This story was updated Feb. 2, 2015.
AOL’s brands are undergoing a major consolidation in markets around the world, which will leave the company with several large global media properties and fewer small, local spin-offs.
Marketing has learned that AOL Canada is merging its independent lifestyle brands StyleList, ParentDish and Kitchen Daily into the Style and Living sections of Huffington Post Canada. Joe Strolz, general manager at AOL Canada, said the move is intended to drive readership growth through its most recognizable global brand, create a seamless experience for AOL readers, and connect its smaller brands to Huffington Post’s impressive search and social machinery.
Huffington Post Canada dominates AOL’s Canadian viewership thanks to aggressive search and social distribution. ComScore metrics show that as of December 2014, it served 11.2 million unique visitors each month, which, according to Strolz, comes primarily from search and social traffic.
“We believe that by landing those brands within Huffpost, we’re going to be able to create even greater growth across that category,” he said. “Those brands have driven us to a leadership position within lifestyle in Canada, and this just amplifies that opportunity.”
The Canadian efforts are part of a global strategy to consolidate AOL’s focus on its four most-successful global brands: Huffington Post, Engadget, TechCrunch and AOL.com. Reports from TechCrunch (owned by AOL) and The Guardian claim that similar mergers are happening in the U.K. (lifestyle brands ParentDish and MyDaily will be merged with Huffington Post U.K.) and the U.S. (tech brands Joystiq and TUAW are being merged into EnGadget, and AOL Autos has already been merged into Autoblog).
In addition to consolidating its U.S. brands, AOL will be laying off 150 U.S. staff, mostly in its sales department. TechCrunch reports that the restructuring was due to AOL’s growing focus on programmatic, rather than direct sales. Update: Re/code has reported that in addition to the layoffs, AOL Platforms CEO Bob Lord has been promoted to global president, where he will oversee not just the technology side of the business, but all ad products, technology and sales. The reorganization consolidates AOL’s U.S. platform and media sales into a single integrated sales division.
Strolz told Marketing that no sales restructuring was necessary in the Canadian market, because its sales team already provides integrated client services across its tech platforms and media properties. He said that the company sees Canada as a growth market, and plans to continue expanding its services and staff here. Although there will be some layoffs in the editorial department at the merged brands, those losses will be more than offset by new hires in the coming months.
Production capabilities and new Canadian content
AOL Canada announced one such growth initiative on Friday: a new full-service video production house in Toronto, which will create original Canadian content for its media properties and brand partners. Strolz said the studio will work on original content for its Canadian media properties and brand partners. It will house a full suite of production, editing and live streaming capabilities.
He said the decision to open the studio was driven by the success of AOL’s American content in the Canadian market. AOL first brought its original programming to Canada in April 2014, including Park Bench with Steve Buscemi and Making a Scene with James Franco. In a notable deal, GroupM bought exclusive access to the content before it was even announced at the NewFronts. Since the slate debuted in Canada, AOL’s total video views have seen an increase of 53% year-on-year, according to comScore data.
Although no new Canadian original series have yet been announced, Strolz said AOL Canada and Huffington Post would build on the best practices of its U.S. franchises like Candidly Nicole and AOL Build. He said the production team would not only work with Huffington Post and AOL.ca, but also agency partners to develop offerings “tuned to marketers needs.”
“There’s all kinds of things that this production capacity will allow us to do beyond creating original new content,” he said. “Brands have a ton of their own original video content… if you look at most retail banks, they produce a ton of how-to, financial counsel content that lives on their website. The studio presents an opportunity to help them massage or curate or edit that content, and then seed that into our syndication and give the content real scale across the internet.”
AOL is set to report its quarterly financials next week.
