News Sites Seek Readers Via Search Ads

Some news organizations have started advertising on search engines, luring readers on stories ranging from Michael Jackson’s trial to Comcast’s bid to buy Disney. BBC has been a leader in this effort, buying Google ads on a range of news-related searches, especially related to the Hutton inquiry. Other news organizations are following suit. The Financial Times is using Google’s ad program to drive users to its special coverage of Comcast’s hostile bid for Disney. The Wall Street Journal has Google ads tied to ImClone searches.

Ok, now for some self-congratulation: we (ok, John Blossom of Shore Communications) exhorted media companies to start using these text-search ads, in an article for our site in August last year. “Using contextual ad placement technology on popular public search engines to highlight very specific content that can be purchased from a premium service in a highly focused and contextual setting may improve the visibility of these sources where many professionals go to start their content searches (whether we like to admit it or not).”

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