AOL, Yahoo! Struggle to Keep Viewers

As web portals, like AOL and Yahoo, continue push and grow original content by hiring journalists, it turns out the amount of time web viewers are using the portals have dropped considerably. This is terrible news for the portals, which could lead to more pain for journalists. The Wrap has a rundown of the dismal numbers: According to Compete.com, AOL had 45.5 million unique visitors last month, down slightly from 47.9 million in May 2009 - and a serious drop-off from January, when it saw 55.8 million. Yahoo, at 134.1 million, was up slightly over May 2009, but MSN (65.6 million) slid 12 percent versus the same month last year. Page views, meaning the number of pages viewed by each individual user, have fallen significantly for each of the big three: AOL (-32 percent), Yahoo (-28 percent) and MSN (-30 percent) all posted steep declines in May. But if you're an AOL or Yahoo! executive, here's the statistic that is most worrisome: Average time spent on portal websites is down 21.7 percent over the last year, with users spending on average six and a half minutes before scurrying off somewhere else. None of these numbers look good, and are especially worrisome for media folks. AOL has said it wants to be the largest hirer of journalists by next year, and Yahoo has made a significant investment ($100 million) in original content by purchasing Associated Content. Do these numbers speak of a trend that could alter AOL and Yahoo's strategy of hiring more journalists? Compete.com, the site that compiled the numbers, says the popularity of Facebook is the main cause of the decreased demand for the portals. But it's unclear if AOL and Yahoo expected this to happen. That's the key. It seems this leads to two possibilities: 1) AOL and Yahoo had predicted this and, in part, began to push new content because of Facebook (great for journalists). 2) This is unexpected and could cause a revamp of the portals' current strategies (bad for journalists). The portals haven't commented on the lousy numbers, but this is definitely a story to follow as it will impact all of media.

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AOL, Yahoo! Struggle to Keep Viewers

Ryan Derousseau

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Ryan Derousseau