Social advertising startup Moontoast just announced that it has raised $5 million in Series B funding. CEO Blair Heavey told me that the company currently works with about 50 clients. It’s not an enormous list, but one that includes names like Universal, Lexus, Nike, Ford, Lady Antebellum, Time, and Simon & Schuster. Advertisers use Moontoast to create custom, interactive ads for social media — the ad types listed on the Moontoast site include a “social store,” surveys, sweepstakes, and a unit to offer free MP3s in exchange for email addresses. Co-founder and CTO Marcus Whitney told me that the ads usually incorporate some form of rich media, but they aren’t just traditional ads repackaged for Facebook or Twitter. “In the social advertising world, the actual creative is conversational,” Whitney said. “It’s much more marketing than standard, old world advertising. Our units are meant to really bring the conversation to life.” The round was led by The Martin Companies and brings Moontoast’s total funding to around $14 million Read more »
Google’s Chrome Remote Desktop Screen Sharing Service Comes Out Of Beta, Adds Real-Time Audio For Windows
Google just announced that it is taking its Chrome Remote Desktop screen sharing service out of beta. As the name implies, the Chrome Remote Desktop app runs in Chrome and allows you to share your desktop with others or control theirs to see presentations — or, as Google notes, become the family hero by “adjusting printer settings on your mom’s computer to finding a lost file on your dad’s laptop.” In addition to taking the service out of beta, Google also added a few new features to the tool Read more »
Seeking To Become The Eventbrite Of Japan, PeaTiX Raises $1 Million From 500 Startups And Others
Like the U.S., Japan has a ticketing problem. Big incumbents keep independent event producers from managing ticket sales and growing their events. Read more »
Hands On With Google Drive On iOS
As promised at this morning’s Google I/O conference , Google has launched a version of its Google Drive application on iOS today, which offers native support for the service formerly known as Google Docs on both iPhone and iPad. The app is live now in iTunes, and looks to give competitor Dropbox a run for its money. Although Google Drive has offered a mobile web version of its service for some time, many people prefer using a native application on their smartphones or tablets. Read more »
Survey: Telecommuting Becoming More Prevalent [INFOGRAPHIC]
Working from home is on the rise, and more companies are trusting their employees to be more productive in their own home offices than they might be at the workplace. Read more »
4 Tools for Better Agency-Client Collaboration
This post originally appeared on the American Express OPEN Forum , where Mashable regularly contributes articles about leveraging social media and technology in small business. The most effective consultant/client relationships tend to morph into partnerships, in which the consultant is truly an extension of the internal team. However, elevating a relationship from “vendor” status to a meaningful collaboration isn’t always as easy as it sounds. Read more »