Advertising - Top-Tier Travel Discounts to Promote a Magazine
OF late, the news about Condé Nast Publications has been none too good. Magazines are being closed and employees are being laid off, along with other measures that echo the words of Ernest Dowson, who wrote, “They are not long, the days of wine and roses and black cars.” (O.K., that part about cars was not in the original.)
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The jetsetter.com page, offering a chance for discounts on expensive travel tied to articles in Condé Nast Traveler magazine.
Still, executives at Condé Nast, a division of Advance Publications, are trying to move forward with ideas intended to build business at a time when the company has lost hundreds of millions of dollars in advertising revenue since last year.
An example is being provided by Condé Nast Traveler magazine, which is teaming up with the Gilt Groupe, the online marketer known for making bargain hunting the most entertaining pursuit for the rich during an economic downturn since the scavenger hunts that were so popular during the Great Depression.
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Condé Nast Traveler and Gilt are to describe on Wednesday the details of their partnership, which is centered on a new Web site from Gilt called Jetsetter. The site (jetsetter.com) joins the gilt.com fashion Web site as a destination for so-called flash sales, offering members discounts on high-end travel trappings like hotels, cruises and resorts — with one catch: Cinderella-style expiration dates.
The centerpiece of the partnership will be limited-time deals that Jetsetter will offer each month, based on themes inspired by issues of the magazine. Those sales will be on products and services sold by marketers that advertise in Condé Nast Traveler.
For instance, the first such sale, which is to begin on Wednesday, will be tied to travel marketers featured in the magazine’s annual Readers’ Choice Awards issues. Among those scheduled to take part are the Yachts of Seabourn luxury cruise line and the Pierre Hotel.
The agreement between Gilt and Condé Nast Traveler includes a perk for readers of the magazine: They will be invited to become members of jetsetter.com. (Like gilt.com, Jetsetter membership will be by invitation.)
The partnership is an extension of why travel marketers advertise in the magazine, said Chris Mitchell, vice president and publisher: “We need to be a revenue-driving partner to these travel brands.”
“We don’t thank people for giving us money,” Mr. Mitchell said, referring to advertisers. “We thank people for investing with us.”
“It’s too often a cliché of our business — a partnership,” he added, “but this is a good opportunity for us to prove that return on investment.”
The agreement is the first media partnership for Jetsetter, said Drew Patterson, chief executive of the new Web site; he joined Gilt from the kayak.com travel Web site, where he had been vice president for marketing.
“Ultimately, our business is about telling people stories why they should travel,” he added. “If we want to position ourselves as being experts in the category, it’s natural to work with other people with a point of view.”
Jetsetter is still in a test mode, Mr. Patterson said, “but we felt we’ve made enough progress” to publicize the Web site and the deal with Condé Nast Traveler. His goal is to differentiate jetsetter.com from sites run by the likes of Expedia, Kayak, Orbitz, Priceline, Travelocity and Travelzoo.
“Our partners can’t go onto something like Priceline and move inventory,” Mr. Patterson said, because “it’s the wrong customers and the wrong approach for their brands.”
“We position them in a way that’s consistent with a luxury product,” he added, while at the same time discounting rates from regular or list prices for expensive cruises, resort stays or hotel rooms.
Pamela M. Feick, director for sales and marketing at the Pierre — part of the Taj Hotels, Resorts and Palaces division of the Tata Group — praised the agreement between Jetsetter and the magazine.
“Condé Nast Traveler has such an established reputation,” Ms. Feick said, so that when computer users see the name associated with the new Web site, they will “have additional confidence” in what Jetsetter is promising.
“The timing is so perfect” for the Pierre’s participation in the first sales on jetsetter.com, she added, because the hotel is promoting its recent reopening after a $100 million renovation.
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No money is changing hands under the terms of the agreement between Gilt and the magazine. Jetsetter is to promote Condé Nast Traveler to its members, and Condé Nast Traveler will promote Jetsetter to its readers.
The partnership will be advertised in the magazine and on jetsetter.com; in ads in other Condé Nast magazines; on a section of concierge.com, the Condé Nast travel Web site (concierge.com/cntraveler or cntraveler.com); on posters atop taxi cabs and on the sides of buses; on display signs at Kennedy International Airport; and in e-mail messages sent to subscribers of Condé Nast Traveler and members of Jetsetter.
Condé Nast Traveler intends to keep a watchful eye on the partnership, Mr. Mitchell said, so it does not impinge on the editorial side of the magazine, which has a reputation for honest, unvarnished coverage of its subject matter under the rubric “Truth in travel.”
“We are incredibly protective of the ‘Truth in travel’ hallmark,” Mr. Mitchell said, adding that recipients of reader awards like the Pierre are honored not for buying ads in the magazine but for satisfying customers.
“They got into the Readers’ Choice Awards the old-fashioned way,” Mr. Mitchell said. “They earned it.”
Leave it to a publisher to quote an ad slogan, in this instance for the former Smith Barney brokerage house.
Sign in to Recommend More Articles in Business » A version of this article appeared in print on October 21, 2009, on page B7 of the New York edition.
Hmmm. A most interesting monetization partnership betwixt print and online media. Shall watch this relationship grow with much interest.
