Los Angeles Newspaper Group has laid off LA.com's top managers, including manager Lynda Keeler and the heads of ad sales and marketing in light of less-than-stellar ad sales and audience numbers, and LANG's New Media Group is taking over with plans to restructure the site's business model.
Apparently, the layoffs came about 2 weeks ago, as part of a LANG-wide restructuring that seems to have gone completely unnoticed in the L.A. mass media or blogosphere, despite the cutting of about 100 jobs in editorial and circulation:
It seems LA.com's plan to attract young, solvent women with a blend of entertainment news, listings and travel content and utility, and then selling their eyeballs to high-end advertisers like L'Oreal and Amex in exchange for ad space wasn't quite raking it in fast enough to keep the content-heavy site afloat.
LA.com still retains its staff, including editor Laurie Pike, and LANG is planning to revisit the original business model proposed 2-1/2 years ago while the chain was busy paying half a million dollars for the domain name and considering basing revenue efforts more heavily on a booking engine and ticketing partnerships.
My source tells me that LA.com might soon look more like Hawaii.com if LANG goes that route.
For a bit more of what Keeler had in mind, check this July Q and A with her in Editor and Publisher.
Posted by: mack_reed on Friday, September 24, 2004 - 01:15 PM
