8 ms·

LeanMarket (YC S12) brings real-time bidding display ads to the masses

86 points by garry 14y ago

mcarvin 14y ago
broadening the base of marketing channels available to small biz guys like myself is always welcome... kudos.
kposehn 14y ago
Interesting. I'm wondering how this will differentiate from companies like SiteScout, which provide the same basic service. If the optimization engine is just that good, I'm definitely going to push more of my budget to it.
- CyrusL 14y ago
  It's true that the vast majority of demand-side platforms are bidding on the same impressions, so the differentiation really comes from technology, service, and usability. For example, the main component of building a campaign on SiteScout is scrolling through a really long list of websites and entering individual CPM bids. Between LeanMarket's slick category-targeting UI and auto-optimization, I think we handle this process much more gracefully.
  - kposehn 14y ago
    Ok, I'd love to give it a shot. Auto-optimization has always been a pain point for me, especially with lower impression/higher EPC campaigns. How soon will you be sending out invites?
    - CyrusL 14y ago
      No real invite system, I'm just trying to make sure any advertiser's campaigns seem like a good fit for RTB before I push them to test a campaign that probably won't succeed. Can you please reach out through the contact form or email first name @ company domain dot com? Thanks!
  - chaseideas 14y ago
    Sounds great! Looking forward to checking it out. Very curious to see how the auto-optimization does compared to our current systems.
  - samt 14y ago
    CyrusL: could you send me an email (sam@rubiconproject.com)? Can't find an email from your profile.
gcb 14y ago
So you don't have to go thru "enterprise sales people" to get onboarded, does that means the company can't afford ad review? If they allow rich media for every one with 2cents, i can't think of a better platform to distribute malware.
- corford 14y ago
  I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff? Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it). Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publishers?
  - calbear81 14y ago
    Haven't touched ad servers for a while but do most ad serving platforms correctly track HTML 5 rich media? I know most of them are setup to correctly hook into Flash (Actionscript) and be able to automatically catch plays, replays, hovers, and other actions.
    - corford 14y ago
      I'm out of date as well so I don't know. Hopefully someone more current can enlighten us :)
    - gcb 14y ago
      No. None of they aren. some consume a global variable with a link but that's minor and has irrelevant reasons for the security concerns here. For richmedia, the publisher (website owner) just accepts to serve a Javascript snipped, which most of the time request more Javascript from places the publisher has no control whatsoever. And it has to be inlined on the page because that script uses document.write like crazy. because of that, the script has total control of the page. That's why there's no rich media in most free email providers. Yahoo is the only one but they render the ad in an crossdomain iframe and force the ad to behave via a richmedia api
omarchowdhury 14y ago
And where do I signup?
slig 14y ago
Such great domain name. Kudos!
- mcdowall 14y ago
  Slightly confusing to be to be honest, Lean.com as the domain (which most likely cost a small fortune) but all the branding is LeanMarket. I'm sure they have plans for more combined branding, but its a bit amiss for me.
chaseideas 14y ago
Sounds like a cool new platform to check out! I've contacted them about starting some campaigns for both myself and clients, and looking forward to seeing how the system delivers on its promises. Like kposehn said, if it is really that good I'll be moving a lot more of my budget to it. Would really take a lot of the time and effort out of large-scale media buying.
zorked 14y ago
Is there any way that a small ad buyer (a few hundred thousand dollars a month) can participate in the auctions directly, bidding in real time rather than going through a middleman that does the work for him (which is what LeanMarket seems to do)?
- samt 14y ago
  zorked send me a note at sam@rubiconproject.com. I'm happy to walk you through the industry a bit. We could definitely work with you.
- kposehn 14y ago
  You can pretty easily at that size. OpenX and AdBrite are both easy to get started with, let me know if you want an intro.
- CyrusL 14y ago
  On the larger exchanges, not really. This would be like a retail investor wanting access to NASDAQ or NYSE rather than Schwab or E-Trade. Some of the 3rd-tier exchanges may be exceptions.
  - CyrusL 14y ago
    Oops, I just saw you said few hundred thousand. I read "a few hundred" at first. Then yes, absolutely.
- earl 14y ago
  Why would you want to directly participate? It's a lot of tech and overhead for what? I think what you really want is a good dsp that will help you leverage your first party data; maybe look at triggit?
  - indyadguy 14y ago
    We've been using Triggit for years. I can't say enough good things about them or the product. Well worth the call!
- 14y ago
cowboybob 14y ago
This looks similar to AppNexus: http://www.appnexus.com/ http://www.appnexus.com/
yaix 14y ago
How is this different from AdWords?
- CyrusL 14y ago
  LeanMarket's value proposition is probably not very clear to anyone who isn't familiar with real-time bidding. This Google whitepaper goes over the industry at a high level: http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/www.google.com/en/us/doubleclick/pdfs/Google-White-Paper-The-Arrival-of-Real-Time-Bidding-July-2011.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrust... One core component of RTB is the separation of supply and demand. This is different than the ad network model where a central hub connects the buyers and sellers who all work with the network. This "central hub" approach is true of AdWords; you can buy traffic from AdSense publishers through AdWords and no one else. Through LeanMarket, you can buy impressions from publishers who sell through Google, Microsoft, Admeld, Rubicon, or PubMatic--none of whom LeanMarket has a direct relationship with.
aslewofmice 14y ago
How's your mobile capability? Are you tied into any Mobile specific exchanges? I'm guessing you're running your own ad server... is it performing well for Mobile devices? Judging the by the screenshots, it looks like a pretty clean interface. It really surprises me how convoluted RTB UI's are when it's really not a complicated workflow. Great job, very impressive! There's a lot of potential in this space...

86 points by garry 14y ago

broadening the base of marketing channels available to small biz guys like myself is always welcome... kudos.

