Clients: In negotiations with cable, satellite, Internet and telephone companies, banks, and moving and shipping companies.
Job: To allow companies to do geographic-specific targeting to reach customers before they move to a new neighborhood.
Agency: HotPads.com, based in D.C.
Theme: “Reaching customers where they live”
The Concept: HotPads.com is a Web portal for classified real estate rental listings that allows customers to view the properties on street-level maps to get a geographic sense of the area. HotPads can track which areas customers are viewing, giving advertisers an opportunity to target potential clients who may need telephone, banking or shipping services when they move to the neighborhood.
The Plan: HotPads is creating an advertising opportunity that it says is the first of its kind. The company will insert advertisers’ logos as icons at the appropriate locations on the street-level maps so that when site browsers are viewing an apartment listing, they can see which banks, service providers or retailers are nearby. Each icon will link to a customized Web site for the advertiser.
Most Web-based advertising is based on targeting clients at their current location — HotPads will allow clients to identify potential customers’ destinations. In addition to map-insertion advertising, clients can buy traditional banner advertising on the site, which also will be geographic-targeted.
Creative Team: Matt Corgan (co-founder), Douglas Pope (co-founder)
Background: HotPads.com is a venture-funded company that started in November 2005 as a free classified real estate listings site. The site now has about 80,000 listings, making it the second-biggest classified real estate site after Craigslist, the company says.
Working on Next: The company is working to recruit Fortune 500 companies with a big retail presence to use its map-insertion advertising platform.
