The Mazda2 is being positioned as a go-to car for young people, with a low price tag and zippy, compact look. Building on that strategy, the brand has launched an integrated sponsorship with student-targeted career website TalentEgg.ca to reach its young and ready-for-real-life audience.

The media plan hinges on a new section of TalentEgg.ca called the Career Toolbox, built by the website to accommodate Mazda’s desire for editorial-based integration and the website’s desire to keep a division between church and state. The Mazda-branded Career Toolbox is accessible only to registered TalentEgg.ca users and contains four channels: ‘How-to’ articles, a collaborative Wiki channel, an employer directory and an interactive tests and quizzes page.

Each page features Mazda branding, and the company also has premium placement in the site’s big box and leaderboard inventory.

The integration was designed to be both an effective vehicle for Mazda branding, and to circumvent what the site’s founder Lauren Friese says is young people’s ability to ignore traditional advertising.

‘Students and recent grads are ad-blocking ninjas,’ she tells MiC. ‘They’re great at ignoring big box and banner ads. But what works really well is when an advertisers’ content is integrated in a genuine way into the site’s content.’

The deal was facilitated by Donor in Toronto, along with Mindshare’s Excelerator Media, also in Toronto. It launched at the beginning of the month and will run until Dec. 1. TalentEgg.ca has an average of 52,000 unique visitors every month, who spend an average of five minutes on the site browing through an average of 10 pages each, Friese says.

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