The First

Media Company

Built to Be

Influential

the halogen blog

fine dining for thought

Archive for January, 2009

Halogen Launches New Program with Exclusive Resorts

authored by Greg Shove

We have the audience (over 10 million monthly unique visitors across 50 publishers), we have the right kind of advertisers (Abercrombie&Kent Residence Club, American Express and The Plaza Hotel have all just signed in January), so now it’s time to start to work with both to really engage the consumer. Clients, agencies, and even consumers, are starting to ask for more than the banner. We hope to bring some ideas to the table that show new, different and better ways to engage the consumer online – in which they and the advertiser get a little more out of it.

One program we are testing with a small number of publishers are Sponsored Posts. This is a paid advertising program, identified as such to the consumer, but presented in the flow, style or tone of editorial content on the publisher site. Our first run was with Exclusive Resorts, the luxury destination and travel club that is owned by Steve Case (one of those “I joined the club, liked it so much, so I bought it”). A destination club is a relatively now concept, and is not well known by many affluent consumers – and they typcially cost about $250,000 + to join. It’s a concept that needs a little more “time and space’ to help the consumer decide if they are interested.Perhaps a Sponsored Post can do that a little better than a 300X250 ad unit. We will track the results and report back.

Over the last year, publishers who implement custom or advertiser-supported content have gotten a lot of flak from industry pundits. Not sure why, since it has been a big part of the offline ad busines for years (according to the NYTimes, Conde Nast did $100million in custom advertising programs this year) and if done well, can and should be a part of the online toolbox.

New Advisor for Halogen Network

authored by Greg Shove

I am pleased to announce that Shenan Reed, the Founder & Managing Director of Morpheus Media, has joined our Advisory Board. I first met Shenan about a year ago at a Luxury Interactive Conference in London, where we spent a lot of time discussing the online media challenges for luxury retailers – when we weren’t complaining about how expensive London was (that was a year ago when the dollar was more like a peso – what a difference a year makes).

So now, on my monthly trips to NYC, I always find time to stop in and chat with Shenan and her team. They have an envious list of luxury brand clients, and her agency understands rich media, search and social media marketing. I find them always willing to listen to new ideas for their clients – hopefully they will implement some of ours in 2009 for one or two of their larger advertisers.

The Morpheus client list includes: Bergdorf Goodman, Burberry, David Yurman, Diane von Furstenberg and many of the LVMH brands. Obviously an agency that knows online luxury marketing.

Wine and Chocolate Recession-Proof?

authored by Greg Shove

According to the editors at Gourmet,  consumers that dine out less frequently to save money, will turn to wine and chocolate – since they are affordable luxuries. Makes sense, and in fact both industries have seen an explosion of boutique brands and products over the past few years – many at the very high-end. Both vitners and chocolatiers face the same challenge however – getting consumers to discover their product, besides retail display. The web can help of course, with hundreds of independent food blogs cataloging the latest foods and delicacies – and now a growing number of websites enabling consumers to discover and buy wine. We all know of Robert Parker, and his eponymous wine ratings site, but our favorite is Snooth – a community-driven site that combines great research and discovery with price comparison and shopping tools.

Snooth is a great example of why we decide to add certain  sites to the Halogen Network: we use the site ourselves and appreciate its function and design, its audience is of the size and quality to appeal to our advertisers, and the owners and publishers of Snooth are willing to implement and integrate advertising  campaigns that will really engage their readers.

Snooth is a key publisher in our Food and Wine Channel and will deliver an upscale, affluent audience that is spending a little more time at home in 2009.