Report: Macromedia Flash Increases Effectiveness of Online Advertising

San Francisco -- August 6, 2001 - Macromedia, Inc. (NASDAQ: MACR)today announced that new guidelines from the Interactive AdvertisingBureau’s (IAB) Rich Media Task Force will make it easier formarketers and agencies to use rich media such as Macromedia Flash formore effective online advertising. In addition, recently publishedresults found that Macromedia Flash provides greater impact for onlineadvertising than other technologies. Macromedia Flash 5 is the standardfor producing high-impact web experiences.

"Macromedia Flash is the best way to convey branding and increaseclick-through rates for online advertising," said Meredith Searcy,director of product marketing, Macromedia. "By using Macromedia Flash,advertisers can deliver interactive, high-impact content that providesthem with more options than traditional banner ads."

The IAB guidelines are baselines enabling sites and advertisers towork from a common starting point, and scale their creative efforts.The Task Force includes the following companies: Ask Jeeves, Inc., CNETNetworks, Inc., CNN Interactive, DoubleClick Inc., MSN, Terra Lycos,Walt Disney Internet Group, and Yahoo. DoubleClick and MSN recentlyissued studies, which examined ad technologies such as video, audio,.gif, and Macromedia Flash. The DoubleClick study, conducted byDiameter, found that Macromedia Flash increased branding metrics by 71%for three different-sized ads measured, demonstrating the brandingpower of richer media. The other three technologies delivered a 14%improvement for audio, 9% for video, and 4% for .gif in the samestudy.

More information about the advertising study and rich mediaadvertising guidelines is available at the IAB's website at www.iab.net. For more information aboutMacromedia, visit www.macromedia.com.