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New York Life is a 156-year-old life insurance company with major brand recognition and no plans (at least not yet) to sell its products direct online.

So why would the venerable firm launch its first-ever online ad campaign now, especially as other major advertisers are second-guessing click-through rates and banner ads?

Because the medium is perfectly suited to the firm's objective of generating leads for its direct sales agents, for one, says Michael Battaglino, vice president and head of New York Life's Internet group.

Secondly, a younger generation of Web users may not be very aware of New York Life and its products, and the company is looking to find them as it extends to another marketing channel.

On those goals, so far so good, he says of the ad buys with Women.com, Discovery.com and Insure.com, which run until August.

Since it launched last month, the campaign (tweaked for each site) is positioned around a series of 12 rotating banners and tile pages.

The unifying theme is "life events" such as marriage, the birth of a new baby and retirement. Depending on which of the ad sites drove the traffic, clicking through sends people to different parts of the the New York Life site, which offer specific insurance information sections about events such as marriage, children, retirement or financial planning.

The site features a section where people can fill in their contact information and opt-in for e-mails about the many flavors of insurance products.

Battaglino was mum about how much the company is spending or the amount of traffic it expects to drive to its own site http://www.newyorklife.com. He would only say that the main goal of the campaign is to provide leads for the thousands of agents employed by New York Life.

What is clear, however, is that the success of the campaign and the company's strategy are not measured on click-through rates alone.

"We've set up a series of benchmarks that we believe, when you take them in totality, will help us achieve our goals" of generating leads and using the medium to create a dialogue with customers, he says.

"Click-throughs are important, given that our banners are a major element of the campaign. But I think it also goes beyond that in determining" how online advertising performs," says Battaglino.

"A lot of this is predicated on (New York Life) being able to tell our stories on sites in a little more depth. I think that will be the key to the success of the program."

For example, the "suddenly single," section (targeting the newly-divorced) offers information about how that "life change" would influence a customer's approach to insurance coverage or retirement savings. In addition, it contains articles that explain the difference between life insurance products, such as whole, term and variable annuities as investment vehicles.

Since research shows that women usually drive insurance-buying decisions -- especially after the birth of a baby, that's one reason the company chose to advertise with women.com.

With the discovery.com and insure.com sites, Battaglino says the campaign is targeting a family unit, loosely defined as between the ages of 25-50 with an income in the range of $70,000 a year and above.

Kathleen Hofer, Vice President of marketing agency DVC Communications, which assisted New York Life in the online effort, says New York Life was looking for new approaches to the marketplace. At the same time, "the company is very solidly behind the direct agent approach. What they want to do is make consumers more aware."

To strike a balance between acquiring customers and keeping direct sales in the loop, a two-pronged strategy evolved. First, use the ads to start a dialogue by asking the consumer to think about retirement, or about how to provide for a child, and position the destination site to answer some of those questions.

Then provide deeper, so-called "life stories" in order to sustain interest and make an emotional connection that usually leads to a sale.

"There were articles featured on the Discovery.com site and New York Life has created kind of a lending library of articles for the insure.com site," she says.

"It gets back to the idea that it's not simply an advertising campaign, but rather a partnership with the (other) Web sites, and a way to bring extra service to the viewership."

Plus, the online campaign dovetails with the company's futuristic television ads that depict New York Life's building of today and ends with a young woman getting into a yellow cab of tomorrow that hovers above the ground before jetting onward and upward. The Key: reaching a younger generation.

Yet although the generation x and y set that has grown up on all things digital is inclined to expect some kind of Web interaction as a consumer, Battaglino says the strategy for now is to help educate and build awareness that may lead to a face-to-face with an agent.

"We're looking at using the Internet to perhaps go further in the sales process," but for now, qualifying leads is as far as the strategy goes."

Adds Battaglino: "There are people out there on the Web who we may not have reached yet. We're hoping we can touch them with the use of the medium."