Yahoo! has struck its second deal with a major U.S. TV news organization in less than a year. This time, the company is partnering with CNBC on a “content, programming and distribution alliance” related to business and financial news.
As with the Yahoo!/ABC News deal back in October, no money will be exchanged, but content will be. As with ABC, the two companies will develop original web series featuring CNBC talent, and will share printed financial news, information and analysis on their sites.
Why make the deal? For Yahoo! it means getting a major “in” with Wall Street insiders and wealthy traders. For CNBC, it means expanding the channel’s online reach dramatically.
“This collaboration is about two leaders in their respective spaces coming together,” said Mark Hoffman, president and CEO of CNBC in a statement. “With CNBC taking a central role on the biggest business news site in the world, we now have the ability to provide real-time news, analysis and information to a larger audience and offer unmatched advertising solutions for marketers looking for access across multiple platforms.”
Back in October Yahoo! struck a similar deal with ABC News, leading to original web shows hosted by Katie Couric and Jake Tapper, among others. Since then, ABC has boasted of record-breaking online readership, though given the voodoo required to measure multiple websites on multiple platforms, the actual benefits aren’t entirely clear.
As we noted at the time, Yahoo! has a long and not so illustrious history of partnering with TV networks, usually hooking them by noting the massive traffic generated by its portal, Yahoo.com. Fox News, CBS News, CNN, ABC News (back in the early 2000’s) and Current TV are among the networks that teamed up with Yahoo!, only to end their deals later on.