Online finance site SmartMoney.com is debuting a new print advertising campaign, designed to promote the Dow Jones-owned Web content play’s suite of specialized market tools.
Creatives designed by New York-based Digital Pulp will run in fellow Dow Jones publications, including the Wall Street Journal, Barron’s and Smart Money magazine. (Hearst Communications also owns a stake in the site.)
Spending was not disclosed.
The ads use the site’s new tagline, “Our insight, your vision,” in a bid to highlight SmartMoney.com’s content, columnists and particularly its online market analysis programs as a tool for the savvy investor.
According to Smart Money group marketing director Ari Brandt, it’s an especially lucrative time to launch an ad campaign because with the advertising slowdown, there’s so little “clutter.”
“At a time like this, it’s the best time because things are so quiet in the marketplace, and if there’s ever a good time to do strong branding, I believe now is it,” he said. “There’s no question. The way things are right now, it’s the best time to attract new visitors. There’s no clutter, and people are looking for answers … SmartMoney.com offers those answers.”
Several other online ventures have recently used such thinking. Web ad network 24/7 Media, for one, recently debuted a campaign seeking to win market share as most dot-coms continue to slash their marketing budget.
Brandt said Smart Money and Digital Pulp had developed five creatives, but not all might be used. At any rate, the ads will run until fourth quarter, with several insertions monthly in each pub.
“It’s a branding campaign, and the idea was to take our tools that are on the site … and visually represent them in real-life settings,” Brandt said.
One of the creatives, “Plan,” focuses on SmartMoney.com’s College Planner Tools, and shows a girl playing hopscotch. “Visualize,” meanwhile, touts the site’s Map of the Market tool — which graphically depicts market action — by showing patrons in an art gallery gazing at a piece of abstract art.
Copy for “Visualize” reads: “Take a step back and analyze the big picture with ‘Map of the Market’ from
SmartMoney.com … at the end of the day, perhaps the most important thing youll see with Map of the Market is how your own portfolio fits into the picture.”
The ad push is the most recent effort by SmartMoney.com following a campaign in early 2000. New York-based DiMassimo Brand Advertising previously handled that effort, which included television, print and online media, and which focused in part on brand-building around the site’s tools.
But Brandt asserted that the new campaign strikes out in new directions.
“This is unlike any advertising that’s been done,” Brandt said. “It leverages our tools that are so distinctive and piques curiosity.”
Digital Pulp won the account in March, following a review that included several other, undisclosed Alley-based agencies.
