Dive Brief:
- Refinery29, a media and entertainment company targeting younger women, announced plans to expand its "Money Diaries" platform with "Money Diaries: The Podcast," spinoff series "Money Diaries for Entrepreneurs" and a custom video series featuring actress and entrepreneur Nikki Reed, according to a press release shared with Marketing Dive. Intuit, the parent company of TurboTax, QuickBooks and Mint, will return as an exclusive partner for the second consecutive year.
- "Money Diaries: The Podcast" will be hosted by Refinery29's Lindsey Stanberry with Paco De Leon, musician and founder of financial firm The Hell Yeah Group. The weekly podcast will offer tools to help young women manage their finances and will cover topics like student loans and the cost of raising a child.
- In "Money Diaries for Entrepreneurs," self-employed diarists discuss their successes and failures, financial decisions and personal experiences with budgeting. The video series with Nikki Reed will focus on finding a balance with money management and highlight Intuit's products, with Reed touching on how she launched her business Bayou With Love. It will debut on Refinery29.com in March, and monthly episodes will air through April.
Dive Insight:
Refinery29 is hoping to continue the success of its "Money Diaries" content with the new spinoff, podcast and video series. The expanded content comes as half of Refinery29's users said they wanted more financial advice from the platform. The series was the second-most-searched content on the site and had 7 million unique visitors in 2018, according to materials provided to Marketing Dive, suggesting that the additional content could be a success with users. The platform also released a Money Diaries book, "Everything You've Ever Wanted To Know About Your Finances... And Everyone Else's," which launched in September and broke the top 10 of Amazon's Top New Business and Money Books on its first day out.
By continuing its partnership with Refinery29, Intuit has the opportunity to reach a new audience of millennial and Gen Z women, who are inspired to reach their financial goals and are seeking out on-the-go tools to help. Millennials have some of the highest rates of student debt of any generation, aren't as knowledgeable about financial literacy topics and are also more likely to have a "side hustle" to make extra money, pointing to a gap in accessible financial content that Refinery29 looks to fill.
More marketers are shifting their budgets to digital platforms in an effort to better reach younger demographics, who often appreciate relevant, educational information from brands and make up the largest audience base of podcasts and digital video series. Podcasts are one format where marketers, especially in the financial sector, are investing more to reach these untapped listeners during their increasingly busy lives. U.S. podcast ad revenue hit an estimated $314 million in 2017, an 86% increase from $169 million in 2016, and is on track to reach $659 million by 2020, a 110% jump from 2017, according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau and PwC. Financial services advertisers made up 18% of total podcast ad revenue, highlighting how marketers can use the podcast medium as a new revenue stream.
Along with Intuit, other financial brands are unveiling campaigns targeting millennials on digital platforms. Citibank recently announced plans to expand its content marketing into new publications and a focus on wellness and personal financial information for millennials. Citibank worked with Well+Good's branded content and editorial teams on the Well+Good x Citi content site, as well as running offers alongside content on sites like Business Insider to capture their younger audiences.
