You don’t see a lot of gray hair amongst the fresh-faced go-getters at Silicon Alley gatherings, and when you do, it’s less likely to belong to an entrepreneur than to an Old World exec putting a toe in the water. But Bob Wolfe is different.
An attorney all his career, the 56-year-old Wolfe just got the U.S. patent for a radical idea that could shake up the dot.com industry: targeted audio advertising. His New Rochelle company The Music Booth has developed “AdAcoustics” technology, which enables advertisers to deliver ads that know who you are.
“Banner ads have proved to be a failure,” says Wolfe. “They’re intrusive, and click-through rates are low. I want to give advertisers a new way to reach people, and a new revenue stream.” (He certainly has the Silicon lingo down.)
The target market is people who have streaming audio on in the background while they web-surf. And that’s a lot of people, thanks to the aggressive marketing of RealPlayer and Microsoft’s catch-up software Windows MediaPlayer. Between songs, or between every few songs, listeners who opt in will hear a sponsored message for a product they are very likely to care about. AdAcoustics lets advertisers know who the listener is based on a profile provided by the portal where the surfer got his or her music.
For example, if you go to Yahoo! Radio and select Eighties Tunes, your Yahoo! profile would alert advertisers as to who you are and would hit you, on the fly, with aging-Xer ads for things like SUVs, cruises and insurance. Profiles can be cross-re040 . 0000.00ferenced with other profiles belonging to market research firms, such as the vast information databases maintained by companies making packaged goods (soap, toothpaste, etc.).
“Even if the user goes to another website, the music goes with him,” says Wolfe. “This way, a site could charge 10 to 15 cents a message, as opposed to the 1 cent banner ads now cost. Another benefit is you can pull an ad quickly if it’s not working. Or you can run test campaigns before you move to more expensive media like TV.”
His enthusiasm for the Internet is complete. “I see this as the most exciting, monumental event of my lifetime,” he says in his slow, steady voice. “I had to get involved.”
It’s worth noting that he chose the software licensing model, not the riskier e-commerce model beloved of most biz school grads. He’s selling the tools for advertisers, not selling ads. In a gold rush, people selling the tools always make a better living than the average prospector. Themusicbooth.com is not an important part of the plan.
Wolfe says he is CEO of the company “for now” but is “not caught up in the get-rich-quick mentality” of many dot.comers.
“I have the good fortune not to need that,” he says.
Asked what he thinks of the Silicon Alley whippersnappers he’s competing with, he is surprisingly generous. “The notion that ‘youth’ means you don’t understand is not correct. They certainly know their technology,” he says. “They just might not have the depth of knowledge when it comes to running a business of an older person.”
040 . 0000.00 00000