Goldman Sachs: Thinking global broadcasting local

A global home page is used to promote a TV broadcast only Americans can see.

The Site

Goldman Sachs, a leading global investment bank, used its home page to promote a television broadcast available only in the US.

Goldman Sachs’ has filled its home page with a striking photograph of a marshy landscape. The headline says “Here, it’s business as usual” above a text that reads “Every day we see the opportunity to do something special. Not just to benefit our clients and our firm, but to have a long-term, positive influence on people and places like Tierra del Fuego. Learn about the Karukinka nature preserve and the National Geographic television special, ‘Eden at the end of the world.’”.

The link leads to a page within the Environment section that says the broadcast is on PBS on January 30 at 8pm EST. An asterisk leads to a note that “The program is available in the US”.

The Takeaway

The Goldman Sachs site has several intriguing features. It uses its home page purely to promote a television broadcast – a sign of self-confidence from a company that does not feel it needs to say what it does, or anything else about it. The television special part of the story will quickly go out of date, forcing the bank to manage the home page very actively (it was unchanged at the start of the next working day EST). And it is a determined effort by an epitome of hard-nosed capitalism to show a caring face: the bank has donated the land to the Wildlife Conservation Society, so the concern is real.

What is baffling from such an international group is that the television tie-in is so parochial – the broadcast can be viewed by at most 4 per cent of the world’s population – and is just frustrating for non-Americans. Why not give the rest of us at least a clip? With broadband, that would be a worthwhile gesture that would, moreover, be there whenever we wanted to see it.

First published on 31 January, 2008