A 130-year-old newspaper in Michigan, United States, launched an online shopping site two months ago in an attempt to create new revenue streams. So far, the site has helped the newspaper build new relationships with non-traditional advertisers and created incremental revenue from current advertisers, Business Wire reported Tuesday.

The Petoskey News Review, owned by Schurz Communication, Inc., created shopsmartupnorth.com, which mixes display advertising and opt-in e-mail campaigns for local shoppers.

“We needed a strategy to generate new advertising dollars without negatively affecting our traditional print advertising revenue ... since our launch in May, 45 new advertisers have already committed budget to the new site as an extension of their promotional mix,” Christy Lyons, advertising director at the newspaper, told Business Wire. “One of the most appealing aspects of our new initiative is that we have been able to offer an effective promotional platform for smaller businesses that traditionally have not had the time or the resources to develop a web presence or to do any kind of print advertising.”

To push the online initiative forward when it was first launched, The News Review advertised heavily in print and on the radio, and also presented it at business events in the area, Lyons said.

The site was developed by Local Thunder, which creates online ad platforms for local media outlets, according to Business Wire.