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| Point-Roll Debuts New Ad Unit on iWon.com |
| June 25, 2001
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SAN FRANCISCO - Jules Gardner, CEO of Point.Roll, cites Let's Make a Deal when describing his company's new advertising vehicle, which goes live today on iWon.com. Like contestants on the game show, users get to pick which ads they want to view from behind five logo-branded icons in a bannerlike ad unit.
The 30x728 pixel product, called Top-Roll, will be marketed to publishers. As a user rolls the mouse over one of the five individually branded icons, a 728x200 pixel mini-Web site drops down from the small logo. There are no clicks involved and the user is not hijacking from the page.
"If we continue to put giant, in-your-face ads on the Internet, we're just going to encourage users to find an ad-blocking software," said Gardner. With Top-Roll, the logo is hardcoded on the page, but the user can ultimately control whether he or she looks deeper into the content by doing a mouse rollover.
Philadelphia-based Point.Roll, which positions itself as a rich-media technology company, is in competition with big companies like Enliven and Bluestreak. However, Point.Roll's technology, unlike that of its competitors, uses Java script, dHTML and HTML rather than Java Applets, Gardner said. As a result, he claims the ad content is already client side when a user rolls over the icon. With Java Applets, there is a second call when the mouse rolls over the icon or a click is made.
The new Top-Roll product uses the same technology as the company's Point.Roll product released last year. However, the new product is targeted at publishers rather than advertisers. Unlike the Point.Roll product, the Top-Roll unit allows multiple advertisers to advertise in the same space.
"We're making it easier for publishers to aggregate their own advertisers," said Gardner.
Irvington, N.Y.-based Web portal iWon will be the first site to host the new units. Advertisers using the ads include Universal Studios, NextCard, Ralston Purina Co., Ford Motor Co., Unilever, Sony Vaio, Gateway and Datek Online. The units will run on the Winners and Money micro-sites on iWon.
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