The new version of the Kalimat Araby advertising platform, by Maktoob subsidiary Araby, will be released in private beta soon for current users of the platform, both advertisers and publishers, to try and get their feedback on the new system and integrate any important suggestions before its official launch.
Kalimat Araby was originally launched in June 2007; and the new system will bring a set of technical and functional enhancements.
While the old system was displaying keyword-related ads on search pages, the ads displayed on publisher’s content pages were pretty much random ads; with the new platform the displayed ads are contextual ones for both content and search pages.
Another feature being rolled out for Ad Agencies is the addition of a new special interface and an API to make their work buying ads and setting up campaigns for their customers easier.
From the publisher’s point of view, a set of new features are being introduced as well; from Ad filtering, to registering multiple sites under one account, to management of ad zones and more; making it easier for them to better serve and optimize ads from the Kalimat Araby network.
Technically speaking, the system will be able to scale a lot better with the changes that were made under the hood; and a very important and interesting addition for advertisers is a new click audit mechanism that should eliminate most common click fraud issues.
The new system’s interface will be in two languages now, both Arabic and English, instead of Arabic only for the old system; with the possibility to add more languages.
With Kalimat Araby maturing into a well-rounded product, I expect we’ll slowly start to see it spreading onto more publisher websites and being generalized on to the whole Maktoob network of web sites and properties, making it a sort of one place stop for placing ads on Maktoob’s content network, online services, and even newly launched Maktoob TV; as well as a list of other publishers’ web properties.