Obama advertising heavily on local news sites

Presidential campaigns have spent relatively little money with newspapers in recent years, but the new technology of videostreaming is bringing political advertising to some widely viewed newspaper Web sites in the critical March 4 primary states.

Erik Sass of MediaPost reports that Barack Obama has "sliding billboard" ads "with an embedded 30-second video across 26 high-traffic local sites in Ohio and Texas," where he could put Hillary Clinton's campaign into a tailspin with victories in primaries Tuesday. "Clinton has also utilized online efforts, but not on this scale."

Sass writes, "The campaign will run 39 different creative versions of the ads, including three different videos touting the candidate's various positions. The embedded video ads are re-purposed spots that are also running on TV in the same local markets. When users click on the ads, they are taken to a landing page with a personalized video message from Obama. This includes, for example, Spanish-language messaging on some sites in Texas." (Read more)