AOL finally has a strategy, or so they say. Its been a couple of years since AOL stopped being a portal and has had a tough time convincing people that it has what it takes to succeed. Unfortunately the AOL brand name has little cache or brand value. It's web properties, however, just may have a chance. Some of their more popular sites include Moviefone, TMZ, and 75 others. Those that front with the AOL name seem to me to have less appeal - AOL Money, AOL Music. If content continues to be king, then the AOL focus on solid content sites should eventually pay off. Still in a down economy, ads will continue to move from print to the web; building and growing content sites will allow Platfom A, their ad network, the chance to aggregate the value of all their content sites and increase their revenue.
So far, it is paying off. "According to comScore Media Metrics, traffic to the portal, which include 20 new niche such as men’s lifestyle channel Asylum.com, rose 7% to 54.3 million unique visitors in October from the same period a year ago. Page views more than doubled to 4.2 billion. The increases marked the 21st month of consecutive growth for AOL." Good luck with the road show.
