OREANDA-NEWS. May 31, 2011. Mail.Ru Group announces the launch of the beta version of the Target platform for targeted advertising in social networks. As of today, the platform allows companies to place their ads in social networks — My World@Mail.Ru and Odnoklassiniki.

The Target is designed to enable tens of thousands of advertisers, regardless of the size and kind of business, to access the multi-million audience of Mail.Ru Group, which currently runs Russia’s largest social networks. Now you can target your ad at visitors of a certain sex, age, and location, and the range of parameters available will be expanded regularly.

The Target allows the promoting of both external websites and corporate pages in social networks (applications, communities, information pages, etc.).

To send money to your Target account, you can use Money@Mail.Ru, other major e-purses, payment cards, QIWI terminals, and Internet banking systems.

Developers of applications for My World@Mail.Ru can pay for their ad campaign with money earned through sales of additional services. Similar functions will soon appear in Odnoklassniki, too. 

Target pricing is based on the price for the showing. At the next stage, we plan to offer advertisers the opportunity to buy ads via pay-per-click auctions.

Developers of the Target have taken into account of the numerous experiences and feedback provided by users of the advertising system Ads@Mail.Ru, launched a number of months ago. In contrast to the system of automatic ad sales via Ads@Mail.Ru, which is available from My World@Mail.Ru only, the Target already provides a fully-fledged service for both social networks of the company, with potential accessibility from other Mail.Ru Group projects.

"Throughout the world, targeted advertising is acknowledged as a promising model for monetizing social networks. For precisely this reason it is critical for Mail.Ru Group to create an effective advertising service enabling tens of thousands of advertisers to access the audience of the two largest social networks of the Runet [Russian Internet].We are confident that Target will become not only a key business line for Mail.Ru Group, but that it will have a considerable impact on the development of the entire Russian market for advertising,’ said Mail.Ru Group co-founder and chief executive officer Dmitry Grishin".