Facebook re-released its ad server Atlas this morning, a move many anticipated since Facebook bought the technology from Microsoft last February. The new Atlas has been heralded by some as a significant development not just for Facebook, but for Web advertising, in general. With Atlas, Facebook proposes it will be able to better track ad performance across sites and devices, helping solve the “attribution” problem that plagues digital marketers. A rundown of what Atlas is, and why it’s important for the digital media industry follows: A short history of Atlas Atlas is an ad server previously owned by Microsoft. Microsoft acquired Atlas when it bought Atlas’s corporate parent aQuantive in 2007 for $6 billion. The “new” Atlas isn’t so much new as it is a Facebook-ified version of the existing product. An ad server is “a collection of software that helps advertisers manage, deliver and measure the effectiveness of their campaigns” from a central hub, Eric Litman, CEO of ad server Medialets, explained to Digiday.

Say a brand is simultaneously running ad campaigns through a demand-side platform, an ad exchange, an ad network and on a publisher’s website via a direct buy. The brand’s ad server would house all the creative assets and data needed for the various campaigns and ensure that the ads were served to their intended publishers and demographic targets. The ad server would also provide a holistic report on how those various ads were performing. The significance for Facebook Atlas will integrate an ad server’s functionality with Facebook’s unprecedentedly rich trove of user profiles. By tracking which ads its users see both on Facebook and other sites, Atlas will be able to better measure conversions across various devices. That is, Facebook can prove that its desktop and mobile ads do indeed work, thus prompting advertisers to spend more on Facebook. “Facebook can control the story about the effectiveness of inventory,” Litman said. “They want a product that represents to advertisers the value of Facebook inventory the way that Facebook thinks it to be valuable.”

Cross-device tracking, or the advertising “holy grail”Coleman Furnace Parts For Mobile Homes This is particularly important for tracking the effectiveness of ads on mobile devices, where cookies — long the lifeblood of digital advertising — are functionally irrelevant.Cheap Coral Drapes Say Pepsi is concurrently running campaigns aimed at getting people to sign up for the Pepsi Points loyalty program on Facebook and BuzzFeed, one of the 10,000 publishers Atlas measures. Hello Kitty Car Seat Covers SetIf a consumer sees a promoted post from Pepsi on Facebook’s mobile app and takes no action, but decides to sign up after reading a Pepsi listicle ad on BuzzFeed on a desktop, Atlas would track that consumer’s conversion path, ostensibly giving Facebook credit for an ad that was not clicked on.

“Cross-device attribution is a huge part of this because it’s the one piece Facebook has that no one else does: It knows who your customers are on mobile devices,” said Jonathan Nelson, ceo of digital at Omnicom, which signed an agency-wide ad serving and measurement partnership with Atlas as part of this launch. Approximately three-quarters of smartphone users are signed into Facebook, either directly to the Facebook app or by using their Facebook profile to sign into another website, Nelson added. Implications for ad spending in general If Facebook is able to prove that mobile ads are effective, Atlas could precipitate a growth in mobile ad spend across the Web. Just less than a quarter (23.3 percent) of media consumption in the U.S. occurs on mobile, but mobile constitutes just 11.4 percent of advertising spend, according to eMarketer. Many blame this discrepancy on the attribution difficulties Atlas will possibly solve. Atlas will also help brands track the effectiveness of their campaigns on Instagram, which has started scaling its ads business recently.

Instagram has been embraced by many prestigious brands such as Mercedes-Benz, but they have not to date been able to track how effective their ads have been beyond counting likes and scouring through the comments. Atlas will allow those advertisers to see if their Instagram ads affect consumer behavior elsewhere on the Web. Facebook’s most formidable competition with Atlas is Google — which by encouraging users to login to its various apps and websites such as Gmail, Google Maps and Google Chrome — is the only platform with knowledge on users’ cross-device habits that can rival Facebook’s. “DoubleClick [Google’s ad server] today has a dominant position on buy-side ad serving,” Litman said. “There isn’t another scaled player in the market that can offer a real competitive alternative to the DoubleClick stack.” Cross-device attribution has been a point of emphasis for Google lately, which launched a tool last October to help marketers estimate their cross-device conversions.

But the barrier to entry for new competitors is low, Litman said. Any property that requires a login — Amazon, Twitter, Yahoo — could buy or develop an ad server and start measuring similarly to Atlas.Imitation as a form a flattery. Two weekends ago, I had a booth at a health and wellness expo and I had a chance to observe a practitioner of a new form of atlas work called Atlasprofilax. Initially I was curious about what he was doing, I’m always open to learning new things.  But now have decided that this is a potentially dangerous procedure and do not recommend people receive it. Here are my reasons: His literature states that the atlas moves out of alignment the same way in every person. This is not true!  In the thousands of x-rays that I have taken, I can demonstrate that each misalignment is unique and individual to each person.  This is backed up by decades of research by NUCCA and other upper cervical chiropractic procedures. To make this worse: They use an thrusting instrument on the upper neck, delivering multiple hard thrusts.

If they are trying to move a person’s atlas in a certain direction, only a percentage of their clients will have their atlases misaligned in the direction they they think it is. They could be moving the atlas in the wrong direction. Then they label any adverse reaction as a healing crisis. A healing crisis can occur when someone retraces an old injury and may feel pain andA health crisis is when you have pain and problems from a new injury or an aggravation of an old one. It takes a qualified health practitioner to be able to listen, do an accurate and objective analysis (that includes a follow up visit) to determine if a person is having a health or healing crisis. Unfortunately, these lay people are using range of motion and palpation to fool themselves into thinking that they are realigning everyone. They don’t realign everyone. I was only able to asses three people that had received this procedure. All three were showing an atlas misalignment with stress on their nervous systems.

I regularly screen individuals that do not have an atlas misalignment. These three were not one of them. They only see people one time. This practitioner and others travel to different towns, manipulate people’s atlases and then leave. The one that was here was from Los Angeles and seems to be making a circuit around the country. Before I get a bunch of email, let me clarify. I know that they are helping some people (they are dealing with the atlas of course!), but I am giving my professional opinion on why this procedure could be dangerous. If you want to get your atlas realigned, go to one of the many excellent upper cervical chiropractic doctors around the country. In my office, I take upper cervical x-rays before the first adjustment, as well as after to make sure that the correction is good. I also to regular follow up visits to make sure that people are doing well. Unfortunately, I don’t always get it right the first time, but I as I improve this happens less. Some of my patients that have had the most amazing results were are ones that I didn’t get right the first time.

I followed up, listed, made the appropriate “adjustments”, and they did well. That is why we call this practice. I’ve received emails and comments from people all over the world about Atlasprofilax, Atlantotec and Atlas Evolution since I first published this article. Many people have told me the benefits that they’ve received from these procedures. However, I’ve had numerous people contact me both on this site and privately about being injured by it. It wasn’t just by one rogue practitioner, it was by several different practitioners. I stand by my comments that there can be a serious downside with the force that they use and directing it into the upper cervical area. There are some upper cervical chiropractic procedures that use lots of force, but they at least take x-rays that minimize the chance of problems. Personally, I don’t even like that amount of force and use significantly less in my practice. Advanced Spinal Care Center (440) 461-9774 Monday 9:30am - 6:00pm Tuesday 9:30am - 6:00pm Wednesday Closed Thursday 9:30am - 6:00pm Friday 9:30am - 6:00pm Saturday Closed Sunday Closed