• by Laurie Sullivan  @lauriesullivan, February 20, 2014

Open ad management company Sizmek on Thursday will roll out a Connect partner network program focused on social media to foster the growth of cross-channel advertising through its platform.

Sizmek wants to become the hub. The spokes become social, search, display, video, mobile and other media channels. The initiative aims to create the ability to easily share data with Sizmek’s cross-channel ad management platform, Sizmek MDX, which sits at the center of any brand's social advertising initiative.

Partners rolling out with the program include Adaptly, Upcast, CitizenNet, SocialCode and SHIFT, but company execs expect to add others soon.

Andrew Bloom, senior vice president, strategic business development at Sizmek, previously DG, said Social Connect is part of the company's open ad stack initiative. "We already have Channel Connect for Search," he said. "We plan to announce other connect partner programs in the near future."

The impact of Social Connect and how it relates to various cross-channel concerns, like data insights, execution, rich media deployment and creative optimization, is a big issue.

The partnerships should allow clients to better measure the impact of social on overall campaign performance, launch global campaigns in multiple markets and gain access to advanced creative optimization techniques.

"Social media and networking" photo from Shutterstock.