AllThingsD » AOL.com

With David Eun Departure, "The AOL Way" Makes Way for the Arianna Way

Kara Swisher — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 14:00:46 +0000

[UPDATE: This post has been updated in brackets, including clarifications and one important correction, in several places below.]

Despite all the polite throat-clearing in the various internal memos coming out of AOL today, with a rejiggering of its content management–including the [elimination of the job] of Media and Studios President David Eun [from the original one he had been appointed to by AOL CEO Tim Armstrong earlier this year]–what is really happening is what sources said will likely be a [drastic rejiggering of] more recent strategies of how to run its media business.

That is likely to begin with the hip-checking of [a controversial, if miscontrued, internal document titled] “The AOL Way,” which many sources tell BoomTown was [sponsored by Armstrong and created to stress best new media practices, including to garner better traffic], once the $315 million acquisition of the Huffington Post is completed.

[Whatever the original intent of "The AOL Way," it was badly received both inside and outside the New York-based company, thought of as too focused on SEO and not as much on creating the kind of high-quality journalism loudly touted by Armstrong.]

And that could mean a new and [perceptually journalistically friendly] direction forged by its the Web site’s Co-founder and new AOL editorial chief Arianna Huffington will take place.

In fact, much of what has [been put into place since Armstrong took over, from an editorial perspective at least,] is being questioned and reevaluated.

While what exactly that means is still being formulated by Huffington and others at AOL, it will likely not be using most of the mostly by-the-numbers recommendations of the infamous “AOL Way” deck.

Subtitled “Content, Product, Media Engineering and Revenue Management” and leaked to the media, it was all about how the struggling Internet portal thinks about its content properties.

Pretty much like cows to be milked, which has caused endless hand-wringing among the editorial troops at AOL. [While it might have been intended as a "best practices" memo for new media], this should come as no surprise, given damn-the-journalists-full-speed-ahead tone and SEO-overboard themes.

As reported by Silicon Alley Insider on February 1:

* AOL tells its editors to decide what topics to cover based on four considerations: Traffic potential, revenue potential, edit quality and turn-around time.

* AOL asks its editors to decide whether to produce content based on “the profitability consideration.”

* The documents reveal that AOL is, when the story calls for it, willing to boost traffic by 5% to 10% with search ads and other “paid media.”

* AOL site leaders are expected to have eight ideas for packages that could generate at least $1 million in revenue on hand at all times.

* In-house AOL staffers are expected to write five to 10 stories per day.

* AOL knows its sites are too dependent on traffic from AOL.com, and it wants its editors to fix the problem by posting more frequently, with more emphasis on getting pageviews.

[It was Eun's job to push the themes in "The AOL Way,' of course, along with upgrading the content business at AOL, which has become its main focus under Armstrong's turnaround effort.

While Eun has added several measures to stress quality journalism at AOL, since he was brought in from Google with much hype a year ago, having the colorful and influential Huffington as the flagship editorial personality at AOL--paired with trusted Armstrong lieutenant Jon Brod as COO--proved irresistible to the AOL CEO.

Of course, that left Eun without the job he had been hired for, which has now essentially been split among Huffington, Brod and also AOL exec Ned Brody.

And while Armstrong offered him different opportunities within AOL, sources said, with his original position gone in the new regime, Eun declined and decided to depart.]

In his parting email to staff, in fact, Eun continued to stress the numbers achieved under his tenure.

But, at the start, he was clear:

“With the historic acquisition of The Huffington Post, my role and responsibilities as President, AOL Media are changing. Tim and I have discussed at length how I might continue within the new organizational structure, but ultimately there isn’t a role that matches what I am seeking to do.”

Nor, it seems, for “The AOL Way.”

For your enjoyment, here’s Eun in happier days–late January–in a jiggy video he did for the troops:

[ See post to watch video ]

Who's Still Using AOL? Your Mom.

