About.com Launches Sponsored Content Studio For Native Ads

To beef up its brand advertising offerings, About.com is the latest online publisher to launch a sponsored content unit.

The 19 year-old company has launched IDEA Studio to match intent-driven searches with content that delivers a relevant platform for advertisers. IDEA stands for Intent. Data. Expertise. About.

For example, About.com says that its team of data scientists can look back at its seasonality data to determine the time of year users look for information about flu season, and how queries evolve throughout flu season. They can then create sponsored content based on what people are searching for or match them contextually against some of the more than 3.5 million articles already published on the site.

Idea Studios launches with a team of eight who came from USA Today, WebMD and other content properties. The team will work with brands to develop custom content, and an in-house production studio in New York can create custom video for brands.

Participating brands already include Disney, Symantec and Walgreens.

About The Author

Ginny Marvin

Ginny Marvin is Third Door Media's Associate Editor, assisting with the day to day editorial operations across all publications and overseeing paid media coverage. Ginny Marvin writes about paid online marketing topics including paid search, paid social, display and retargeting for Search Engine Land and Marketing Land. With more than 15 years of marketing experience, Ginny has held both in-house and agency management positions. She can be found on Twitter as @ginnymarvin.