Saturday 2 June 2007

Google Acquires Feedburner - Cheers all round!

It's official! After much speculation Google has acquired FeedBurner, the Chicago-based online feed syndication company. With it's user base of over 400,000 "burners" and an already developed advertising network, FeedBurner will be a formidable addition to Google's already-strong web services arsenal.

The benefits of this deal will extend to the users as well. Although Google has not yet announced their plans for integrating, Feedburner is sure to benefit from Google's superior financial backing and extensive coverage. According to the official FeedBurner blog, the FeedBurner staff have three main goals they wish to achieve from the acquisition:

a) continue to provide our customers with the best feed analytics,
b) begin to provide a more comprehensive 360-degree view of audience and reach, and
c) enable publishers to most efficiently determine the best ways to distribute and monetize their content.

Basically what this means is that content providers will be able to access greater audience analysis and income-generation tools, while advertisers will be able to reach a greater user base with less effort and expense. Most likely, we will soon see Adsense for Feeds come out of testing and be incorporated with FeedBurner's advertising network to move towards this goal.

Why is everyone so excited about FeedBurner's acquisition? This is the big break for FeedBurner. Just like Blogger, Feedburner will continue to grow, and, with the help of Google, provide increased service, integration, and income for web publishers and advertisers. Just when this level of integration will be achieved is uncertain, but one this is for sure:

Google + Feedburner = ∞!

No comments: