Tulsa Taps Timely Features MicroSites

By: E&P Staff Tulsa (Okla.) World Special Sales Manager Amanda Boyaci and her team subscribed to the three Timely Features MicroSites available from New York-based Metro Creative Graphics in January -- New Year's, Weddings, and Health, Mind and Body -- discovering that the self-contained, interactive sites were easy to customize and launch and popular with advertisers and readers.

The MicroSites proved to be "among the top 10 of our advertising products in terms of click-through rates, and the wedding site alone has received more than 5,000 page views," Boyaci told Metro Creative Graphics.

The ready-to-post electronic editorial sections (which can be copied to laptops for offline presentations) reside on a publication's server, allowing it to benefit from search engine crawls for indexing the content. Created using Flash technology and employing the latest search-engine optimization and Web 2.0 design for easy navigation, MicroSites go out to subscribers monthly on popular editorial themes such as weddings, home, auto, pets, seniors, parenting and more. Seasonal and holiday MicroSites are timed for sales effectiveness.

Site branding, ad spaces, run-of-site sponsorship and directory listings are defined and ready to sell for each MicroSite. Ads may also be rotated to increase revenue sources. Google tags also may be entered into ad spaces. Skyscraper ads can be sold to replace directory listings.

All popular Web browsers are supported, and posting requires no HTML or Web programming experience. Metro's MiSite technology -- a free companion online application for subscribers -- enables the addition of features, placement and rotation of ads without an ad server, and publication of the entire site content to a designated folder on a publication's server.

While holiday-themed sites have a shorter Web life, Boyaci said she plans to keep category sites, such as Weddings, and Health, Mind and Body, up and running on tulsaworld.com for three months each, with the goal of selling two sponsorships for each giving sponsors equal rotation during the period. Sponsorships, along with eight directory listings per site, generate revenue for the paper and allow advertisers to stand out on the page.

"I think it's very important to update the sites as often as possible to give people a reason to go back," Boyaci said. "We also add local content whenever possible and try to tailor that content to our sponsors so that we can help get their message out."

Boyaci looks to offer advertisers multimedia packages that include space in a print section and its MicroSite counterpart. "By combining the print and online products, we're not only offering advertisers additional exposure, but different types of targeted opportunities to reach customers," she said. To drive traffic, the World runs house ads in print and online.