and what is doing well right now. How many of you thought you would ever see an ad from a direct response advertiser during the Super Bowl? Or, during daytime TV on most all of the cable networks, ads for the latest direct-response products and gadgets? This shift is not only occurring offline, it is occurring online as well and is a more recent phenomenon over the past year. Historically, direct response advertisers have leveraged TV masterfully every time you see the label "As Seen on TV". Now, they're recognizing the inherent economies of scale in the online medium, too, and with an already built-in understanding of performance marketing (which most pundits, including us, believe will continue its positive momentum this year as we've seen in January).

The third development is the emergence of hybrid campaigns that include direct response and branding components. This movement is still in its infancy. These types of campaigns are starting to gain traction as more and more traditional brand advertisers need to show a better, more quantifiable return on their ad spend, grow and extend their brands, yet don't want to dive in head-first to the direct response pool, or necessarily compete directly with them. For advertisers and agencies that fit these criteria, the silver bullet is of course brand protection, with scale and advanced targeting. The good news is that this is all happening more rapidly than some people expected.

These developments should be reaffirming to Don's words two months ago, and a precursor to what we think we might see the first half of this year. For those partners we work with already, we look forward to continuing our success this year. For those we don't work with or haven't met yet, we invite you to contact us today for a free consultation.

Sincerely,
Michael Sprouse
Chief Marketing Officer, Epic Advertising
michael.sprouse@epicadvertising.com

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London, England, February 10, 2009 -- Epic Advertising (www.epicadvertising.com), the privately-held, New York-based online performance marketing firm, today announced the official opening of its London office. The announcement follows recent news of the company's successful 2008 performance, impressive revenue growth, and the hiring of Rob Wilson in October 2008 as the SVP and General Manager of the company's European business.

"The global trend that we are seeing in performance marketing, not just in North America but in Europe, puts us in a very good position to execute in 2009," said Mr. Wilson. "It was very important for Epic to establish roots here in London, and to be able to hire talented employees to form the foundation of the company's worldwide growth. To now have our London office fully opened, staffed and operational is critical in our ability to execute right away in the 1st quarter."

Other key staffers in place in the London office include: Heidi Kinsey (Network Director), Jason Kilby (Director of Gaming Operations) and Anna Mazziotti (Office Manager).

The company said that the expansion into London was an opportunity created out of intense demand, as the UK market is currently the company's second largest revenue-producing territory, holding a lot of opportunity for advertisers and publishers alike.

"We have seen, even in the early stages of focusing our efforts in Europe, that the opportunity to expand our footprint in the global performance marketing industry in the UK is there," said Don Mathis, CEO of Epic Advertising. "The important first step of hiring a talented GM like Rob, and then putting key team members in place in a new office is now complete. We look forward to growing our presence in Europe even further under this team's leadership."

The address for Epic Advertising's London office is:
Amadeus House
Floral Street, Covent Garden
London, England WC2E 9DP
Telephone: 0207 812 7012
General Email: epicUK@epicadvertising.com

About Epic Advertising:
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is a global online performance marketing company that provides advertisers with measurable Internet advertising impact. Leveraging proprietary and patent-pending contextual and behavioral targeting technologies, and the over 38,000 publishers in its highly-acclaimed network AzoogleAds, Epic provides its advertising partners with performance and direct response marketing services, media planning, branded marketing campaigns and a targeted, worldwide online reach.

A pioneer in both the online performance marketing industry and in Internet advertising integrity assurance and compliance, Epic Advertising brings an intense focus on achieving the highest ROI yield for its advertising partners via transparent display and search consumer traffic. Epic scales its solutions by leveraging vast quantities of data, enormous internet reach and unparalleled industry expertise.

The company has achieved several industry accolades, including being named an AlwaysOn Global Top 250 Company as one of the top private companies in the world, a comScore top-50 ranking in internet reach (Ad Focus) and being named a 2008 Inc. 5000 company.

Epic Advertising is headquartered in New York, with offices in London, San Francisco, and Toronto. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

Press Contact:
Cherilyn Earl
Epic Advertising
212.308.8509
Cherilyn.Earl@EpicAdvertising.com

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New York, NY, January 21 -- Epic Advertising (www.epicadvertising.com), the privately-held, New York-based online performance marketing firm, today announced strong 2008 results, posting core revenue gains of 29 percent over 2007. The company turned in a healthy 21 percent growth in Q4, accelerating to a 26 percent growth rate in December over the year ago period, in the midst of the starkly slowing overall economy and advertising marketplace. Profits increased apace with solid gains across key advertising categories. All growth came through ongoing operations, as the firm made no acquisitions during 2008.

"We believe 2009 is the year online performance marketing will take its rightful, and permanent, seat at the table alongside other major vehicles in marketing planning and execution, as the difficult environment drives advertisers to demand more from their marketing programs," said Don Mathis, Epic's CEO. "Strong growth in challenging times is gratifying and validates our performance-focused strategy, robust technology investments and hard work. But what's most important and compelling is the story behind the numbers, and what it foretells for our category."

Consumer products, insurance, entertainment and casual gaming were among Epic's standout categories, as recession-resistant marketers stepped up activity and consumers responded in kind. E-commerce and direct response-based offerings added a boost towards the end of the year and into early 2009, with the company recording record revenue days throughout early January. The company's performance is a function in part of Epic's broad, high-quality publisher network and proprietary, patent-pending technologies.

Mathis said marketers, agencies and analysts are increasingly realizing that the measurement of online marketing campaigns must go beyond clicks and traditional CPM measures, and towards what makes them most effective and scalable.

"There's a growing understanding that the real promise of Internet marketing is best unlocked by performance-based advertising - that is, thoughtfully calibrated and integrated campaigns, harnessing the power of search, display, and social media and leveraging brand awareness to drive superior customer acquisition," he said. "Such integrated campaigns need measurement tools that can capture awareness and response, and place the right value on that mix." Mathis said Epic is fine-tuning its patent-pending brand and performance measurement system that simplifies reporting for advertisers and continually optimizes campaigns based on usage and data.

Amid the bleak reports, positive signs remain for our industry. Most pundits think online advertising will continue to grow, even if at a slower pace. The shift towards performance marketing, as the need to make ad dollars work harder, will accelerate - and after all, that is what really separates online marketing from its offline counterparts. Search remains relatively strong, due to its measurable ROI. Emerging forms of distribution, such as social media applications, are proliferating and earning revenue. Even display advertising, as has been noted by several publications, has the potential for a comeback of sorts in 2009 despite some bad press (and declining CPM rates) in 2008. While everyone reading this will have a different opinion and a different market position, I hope that we can collectively agree that the opportunity to grow the entire interactive marketing industry in 2009 still exists … and there are very few industries right now that can legitimately claim this. We are indeed fortunate.

Mathis cited a recent Gridley & Company media conference that shined a spotlight on performance marketing's maturation and power. "There was a real sense among network executives, agency heads and other major industry players that while the current downturn in advertising may be cyclical, one of its effects - the rise and importance of performance marketing - will be an enduring legacy of this period," he said.

About Epic Advertising:
Epic Advertising (www.EpicAdvertising.com) is headquartered in New York, with offices in San Francisco, Toronto and London. The company is privately held and backed by private equity firms TA Associates and Stripes Group.

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