Vertical Ad Network Helps Advertisers Target the Creative Class and Ensures Culture Bloggers Maximize Online Earning Potential
SAN BRUNO, CA–(Marketwire – September 8, 2008) – Adify, the premier vertical ad network management company, Tristan Media LLC, and Mathes Grant LLC announce the launch of the Culture Pundits Vertical Network, the vertical ad network for arts and culture. Culture Pundits provides critical advertising revenue for arts and culture blogs and listings websites while ensuring that advertisers trying to reach their educated and affluent audiences can do so through an aggregated group of premium niche-content sites.
In the past several years, the media landscape has changed considerably, drastically reducing traditional publishing locations for advertisers targeting the educated and affluent audience interested in arts and culture. Writers such as culture critics and reviewers serving this audience have been moving from traditional media and are establishing online presences where they can engage their readers more directly. The Culture Pundits Vertical Network addresses these developments in three critical ways:
— Member publishers, consisting of culture blogs and listings websites, are able to monetize their content by attracting appropriate advertisers while maintaining the editorial control they value deeply.
— Advertisers running campaigns on the Culture Pundits Vertical Network, which include culinary and lifestyle marketers, finally have a resource to reach an elusive target demographic by leveraging the ad network’s scalability and efficiency.
— The community of publishers and readers is strengthened through a syndicated content widget and through Culture Pundits Artists, a curated program providing exposure for under-known artists.
Culture Pundits began with a soft launch in late 2007 with the popular arts calendar ArtCal and a small group of culture blogs. It quickly grew through word-of-mouth to deliver over 2.5 million ad impressions per month through a network of over 50 sites spanning the performing arts, film, music, architecture and fine art. Early on, the network caught the interest of prominent entities within the arts community including Merchandise Mart (producers of Art Chicago and The Armory Show fairs) and the Museum of Modern Art, which began to advertise on the network in June 2008. Today Culture Pundits serves as a conduit to the creative community for a growing pool of advertisers including Tekserve, New York City’s premier Apple service and support center.
“Culture Pundits has offered us a great opportunity to reach the local artistic community. It’s an invaluable resource for us to connect with artists who are interested in participating in our in-store community driven short film program,” said Rose Barrett, Marketing Director, Tekserve. “We also regularly communicate our services and free seminars, many of which target or benefit the artistic community. Culture Pundits has proven itself a worthy tool for extending our brand’s reach to more creative minds.”
“The demographic of the Culture Pundits network is already established,” said writer Paddy Johnson, a culture critic who writes a regular column on art for The L Magazine, in addition to her work on her widely-read blog, Art Fag City. “They are more discerning, which requires targeted advertising, but it also means our readers pay closer attention to the ads on the network than they do in other media. Naturally, savvy advertisers are a good fit with us. They understand the same thing our readers do: A-list Culture Pundits bloggers are A-list press. Period.”
“Arts and culture bloggers can be hesitant to join an ad network as they are very concerned about aesthetics and they fear relinquishing control over what advertisements will run on their sites,” said Barry Hoggard, founder of Tristan Media LLC and the Culture Pundits Vertical Network. “Because we use Adify’s vertical ad network solution, the Culture Pundits network allows our member publishers to attract advertisers that are a good fit and the publishers can increase their advertising revenue.”
Hoggard’s consulting firm, Tristan Media LLC, launched the Culture Pundits Vertical Network in partnership with Mathes Grant LLC, an innovative marketing studio that draws on the creative brainpower of artists to create engaging communications for its clients. The initial goal of Culture Pundits was to provide a means for Hoggard’s many artist and writer friends to earn income from their work and increase their visibility. Hoggard himself is an art fan and, along with his partner James Wagner, an avid contemporary art collector. ArtCal, one of the marquis listings sites in the network, was created by Hoggard and Wagner to provide information to art collectors and lovers of less-known galleries and artists. It is frequently ranked number one on Google for the search term “New York art openings.”
“We recognized that the people author Richard Florida refers to as the creative class are people who are voracious consumers of online arts and culture information, and they want fine things, not just in the arts but in every aspect of their lives,” said Tom Schreiber, principal of Mathes Grant. “The opportunity before us with Culture Pundits is to increasingly play a game of matchmaker for our clients and publishers, to create real partnerships and place just the right ad in the right spot in front of just the right audience such that all parties benefit from the experience.” Schreiber draws on his experiences as an artist, communicator and longtime creative consultant to top digital ad agencies such as Digitas, Publicis Modem, and Avenue A Razorfish.
About Culture Pundits
Culture Pundits is the premier vertical network for arts and culture websites. Advertisers on the network have included The Museum of Modern Art, artnet Online Auctions, and the Wooloo New Life Berlin Festival. Its 50 websites serve over 2.5 million ad impressions per month to approximately 360,000 unique visitors. Over 50% of the network’s visits are from regular readers. Prominent sites in the network include ArtCal, art.blogging.la, Eyeteeth, Art Fag City, Life Without Buildings, The House Next Door, Water Cooler Games, and The Playgoer. [Sources: Adify and Quantcast.]
About Adify
Adify Corporation (http://www.adify.com) is the premier vertical ad network management company and an independent, wholly-owned subsidiary of Cox TMI, Inc., part of Atlanta-based Cox Enterprises, one of the nation’s leading media companies and providers of automotive services.
