Our senior editor talks with Eyeblaster's President and CEO Gal Trifon about the rich media landscape.

iMedia: Can you identify any major trends you see in the way ad agencies will utilize online advertising in 2006?

Gal Trifon: Rich media has moved from having been a novelty to its role today as the mainstay for interactive communications. So, I’d identify the newfound ubiquity of rich media as one result of these trends looking back on 2005, and this is where I see them moving in 2006.

First of all, the level of talent at agencies that manage rich media has really increased. This has led to an increased commitment to converting campaigns that had been delivered as static banners into rich media. That’s one reason why we’ve focused so much of our efforts on driving innovation to enable agencies to do as much as possible using rich media, since the demand for it continues to rise. 

Secondly, the integration of media channels has also driven our sector to new heights. With technological advances having made it possible to better leverage data gathering through interactivity of units, and authoring tools making these units more creative and engaging than ever, people probably will be doing things through rich media by this time next year that nobody is doing today.

That brings me to a third trend I anticipate for next year and beyond, one that I’ll just call future platforms. With marketers increasingly speaking in terms of brand engagement and with the migration of display enabling us to engage consumers in so many different ways than ever before -- in games, cell phones, hand-held devices and more -- the sky truly is the limit for where technology will enable us to go.

A final trend is the globalization of rich media campaigns. We are beginning to talk to clients about international campaigns where we will be able to serve both rich and non-rich creatives across several countries. In this area, we are taking a true lead since no other provider can offer the international depth we have. ACM -- our Advertising Campaign Manager, which is a single-source ad server designed to manage interactive communications across all networked digital channels -- reflects the type of innovation agencies will be looking for, now that rich media has become so widely accepted and standards are being promulgated.

iMedia: Are you saying that business drivers are really more important to nurturing creative development than creative drivers? That’s interesting, and maybe a bit counterintuitive.

Trifon: Creative drivers are best accommodated when business drivers are given comfort first. I think that’s true in any business, but it’s especially true in more creative disciplines when business drivers have to be accommodated. I don’t know anyone in this business who isn’t mindful of ROI -- that’s one of the reasons why interactive is taking so much budget from other media types. After all, isn’t attention to ROI one of the reasons why so many people use the expression, “at the end of the day….” before they make a point about business? We’re in an accountable business, and we all like to think that interactive is the most accountable of all advertising segments.

While our Rich Media Platform is designed with the creative process in mind, anyone who regularly has to design, create, manage and then report on rich media campaigns knows that ACM represents something significant here that accommodates the business side. Good business is about solving problems and ACM provides an intuitive, single source solution that allows agencies to create and manage campaigns across the spectrum of digital media. 

And that’s just from a focus on the agency side. With an eye also to the media side, we launched EyeNet, our “preferred partner” rich media network, this fall. The need to simplify and streamline the rich media process is evident in the fact that we’ve had great success in signing on partners.

iMedia: What do you say to the critics that say standardization of rich media ad serving will result in artificial creativity limits and create pressure to cram great concepts or technology into a standard ad package?

Trifon: We all know how important standardization is for rich media. And we believe that it will actually encourage more creativity, not less. However, many of the standards in effect today were created two or three years ago. Standards have to be set with enough flexibility and openness to enable people to work with some flexibility. The tension between the creative and the business drive is, overall, a positive one, and standards help enforce some discipline on both sides of the equation. The algebra here is important, and I’ve not seen any suggestions that standards will repress creative. 

iMedia: Can you elaborate?

Trifon: We just feel that any ad unit’s standards should be set with a wide palate, and over the fullness of time. When rich media was regarded as intrusive, critics focused on the intrusion. Now that rich media is more widely accepted, and there are actually more in-banner units than others, the creativity of all rich media units has expanded. We regard this as the trend moving forward, not the inverse. 

Next: What's driving the international market's rich media growth, the growing demand for online video and reflection on 2005.