When Google bought radio advertising play dMarc, there was more than a billion dollars in earnout to be had, if the company hit its targets. There was also $100 million or so in cash.
It’s hard to say what happened since, but the founders have left, and Google’s radio plans are discussed in the MediaPost as unproductive so far.
Radio advertising ain’t AdWords, that much is clear. What remains to be seen is whether Google is really committed to this business, and by extension, its dabbling in magazine and newspaper advertising. There’s a lot left to learn, I’m guessing, and the markets themselves are a long way from Google’s way of thinking. That I can say with some authority…
Update: This story was broken over at Paid Content….
and the Times weighs in…
More weight to the hypothesis that most advertising is a waste of money. New tools, some by Google, make these measurements easier. It’s even becoming clear that contextual text ads – probably the most effective type of ads ever invented – often don’t have positive ROI.
Go figure.