This week, we caught up with Jim Diaz, GM of AJinteractive , a division of AskJeeves to ask him how the launch of AJinteractive is going and how he thinks their offering is going to change the advertisers’ marketplace.

In early October, AskJeeves combined the advertising products and sales forces from Ask Jeeves U.S. and Interactive Search Holdings. ISH was acquired by Ask Jeeves in May 2004, and ISH properties include the MaxOnline network, Excite, My Way and iWon. AJinteractive was formed to represent a larger array of advertising products and give buyers a single point of contact for advertising across a network of leading online properties. AJinteractive will offer search, direct marketing and media solutions.

Diaz said their mission is to give advertisers one-stop shopping and access to an expanded reach of products and properties. Diaz says, “The important thing is bringing together these three well-established entities all together, and becoming a one-stop shop, so you can buy across all the different marketing channels online.”

AJinteractive’s goal according to Diaz is to “separate ourselves from the pack and the must-buys like Google and Overture. We intend to compete with the must-buy properties and from the ad buyer perspective our combination has a lot to offer.” Diaz says it’s about making the process easier for the buyer. “No matter what you’re offering at the end of the day, it all comes down to ease and accountability. You’ve got to make your buying process as efficient as possible and deliver better ROI than traditional channels. That also involves having better ad management and tracking initiatives.”

As B2B and B2C ad buyers become increasingly hesitant to invest dollars without a substantiated and tracked ROI, AJinteractive hopes to capitalize on the demand toward relevancy and management tracking. “This bar never stops moving,” said Diaz noting that he sees the shift out of banners and toward search increasing and that buyers must also take into account the continuing growth of rich media usage.