Using a team of designers and writers, the FT’s commercial team is increasing its focus on content creation, data analytics and new digital tools to bring carefully selected client content to the right audience at the right time, say the publishers. Zurich Insurance Group will be the launch partner with a further campaign confirmed for Santander.
The FT has long offered advertising clients a number of content marketing products, including Smart Match, a semantic content matching technology that has, according to the FT, generated up to 20 times higher click-through-rates than industry averages.
FT² brings together this and other existing brand products – including bespoke publishing partnerships and advertising features – with a new ‘Paid Post’ offering for clients. The launch of Paid Posts follows customer research which established that 74% of FT readers found value in promoted content from advertisers, and 58% thought promoted content was as valuable or more so than traditional advertising on FT.com.
Dominic Good, the FT’s global advertising sales director, said: “The launch of FT² meets a high demand for new ways to create and surface quality content from advertisers. We have built a team of talented freelancers and designers who work closely with our advertisers on their campaigns to ensure the best reader experience and outcomes for their specific needs. This team is also fully integrated with our data analytics team and works with our B2B marketing team to extend campaigns beyond FT.com, reaching audiences across multiple channels, whether FT owned or those of a trusted third party.”
“The fundamental principle underlying our advertising offering is that advertisers buy a top quality media platform which in turn rests on editorial independence. This is why readersspend more than three times as long on FT.com than the average reader does on other media sites, and this is why our CPH advertising metric has been so popular,” he continued.
“FT² is an effective way for us to connect with our audiences in order to help them understand what risks they face and how they can protect what they truly love. We are delighted to be the first brand on the FT² platform,” says Andreas Hildenbrand, Group Head of Marketing and Communications at Zurich Insurance Group.
The FT introduced the offering yesterday at Advertising Week in New York, supported by an extensive global client and agency awareness campaign covering trade magazines in print and digital, LinkedIn and newsletters.
