Microsoft's plans to move towards more of an advertising-based revenue model are being aided by the development of its new Content Ads offering.In an interview with Internetnews.com, analyst at Directions on Microsoft Matt Rosoff said that Content Ads form part of the plan which will see the company switch to this model over the coming years.
The new advertising system, which Microsoft will begin beta testing next week, will provide text-only, context-sensitive adverts on content pages.
"It will allow advertisers to buy contextual, text-based ads on Microsoft's sites and those of select partners," Mr Rosoff confirmed.
According to a company statement, advertisers will be able to bid on keywords for advertisements which will appear on Microsoft's sites - including MSN.
"Microsoft Content Ads allows you to place content-targeted ads on the Microsoft network ... [where] you can access the valued MSN audience on high-quality Microsoft content network pages [including] MSN Tech & Gadgets, Money, Real Estate, and Windows Marketplace," said David Jakubowski, general manager of adCenter, in a posting on Microsoft's adCenter blog.
"Until now, this premium inventory has been available directly only through the MSN sales team and has commanded premium pricing."
The Content Ads product is seen as a Microsoft's answer to Google's AdWords, which is the largest revenue-generating section of the search engine's repertoire.
Earlier this week, the Wall Street Journal revealed that social networking site Facebook is also trying to establish a similarly successful ad system.
