AOL Beefs Up Ad Tech Arsenal With $100 Million Convertro Acquisition [THE BRIEF]

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AOL paid approximately $101 million to acquire Convertro, an ad tech company whose platform helps marketers understand which of their ad buys are working best and then helps optimize their spending based on its findings. Convertro's technology will be integrated into AOL's AdLearn ad-buying platform, which has become an increasingly important driver of revenues for the former dial-up internet king.

@WalmartLabs, the retailer's tech and innovation division, acquired Adchemy, a company currently focused on improving semantic search. Semantic search is a type of software that would allow search engines to understand the actual meaning of what people type into the search bar, rather than just processing the keywords entered.

Airbnb hired Coca-Cola executive Jonathan Mildenhall to be its new chief marketing officer. Mildenhall was most recently Coke's senior VP integrated marketing communication and design excellence for Coca-Cola North America.

Adweek reports that YouTube's "Google Preferred" offering, which reserves for brands advertising space on the top 5% of its content in different categories, also includes a special section that includes only the top 1%.

Pet care company Nestlé Purina sued rival Blue Buffalo for false advertising, claiming that Blue Buffalo includes poultry by-product meal in several of its best-selling products, despite advertising that its products are made only with natural ingredients and "real meat, whole grains, and veggies."

The Disney-owned YouTube network Maker Studios secured a commitment from Omnicom Media Group to spend in the low eight figures on advertising with the network. The deal will give Omnicom clients access to Maker Studios' video creators for branded content and other sponsorship deals.

The Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba filed for its initial public offering. It set a $1 billion fundraising target, but reports say that number is just a placeholder and the firm will likely be raising much more.

LinkedIn is rolling out segmented advertising for its 200 million+ international users, which will allow companies to serve ads to people based on their preferred language. They will also be able to select which countries they want to be able to see a given post.

Previously on Business Insider Advertising:

• Netflix Is Testing A New Logo - Here's What It Looks Like
• Walmart's Mysterious Adtech Acquisition Has Tongues Wagging Over The Price
• Listen To These Hot Models Try To Make Child Poverty Sound Sexy