With Microsoft's (MSFT) vice president of online ad sales, Mike Hard, saying he has been spending this holiday season talking with advertisers about placement for next years' Christmas season ... and even beyond that, it makes one wonder if this is the beginning of an upfront model for the Internet? My answer: Yes and no.
First of all, the Internet advertising market is finally starting to take on some predictability, and so in certain segments, it's as profitable to market online as on any other media platform.
One different element that's included on the Internet, as it relates to the more desirable advertising content, is the advertisers have been taking the lead on what's being called the Internet "upfront," in contrast to television, where the 
producers lead the process. At this time it's being done on an invitation basis instigated by marketers.
This doesn't mean the explosion of user-generated content has done anything to spur this on, on the contrary, it's considered for the most part useless by the majority of marketing firms.
Where there is a kind of upfront emerging online, is in the hyper-targeted market, where websites or blogs focus on niche products or demographics. It is in that quality content where deals and a sort of online upfront is emerging.
To define what is being called an online upfront, it's simply selling advertising against content way ahead of the expected high visitation times. Content relating to health, automotive, personal finance and gadgets continues to be desirable content to place advertising against.
Other niches starting to get the advertising nod early are beauty and bridal related content.
At this time this isn't an upfront, in the way the word has been used in the televison industry. But the need to buy advertising early against quality, targeted content online is increasing. A number of advertisers have already committed their online spend for 2008.
Call it whatever you want, the need to commit your ad spend on targeted, highly trafficked web sites must be entered into at a much earlier time than ever before. The reason is simply the lack of quality content online at this time.
Once the quality increases, we'll start to see a much broader base of content to work from, and possibly the Internet will turn pretty much into a year-long scatter market, much like it has been. Even if it does, desirable sites with the right content will start to command a premium price and early commitment. That can now be counted on.
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