Remember widgets? Well, they’re still around, they’re just far more interactive. Sprout, the company that launched an impressive widget builder two years ago, is diving deeper into advertising, as it shifts its products to better suit today’s market. This has all led up to Sprout integrating with DoubleClick, adding the ability to serve ads as well as help you create them.

Perhaps you’ve noticed the change in advertising methods, moving from display ads to app ads. This has occurred primarily in the mobile market, as apps from particular brands can act as methods of advertising themselves. The web overall is becoming more fluid and interactive, meaning ads need to keep up.

Sprout has spent the last six months addressing these changing needs, layering in new features to create Flash and HTML5 ads simultaneously, reducing the amount of work needed to make dynamic and interactive ads for varying platforms. Having had a great deal of practice as a preferred developer on Facbook, Sprout has witnessed first hand the needs of consumers as well as brands.

Taking things one step further, Sprout can help you create the ad, and deliver it. This is the company’s latest move in working towards a full-circle service. From the release,

“Now, ads created using Sprout Engage can be uploaded to DoubleClick Studio. The integration allows ad properties, such as rich media events, to be setup during ad creation and carry over to DoubleClick Studio, where the Sprout Engage Ads can be previewed, tested and pushed to DFA or DFP. This ensures the ads can be served by DFA/DFP, which provides clients with accurate measurement metrics wherever the ads are run across the web.”

Good Timing

It’s a good time for Sprout to delve into ads in this manner, particularly as things continue to play out on the mobile scene. This is an area of great interest for Sprout, with Senior Director of Marketing Roland Smart saying that “[mobile] is the direction we’re headed. Google has long-term plans to build out its display offerings, making Sprout’s new integration a dually beneficial one. Google’s also looking to real-time ad options, as well as additional tracking mechanisms, as it grows its plethora of metrics tools for enterprise solutions.

That’s not to say that everything’s rosy for DoubleClick. Glam is pulling away from the Google giant, citing its high costs in relation to its efficiency. Launching its own competitor, Glam is also hoping to reel in brands with a full-service suite.

For Sprout, its DoubleClick integration looks like a smart move, especially as it becomes part of a larger initiative. One way in which Sprout is already hedging its bets is with a detection tool that determines if an ad needs to be served in Flash or HTML5. This preserves the interactivity of the ad, and avoids holes in analysis and displaying of those ads.