4 of 5
BACKNEXT
Beyond the banner ad
Beyond the banner ad
CEO Venkat Kolluri (left) and CTO Alden DoRosario, with a laptop displaying a Chitika ad

The product: Chitika
Sounds simple enough, at first: They serve Web ads.

But then it gets more complicated: People's eyes tend to glaze over when Chitika marketing director Daniel Ruby explains that his company, based in Marlborough, Mass., offers ads that are "search-targeted rather than contextual" and describes how "instead of scanning a site for what the network deems relevant terms, we advertise directly to the intent of the user."

As Ruby puts it: "Never seems to be an easy message to get across."

But push aside the technical jargon, and the product is fairly understandable. These ads look at what a customer is researching -- say, a vacation trip to Bermuda, on a search engine like Google or Bing. When the Web surfer then visits a site that uses Chitika, they see an ad for something relevant, like a cruise package. In other words, an ad that's based on their recent search history. It's kind of Big Brother-ish, but, hey, if it helps stimulate the economy...

What the experts say: "There are two types of customers for this kind of technology-heavy service," Calloway says. "The technology-savvy customers who want to know how it works -- and the guy like me who just wants to know if it works. I don't care how it works. If it does what you say it will do, then for all I care it can work because a magic wand passes over it and you say, 'Abracadabra!'"

For those customers, suggests Calloway, "Stop explaining how it works -- and just convince me that it does, in fact, work."

NEXT: If it's good enough for Europe ...

Email | Print | Share  |  RSS
 
google my aol my msn my yahoo! netvibes
Paste this link into your favorite RSS desktop reader
See all CNNMoney.com RSS FEEDS (close)
LAST UPDATE: Oct 22 2009 | 5:26 PM ET
Six steps to creativity Innovation is a process. Follow our road map to generate game-changing ideas for your business. More
The Eureka MomentIt's the sudden, blinding flash of inspiration that leads to a new product. We asked four inventors to share the story of theirs. More
What's your idea worth? A federally funded service helps small manufacturers find inventors with new technologies -- and estimate their worth. More
Sponsors

Most stock quote data provided by BATS. Market indices are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2018 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Factset: FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2018. All rights reserved. Chicago Mercantile Association: Certain market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. Dow Jones: The Dow Jones branded indices are proprietary to and are calculated, distributed and marketed by DJI Opco, a subsidiary of S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC and have been licensed for use to S&P Opco, LLC and CNN. Standard & Poor's and S&P are registered trademarks of Standard & Poor's Financial Services LLC and Dow Jones is a registered trademark of Dow Jones Trademark Holdings LLC. All content of the Dow Jones branded indices © S&P Dow Jones Indices LLC 2018 and/or its affiliates.