Interesting. I'm wondering how this will differentiate from companies like SiteScout, which provide the same basic service. If the optimization engine is just that good, I'm definitely going to push more of my budget to it.

CyrusL 14y ago
It's true that the vast majority of demand-side platforms are bidding on the same impressions, so the differentiation really comes from technology, service, and usability. For example, the main component of building a campaign on SiteScout is scrolling through a really long list of websites and entering individual CPM bids. Between LeanMarket's slick category-targeting UI and auto-optimization, I think we handle this process much more gracefully.
- kposehn 14y ago
  Ok, I'd love to give it a shot. Auto-optimization has always been a pain point for me, especially with lower impression/higher EPC campaigns. How soon will you be sending out invites?
  - CyrusL 14y ago
    No real invite system, I'm just trying to make sure any advertiser's campaigns seem like a good fit for RTB before I push them to test a campaign that probably won't succeed. Can you please reach out through the contact form or email first name @ company domain dot com? Thanks!
- chaseideas 14y ago
  Sounds great! Looking forward to checking it out. Very curious to see how the auto-optimization does compared to our current systems.
- samt 14y ago
  CyrusL: could you send me an email (sam@rubiconproject.com)? Can't find an email from your profile.

gcb 14y ago

So you don't have to go thru "enterprise sales people" to get onboarded, does that means the company can't afford ad review? If they allow rich media for every one with 2cents, i can't think of a better platform to distribute malware.

corford 14y ago
I wondered the same thing. Maybe just block Flash totally and only allow HTML5 for rich media stuff? Other than that, I think it looks like a great idea (love the name) and could have a decent chance of going somewhere (assuming enough small biz firms are sophisticated enough to use it). Edit: or maybe the plan is that the ad exchanges (e.g. Rubicon) do the vetting, since they're in-between leanmarket and the publishers?
- calbear81 14y ago
  Haven't touched ad servers for a while but do most ad serving platforms correctly track HTML 5 rich media? I know most of them are setup to correctly hook into Flash (Actionscript) and be able to automatically catch plays, replays, hovers, and other actions.
  - corford 14y ago
    I'm out of date as well so I don't know. Hopefully someone more current can enlighten us :)
  - gcb 14y ago
    No. None of they aren. some consume a global variable with a link but that's minor and has irrelevant reasons for the security concerns here. For richmedia, the publisher (website owner) just accepts to serve a Javascript snipped, which most of the time request more Javascript from places the publisher has no control whatsoever. And it has to be inlined on the page because that script uses document.write like crazy. because of that, the script has total control of the page. That's why there's no rich media in most free email providers. Yahoo is the only one but they render the ad in an crossdomain iframe and force the ad to behave via a richmedia api

omarchowdhury 14y ago

And where do I signup?

slig 14y ago

Such great domain name. Kudos!

mcdowall 14y ago
Slightly confusing to be to be honest, Lean.com as the domain (which most likely cost a small fortune) but all the branding is LeanMarket. I'm sure they have plans for more combined branding, but its a bit amiss for me.

chaseideas 14y ago

Sounds like a cool new platform to check out! I've contacted them about starting some campaigns for both myself and clients, and looking forward to seeing how the system delivers on its promises. Like kposehn said, if it is really that good I'll be moving a lot more of my budget to it. Would really take a lot of the time and effort out of large-scale media buying.

zorked 14y ago

Is there any way that a small ad buyer (a few hundred thousand dollars a month) can participate in the auctions directly, bidding in real time rather than going through a middleman that does the work for him (which is what LeanMarket seems to do)?

samt 14y ago
zorked send me a note at sam@rubiconproject.com. I'm happy to walk you through the industry a bit. We could definitely work with you.
kposehn 14y ago
You can pretty easily at that size. OpenX and AdBrite are both easy to get started with, let me know if you want an intro.
CyrusL 14y ago
On the larger exchanges, not really. This would be like a retail investor wanting access to NASDAQ or NYSE rather than Schwab or E-Trade. Some of the 3rd-tier exchanges may be exceptions.
- CyrusL 14y ago
  Oops, I just saw you said few hundred thousand. I read "a few hundred" at first. Then yes, absolutely.
earl 14y ago
Why would you want to directly participate? It's a lot of tech and overhead for what? I think what you really want is a good dsp that will help you leverage your first party data; maybe look at triggit?
- indyadguy 14y ago
  We've been using Triggit for years. I can't say enough good things about them or the product. Well worth the call!
14y ago

cowboybob 14y ago

This looks similar to AppNexus: http://www.appnexus.com/ http://www.appnexus.com/

yaix 14y ago

How is this different from AdWords?

CyrusL 14y ago
LeanMarket's value proposition is probably not very clear to anyone who isn't familiar with real-time bidding. This Google whitepaper goes over the industry at a high level: http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrusted_dlcp/www.google.com/en/us/doubleclick/pdfs/Google-White-Paper-The-Arrival-of-Real-Time-Bidding-July-2011.pdf http://static.googleusercontent.com/external_content/untrust... One core component of RTB is the separation of supply and demand. This is different than the ad network model where a central hub connects the buyers and sellers who all work with the network. This "central hub" approach is true of AdWords; you can buy traffic from AdSense publishers through AdWords and no one else. Through LeanMarket, you can buy impressions from publishers who sell through Google, Microsoft, Admeld, Rubicon, or PubMatic--none of whom LeanMarket has a direct relationship with.

aslewofmice 14y ago

How's your mobile capability? Are you tied into any Mobile specific exchanges? I'm guessing you're running your own ad server... is it performing well for Mobile devices? Judging the by the screenshots, it looks like a pretty clean interface. It really surprises me how convoluted RTB UI's are when it's really not a complicated workflow. Great job, very impressive! There's a lot of potential in this space...