Holiday Inn Express has partnered with Blip.tv for the release of the second season of its web series "The Smart Show."

Published: 09 Jul 2008

Holiday Inn Express has partnered with Blip.tv for the release of the second season of its web series "The Smart Show."

The series (http://thesmartshow.blip.tv/) has been developed by ad agency Digitas and its new branded content unit, the Third Act.

The episodes were produced in partnership with production house Endemol USA.

The web series will run twice a week from July through October at the show's own Blip.tv-hosted microsite, hiexpress.com/the smartshow, and on the travel site Tripadvisor.com.

As per the information available, the first season of The Smart Show, which debuted in October 2007, followed two hosts on a cross-country trek from Boston to Los Angeles. While the new season will offer more of the same "man on the street"- style clips, product demos, and travel tips, The Third Act moved away from the narrative storyline in favor of episodes that focused on particular topics.

Another major change, according to mediapost.com, includes the show's new distribution partner, TripAdvisor. While Blip.tv will still host and syndicate the episodes overall, The Smart Show will serve as a new business travel-focused hub on TripAdvisor.com. The deal expands the show's potential audience by TripAdvisor's more than 25 million unique monthly visitors--a major positive since building reach was a key goal going into the second season.

Digitas Creative Director Ben Jones said that the TripAdvisor partnership offered "just the kind of distribution that we were looking for," and added a wealth of business travel content to the primarily consumer-based travel ratings and reviews site.

"When we first met with TripAdvisor, they offered us banners and other inventory," Jones said. "But through discussion, we discovered that they needed business traveler content, so they decided to pull the entire Smart Show site in. That kind of media distribution and content development becomes much more efficient now that we have a distinct division in The Third Act."