Study: Targeted ads worth at least twice as much

ehaviorally-targeted advertising secured an average of 2.68 times as much revenue per ad as non-targeted “run of network” advertising. When consumers click, 6.8 percent of those who click on targeted ads end up buying what’s advertised, compared to 2.8 percent for run-of-network ads.

The study comes out just as Google’s AdWords unit is being reported to be providing new retargeting tools to members of Google’s ad network. Retargeting is a refinement of behavioral advertising in which consumer behavior is tracked, and ads are served based on that behavior, which is to say, based on the sites a consumer visits...