Peter Kafka — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 17:35:44 +0000

No one in tech’s chattering classes will fess up to visiting AOL. Time Warner’s (TWX) portal is a dinosaur, we all tell ourselves, that simply won’t acknowledge that it’s extinct.

Except that it’s not. At the end of last year, AOL was averaging 109 million unique visitors a month. So who are these people?

Turns out there’s a good chance they look like your mother–if your mom is somewhere between the ages of 45 and 64, and uses the site to get a little “me time.”

That’s according to Digitas, the ad agency working on behalf of the portal’s core AOL.com property. And now AOL wants that audience to become just a touch more youthful, via an ad campaign slated to launch this spring.

Here’s how AOL sees AOL.com, according to a document Digitas circulated to Web publishers last month:

AOL.com offers an escape from the daily grind with its window into news, entertainment, lifestyle, finance/money, social networking and helpful tools to manage a busy lifestyle. Users get all the ‘snacks’ they need by taking a break for some ‘me time’ at AOL.com.”

And here’s the site’s sense of its users–and who it would like its users to actually be following the online ad campaign, scheduled to run from April through July:

AOL traditionally appeals to a core 45-64 year-old female audience. With this campaign we aim to skew a shade younger.

PRIMARY TARGET–We will primarily target a slightly younger Gen X/Baby Boomer female. She may be a busy household manager looking for ways to economize. Beyond task based internet use, she often turns to the online world as a means to relieve stress and escape her day by indulging in soft news, relevant tips, email, shopping. etc. We have coined these women ‘i-Browsers.’”

Specifically, AOL/Digitas says, it’s going after women ages 30-44 who don’t currently come to the site. It also wouldn’t mind targeting women ages 45-54, and adults of both genders between 30 and 54.

And just to be clear–neither AOL’s existing demo nor its desire to shift that demo a bit younger is a bad thing.

In fact it’s a great thing, at least right now: Advertisers aren’t spending much money trying to sell cars or financial products these days, but they’re still trying to move food, clothing, cleaning products and other stuff that falls under the “consumer packaged goods” rubric. Stuff that women (still) buy for their families. So no need for AOL to be bashful about reaching that audience.

[Image credit: freeparking]

The Book on Facebook?

Kara Swisher — Fri, 09 May 2008 09:00:36 +0000

While there have been not-so-nice insider books about Facebook, the first major deal to chronicle the rise of the social-networking phenom has been signed by Fortune magazine’s David Kirkpatrick (pictured here).

Titled “The Facebook Effect,” the tome will be (glacially) published in September of 2009 by Simon & Schuster, which noted in a statement that it “will chronicle the amazingly rapid rise of this company as well as the impact it is having on social life, politics, business and even international relations.”

Ah yes, peace in our time via The Wall!

Facebook and its CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, have agreed to cooperate, said Kirkpatrick, who has written several pieces in Fortune on the much-hyped start-up that have been largely laudatory.

The book, said Kirkpatrick in a phone chitty-chat with BoomTown (while I froze at Little League practice in the-coldest-winter-I-ever-spent-was-a-summer-in-San Francisco) will also not necessarily be tough, but look at the ways Facebook has been the latest to profoundly impact the online industry.

“This is a company that is changing the way we use the Web, and I want to look at where it is going and what it could become,” said Kirkpatrick.

I like a positive attitude, although my book on Facebook–which I have dinged for a lot of stuff over the last year, from its kooky $15 billion valuation to its still-nascent ad business–would have been titled: “There Must Be a Pony in Here Somewhere.”

Oops! That was actually the title of my second book on AOL, the Facebook of Web 1.0, which chronicled the near-collapse of the company after its disastrous merger with Time Warner (TWX).

That, of course, came like winter follows fall after the first I did, “aol.com,” which told the story of the stunning rise of the online pioneer.

Actually, now that I think about it, it still might work for Facebook!

I kid, David, I kid! Good luck!