Flite 3 lets advertisers integrate apps, tweak campaigns on the fly

Display-advertising company Flite today unveiled Flite Platform 3, marking a shift away from static ads to one based on a real-time, app-driven world. Flite 3 enables two fundamental innovations: real-time updates to live campaigns and the ability to integrate Web applications directly into online ad units.

This means that advertisers can tweak campaigns based on real-time analysis of how users are responding to ads, including interaction rates and how much time users spend seeing an ad, but also the ability to edit an ad on the fly based on what the analytics data shows the advertiser.

Flite 3 also enables advertisers to integrate marketing applications such as ePrize, LinkedIn, and LivePerson directly into their online ads, obviating the need for click-through rates and bringing the power of their Web sites directly into their paid media.

According to CEO Will Price, this is all related to effectiveness, which has become the key metric in display advertising.

Price told CNET that one of the most important aspects of measuring effectiveness is the operational efficiency that advertisers gain by having the ability to adjust creative materials on the fly, while also making display ads functional and application-driven. Traditional online display ads, by contrast, have a fixed message and format; updates take one to four weeks, and the goal of the ad is a click-through to another page on the Web.

The ability to adjust the creative aspects of an ad, along with the ability to make ads function like mini Web sites, or applications unto themselves, is helping make advertising interesting again. Digital-media specialist Vivaki's chief strategy officer, Rishad Tobaccowala, noted recently that "in a world of Twitter, Facebook, Google+, and other social platforms, marketing will increasingly resemble political campaigns, with brands mobilizing and incentivizing their advocates to market to their friends and communities."