Political blogs unite for advertising venture

Mark Sweney
Tuesday August 29, 2006
http://www.mediaguardian.co.uk/

Britain’s leading political blogs have joined forces to sell their advertising space, in an attempt to cash in on the growing commercial potential of the blogosphere.The seven websites – including the country’s top three political blogs Guido Fawkes, ConservativeHome.com and former Tory candidate Iain Dale – have launched an advertising sales service called MessageSpace. Its aim is to make it easier for advertisers to run campaigns on blogs, across one or more of the seven sites. “Between us there is definitely a market. Political blogs are very popular and influential,” said Alex Hilton, the editor of Labourhome.org and author of Recess Monkey. But Mr Hilton, who runs ad sales company EOS Online Media, said the service would shy away from signing up mainstream advertisers.

“We will look at the public affairs and campaigning industry – on topics such as child poverty, tax liberation and climate change. It is a way for them to get to politicians, a way to add value to political campaigns and support the lobbying process.”

MessageSpace is designed to offer a “surgical strike” facility, by which ads are targeted at specific organisations such as parliament, the government, political parties and other groups.

The cartel of blogs covers a broad political spectrum including Labourhome.com, LibDem Blogs.co.uk, Political Betting.com and Recess Monkey, with a claimed combined readership of 1.5 million a month.

In June, influential US political blog the Huffington Post signed a deal with Barry Diller’s InterActiveCorp to sell the website’s online ad space.