Bloomberg aims for a larger audience

Michael Sebastian of Advertising Age writes about the new Bloomberg Business website and how it will attempt to attract more readers.

Sebastian writes, “Now the most visible results of its work are about to emerge, executives said, starting with the roll-out of a digital mother ship called Bloomberg Business — a website that will live at Bloomberg.com and become Bloomberg Businessweek magazine’s new home online.

“The site’s aim is to both translate the vivid design and storytelling of Businessweek to digital and fill a ‘conversation gap,’ according to Josh Topolsky, editor-Bloomberg Digital and chief digital content officer. ‘Bloomberg News will do a killer breaking news story,’ Mr. Topolsky said. ‘Businessweek might do a big feature around that or some pieces of that story. But in between, all week long, there are conversations happening.’

“‘We’re trying to take the vibe of Businessweek and take it to a space that’s minute-to-minute,’ he added.

“Bloomberg Media would not offer a preview, but Mr. Topolsky said the site will share design DNA with both Businessweek magazine and Bloomberg Politics, the website that rolled out this fall. Politics more closely resembles Businessweek’s print edition than the magazine’s own current website. It is colorful and bold, with large headlines and images, plus big ad units from BP and Goldman Sachs that fit within the stream of content. Noticeably absent are the web’s standard sort of banner ads pushed off to the right.”

Read more here.