By the end, Clinton was operating at half-strength: In most states, Obama had double or triple the field offices she had and often four to five times the ad budget.

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However, when major disasters happen, the process of learning from them is often ad hoc.

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The Groupon Web page for first-time users features an image of two cocktails, and its ad copy often touts that drinks like margaritas, ouzo or beer are included in the deal.

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However the issue with contextual advertising is that web publishers often sell out ad slots on their popular pages while a majority of their site remains unused.

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Better targeting through audio and image recognition could also improve the click-through rate of videos, or how often an ad is clicked for every time it appears.

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Soon MySpace's ad salesmen will use software that sifts through its members' profile pages and sorts them based on the often piercingly personal information they pin up on their pages.

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