The last time I blogged, I was still figuring out my project. Well since then, I have finished one of my projects (after spending a few 14 hour days), made presentations and started working on my other projects. Online advertising is an ever evolving field, with new technologies evolving rapidly (compare it to offline advertising, which has been in steady state for decades!) and the strategy group provided a great experience to get an overall view of the business in a few weeks.
Online advertising can be separated into Display advertising and Search advertising. The display advertising space is insanely complex. The current value chain is summarized here http://www.adexchanger.com/pdf/Display-Advertising-Technology-Landscape-2010-05-03.pdf. Being in the strategy group involves thinking through how each segment of the value chain is evolving, and which segments will be able to maintain their margins while other segments might get commoditized. The image above also gives a great idea of the main players in the field.
Search advertising is much more organized. Advertisers primarily bid on keywords in an auction, and the winning advertiser is chosen based on his bid price and the historical probability of the ad being clicked. Its fascinating how such a simple idea is leading to billions of dollars in revenue for Google.
At Seattle, we probably have one of the largest MBA intern communities (between Microsoft, Amazon and Boeing) and the fact that all of us stay in the same apartment complex doesnt hurt. We had a bar crawl before heading to a Mariners game last weekend, which was a lot of fun. What made it special was a few Rossers flew from around the country for the weekend! World cup matches on weekends is becoming a routine, as are boardgames nights and dinners on weekdays.
I am looking forward to the next 7 weeks and hopefully will have interesting stories to tell in my next post. Until then..
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