Rob Grimshaw, managing director for Financial Times.com says in the early months of 2009 traffic has been consistently "very high". He says people are coming back again and again to see what the top journalists are saying about the financial crisis.
However, the financial newspaper is not totally invulnerable to the crisis.
"You win some, you lose some. Certainly we gained in terms of traffic and exposure and that's fantastic for us in the long term. But there are particular categories in advertising that are under pressure that you would expect, " Grimshaw notes.
Banks are cautious, he says, adding that there are more banks advertising on FT.com than you expect.
Grimshaw observes marketing managers at companies working on smaller budgets now are under pressure to show results in their marketing are increasing their share of money online.
In particular, the luxury goods category has developed online in a big way with Rolex and Hublo, a Swiss watch manufacturer committed to running campaigns on FT.com.
"The luxury goods category is starting to take online much more seriously and explore how they can put their brands online," he says.
FT.com has also being working on its mobile platform as it sees it critical to have a strong mobile proposition for core users - busy people who want information on the move.
Although FT's mobile platform gets an average of 2 million page views, it is currently a developmental channel with plans to relaunch the mobile site and introduce an i-phone application in May.
Grimshaw admits the company is experimenting how to create different ways for its audience to consume content and working on fixing its mobile user targeting, which is not as sophisticated as the website.
He is optimistic that with handsets evolving in the future, "it's a question of time before mobile becomes a real commercial money spinner."
Grimshaw is also pleased with the way its community blogs Alphaville has developed in the past year, which has become "real engagement blogs" that attract over 100 comments.
He finds it gratifying to read comments and see people are taking time to write intelligent stuff to enrich the site as well as confirm the quality of audience with 80% of them returning users of the site.
Grimshaw points out not many sites out there can match the precise behavioural targeting that FT.com offers to marketers.
Apart from extending new tools to make the site richer and create 'stickiness', he says his team is devoted to creating exciting things for advertisers with IBM coming on board for the first time to launch special sponsored videos based on carbon management in business on the site recently.
Grimshaw emphasises not many publishers out there have the capability to offer and allow marketers to match their strategies closely to the targeting and special features that they could on FT.com.
When it comes to free versus paid content. Grimshaw doesn't believe in a trade-off. He thinks one can have a successful business both in terms of content sales and advertising all at the same time.
FT.com allows users to read 3 articles on the site and over 50 million unique users make up the top of the funnel of casual users that drives 20, 000 of them to register on the site every week.
Meanwhile, FT.com is undergoing a major project to transform the regular site, completely revamping the structure that will put it in a good place in the next 5 to 10 years.
He reveals in parallel with this are smaller projects such as the launch of the iPhone application, an online glossary of financial terms for readers and creating a separate online existence for its high-end luxury magazine How to Spend It.
FT recently launched China Confidential and Grimshaw says it's an indicator of possible future strategies to expand their proposition of the online brand to support specialist and niche content targeting industry verticals and geographic areas.
He hopes to get advertisers from all areas and is working hard to diversify FT advertising from its core marketplace of financial advertisers.
Grimshaw observes a big shift from its core advertisers in finance, technology and recruitment to other areas such as luxury goods and business education and looks forward to new opportunities and beyond.
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