Tameka Kee

Tameka Kee has been covering the digital media industry with a focus on advertising, social media and video games for nearly four years.

Before launching Kee Consulting (clients include Econsultancy and SocialTimes Pro), she served as editorial director of DM2 Media, where she oversaw content development for DIGIDAY:DAILY, as well as the company’s roster of digital media and marketing conferences, including DPAC and DIGIDAY:APPS.

Before joining DM2, she served as a full time reporter for paidContent, covering the business of digital entertainment and gaming, and breaking news on companies like Electronic Arts, Playfish, Netflix and Facebook. Before paidContent, she covered search marketing for Mediapost.

Kinect could be Microsoft’s ticket to addressable advertising on your TV

With movies from Netflix, games from ESPN, music from Last.fm, and status updates from Twitter, Microsoft has evolved the Xbox 360 into a premium content delivery device, not just a game console. Now, with its new Kinect motion-controller system, the company has the means to turn the Xbox 360 into a hyper-targeted ad platform.

After all, Kinect can recognize different users by their faces.

by Tameka Kee 12 November 2010 13:22pm 1 comment

Three tips for mobile shoppers this holiday season

The latest research from the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) confirms what most advertisers should already know: More consumers will use their phones to search for gifts and deals this holiday season than in 2009. But how much of that searching will actually translate into mobile-based buying?

by Tameka Kee 12 November 2010 13:12pm 1 comment

Has digital bled the creativity out of advertising?

Optimization and targeting. Segmentation and analytics. There are countless tools that let digital marketers track the effectiveness of their campaigns, and even tweak them on the fly for a better ROI. And yet, when it comes to accepting new ad formats and strategies, there are still cries for "better metrics" and "more accountability."

What of creativity? Don’t ads need to be engaging and beautiful enough to attract a click (if that’s the metric you’re going for) in the first place?

by Tameka Kee 11 November 2010 20:48pm 4 comments

Early reaction to the new AdSense interface

After a year’s worth of tweaking, Google is rolling out a new interface for its AdSense contextual advertising platform. The goal? To help publishers "make more money," according to the Inside AdSense blog. The company says over two million publishers currently use AdSense, and the changes come as a result of listening to lots of feedback.

Makes sense, but the fact there are multiple contextual and in-text ad networks to use, as well as targeted networks such as Glam and Complex Media that publishers can join, was likely just as much a factor in the revamp.

by Tameka Kee 11 November 2010 13:07pm 4 comments

Hulu’s voodoo: Optimized online video ads lead to double the revenue in 2010

Hulu has finally shed light on how much money it's bringing in. At the NewTeeVee Live event, CEO Jason Kilar said Hulu would close out 2010 with over $240 million in revenue. That’s double the $108 million it made last year, and a nice benchmark for comparison to online video platforms across the board.

It’s very strong growth, particularly when gauged against the overall US online video ad market. eMarketer predicts advertisers will spend roughly $1.5 billion on online video ads in 2010. Hulu’s $240 million equates to a roughly 16% share of that market. So how has the company attracted so much demand?

by Tameka Kee 11 November 2010 00:15am 1 comment

Back to the future: How Hollywood is fueling the adoption of augmented reality

AVTR Coke Zero screengrab

Say what you will about Hollywood's lack of creativity, but the industry is decidedly innovative when it comes to movie promotion. Take augmented reality, for example. At the AR Immersion 2010 event in Los Angeles, execs rattled off examples of movie and TV studios using augmented reality (AR) to drive ticket sales, video on-demand purchases, and DVD sales at retail.

AR development firm Total Immersion hosted the event. Jason Smith, the company's manager of pre-sales and product marketing for North America, outlined three ways these movie and TV studios are making AR part of their marketing plans.

by Tameka Kee 10 November 2010 12:54pm 2 comments

Q&A: So, Larry Fink, why did The Palms decide to try Facebook Deals?

Palms Casino Resort webpage

The Palms Casino Resort is one of those spots in Las Vegas that's notorious for its "hip" status. (It even spawned a reality TV show called "Party @ the Palms"). So when the Palms was featured as one of the first companies to offer location-based deals on Facebook, the pairing made sense. After all, "hip" companies are the first to experiment with "hip" new ad units, right?

According to Larry Fink, the Palms Casino Resort's executive director of public relations, offering Facebook Deals is about more than just being hip. It's about creating opportunities to generate incremental revenue from customers already earned through other means.

by Tameka Kee 09 November 2010 13:26pm 1 comment

Anatomy of a cross-platform campaign: How HBO Sports plugs Pacquiao-Margarito

Subscription-based cable companies have been among the most reluctant to “go digital,” both with their marketing campaigns and with their content. Keeping expensive TV shows and pay-per-view (PPV) events behind paywalls makes sense, but neglecting to promote that content via digital channels (running a few banner ads doesn’t count) is inexcusable.

Analysis of HBO Sports’ digital campaign to market the upcoming boxing match between Manny Pacquiao and Antonio Margarito, however, shows the companies are becoming wiser.

by Tameka Kee 08 November 2010 21:08pm 2 comments

Performics: Three tips for optimizing paid search campaigns for mobile this holiday season

Halloween’s gone and Thanksgiving is on the horizon. That means it’s time for the holiday ad onslaught, which means a razor-sharp focus on optimizing paid search campaigns for most retailers. Performics predicts retail sales from actively managed paid search campaigns will grow 15% this holiday season. CEO Daina Middleton recommends creating and optimizing standalone mobile search campaigns - not just using existing holiday search campaigns - to foster sales growth.

Read on for three tips on making those mobile search campaigns more effective.

by Tameka Kee 09 November 2010 18:59pm 1 comment

Lessons from Apple’s social networking #fail with Ping

There are many things digital marketers can learn about customer engagement from Apple. How to launch and sustain your own social network is not one of them. Two months after the launch of Ping, Apple’s music social network is failing to resonate with users. (It's dead in the water, if you ask Fast Company).