Wash Po: Go Where The People Go

The Washington Post has launched another widget application as it seeks to take content to the people.

Sponsored by real estate company the Bozzuto Group, the new apartment finder application is the Post’s first ad-supported widget and forms part of its latest online strategy to deliver content to wherever users are.

People can embed the Washington Area Apartment Finder into their blogs or own pages on social networking sites such as Facebook and MySpace.

The Post’s director of business development explained the idea behind these widgets to Editor & Publisher.

“From a strategic sense, we came to a realisation that investing in bringing eyeballs to our sites was going to be more difficult over time, so we want to deliver our content where people [already] are,” said Ken Barbieri.

He added: “More and more what you see is this content is going to be consumed where the readers encounter it.

“The question for us is how do you grow this into a long-term business.”

The Post now has a range of widgets, including an Issue Coverage tracker for the current presidential nomination elections, an Entertainment Scrambler and Recipes for the Day application.

More information about widgets – what they are and how to use them – can be found on the Web Trends site.