In this interview, I had the opportunity to speak with Bill Flitter, Founder & CEO of Pheedo, a company focused on RSS advertising and analytics for distributed content on the web. They provide the means to assess the Return on Investment of a site’s RSS feed by analyzing subscriber traffic and demographics, as well as tools to generate revenue from the feed through the integration of ads.

Bill begins the interview by discussing the tremendous size of the RSS market, citing studies revealing that 43-53% of today’s internet users are consuming feeds, whether they realize it or not. For example, the Facebook home page aggregates content from all friend-related online activity, allowing the user to consume information about their friends in one place instead of visiting individual Facebook profiles.

Pheedo provides feed publishers with a holistic view of all activity related to their feeds, allowing publishers to determine the ROI of their RSS feeds and really assess the value of their syndicated content. Their service can track details on feed traffic, allowing publishers to learn information about their subscribers, who have a stronger loyalty than ordinary website visitors, and are thus more valuable to advertisers. Pheedo also works with Fortune 1000 advertisers to embed ads into RSS feeds, and they share 50-70% of the ad revenue with the publishers.

Bill talks about how Pheedo is distinct from companies like Feedburner, in that they focus specifically on premium publishers (e.g. CNET, New York Times, Wired, etc) rather than small blogs. They allow these publishers to extensively analyze the behavior of active readers, and integrate ads from their own corporate partners, going beyond the simplified analytics and Google AdSense advertising options that Feedburner provides. Bill also shares his thoughts on Pheedo’s unique advantages when competing with Google in this space.

Bill also discusses the technology behind Pheedo’s services, explaining the fingerprints added to the RSS feed for analytics and advertising, as well as the challenges with JavaScript and IFRAME compatibility issues when embedding ads into feeds. He also chats about the history of the company, the opportune timing with the immense growth of RSS, his experience as the founder of multiple startups, and his advice for successful VC negotiation, so you won’t want to miss this interview!

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Posted in Web 2.0 |