Apple launched iAds way back in 2010. It hasn’t exactly taken the world by storm in the last two years, but hopefully this update to iAd Producer will entice some ad companies to explore the system.
In version 3.0, not only are there new templates to choose from when you’re making your ad, but the entire project overview UI has been retooled. Also important is the addition of new abilities for the finished product. iAds produced in version 3 will be able to add calendar events, place a call, add a ringtone, and even save a PDF to the iBooks library. All of a sudden, these ads just got a lot more interesting.
If you want to take iAd Producer v3 for a test spin, you’ll need to drop $99 USD for an iOS developer account. The problem remains: not very many apps use iAds. In fact, I don’t have a single app on my iPad that displays any ads. Ads are a hard sell, and iAds could be even harder. Sure, you can do all sorts of neat interactive things, but if it doesn’t bring in enough cash for the devs or enough conversion for the advertiser, the chicken-egg cycle won’t even begin. Clearly, Apple has a lot more work to do.
This major release contains a number of new features and improvements, including:
- New templates
- New project overview user interface
- New layer list with search, re-ordering, and the ability to hide layers
- Project-wide shared layers
- Auto-advance between pages
- New built-in actions, including:
- Add calendar event
- Send email
- Place a call
- Add contact
- Add ringtone
- Take screen shot
- Set content offset for scrollView
- Add PDF to iBooks
- Set wallpaper
- Save to photo library
- Open URL
- Take photo
- iAd JS updated to version 1.6
Source: Apple
Hat tip for the feature list: 9to5Mac
