Kiosked, a company that dynamically inserts ads into a publisher’s content, has a new CEO — co-founder Antti Pasila.
Pasila, who previously served as the company’s chief strategy officer, said his appointment is part of a broader shift: “The key thing is, we’re focusing our resources on the supply side.” In other words, while there are no plans to get rid of Kiosked’s ad-buying tools, Pasila’s strategy moving forward is all about working with publishers.
Most readers don’t get too excited when they hear about new technologies for introducing ads, but Pasila argued that the Kiosked approach actually balances the needs of the publisher and the consumer — something that’s particularly important given the growth of ad-blocking options. Sure, Kiosked ads insert themselves into the story that you’re reading, but they’re meant to be high quality, relevant ads, and they don’t take control away from the reader.
“When you talk about user experience, you have to balance it out with monetization,” Pasila said. “You can’t fix one or the other part, you need to think about them both. There needs to be a consumer feeling of the value exchange … Taking out all the ads won’t solve anything for the publisher.”
Pasila co-founded the company in 2010 with Micke Paqvalen, the previous CEO, who’s becoming Kiosked’s chairman of the board.
So why is Pasila taking the reins now? He said it’s because he helped develop the publisher-centric strategy — “It was pretty clear that I would probably be the best one to execute this plan” — and is based in the United States, which is where Kiosked has most of its customers. (Paqvalen is based in Finland.)
The company says its revenue grew 400 percent last year, and that its publishers include DailyMail, News Corp and CNN.