Premium Publisher Ad Pricing From Ad Networks Up 111% In Past Year

2009 A Major Rebound Year For Publishers As CPMs Surge Past Pre-Recession Numbers

PALO ALTO, Calif. – (January 20, 2010) – PubMatic today announced the results of the 2009 Year-End Ad Price Index. The research brief indicates that 2009 proved to be a rebound year where ad pricing increased significantly and steadily.

PubMatic, which has been providing public ad pricing data since early 2008, has the longest running ad pricing report in the digital display advertising industry. The latest report is a key indicator that rapid innovation of targeting technology from publisher vendors is helping unlock greater value of publishers’ ad space.

The recession hit online publishers the hardest in 2008 with ad prices falling to new lows, but each quarter since the beginning of the year saw big gains in premium publisher ad pricing, ending with a surge that raised December 2009 prices even higher than pre-recession prices:

Sequential Changes in Ad Pricing for Non-Guaranteed Inventory:

* Q1 2009 – Q2 2009: 57% increase
* Q2 2009 – Q3 2009: 31% increase
* Q3 2009 – Q4 2009: 42% increase

Year on Year Changes in Ad Pricing for Non-Guaranteed Inventory:

* Q4 2008 – Q4 2009: 111% increase

“Online publishers were hoping that 2009 would be a rebound year for ad pricing, but few predicted a comeback this strong,” said Rajeev Goel, PubMatic Co-Founder and CEO. “2010 is off to a promising start as well with new opportunities available to help publishers unlock the true value of their audience, including broader adoption of real-time bidding, increased abilities to better monetize audiences, and extending ad network optimization to the publishers’ mobile platform.”

The 2009 Year-End Ad Price Index can be downloaded at: http://www.pubmatic.com/adpriceindex.

*according to PubMatic data

About The Ad Price Index

PubMatic collects data from a large number of premium publishers that is then analyzed by our independent statisticians, and from which an aggregate monthly price index is produced. The 100 index reflects pricing from Q1 2008.

About The Ad Price Data Methodology

The PubMatic ad price data used in this brief is comprised of premium publishers using PubMatic. The data is prepared by leading independent statisticians and industry experts: Albert Madansky, Ph.D., H.G.B. Alexander Professor Emeritus of Business Administration at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and recipient of the 2005 American Statistical Association Founders Award, and Michele Madansky, Ph.D., a media and market research consultant and former VP of Global Market Research for Yahoo!

The pricing data reflects net publisher monetization for non-guaranteed ad inventory via ad networks and excludes ad networks’ share of ad spend as well as inventory sold directly by publishers to ad agencies or advertisers.

The pricing data is not representative of the performance of any particular ad network.

Source: PubMatic