Epoch Internet Taps RiechesBaird; LocalBusiness.com Cuts Back
Irvine-based Entrepreneur.com, a Web site for small businesses, is ramping up its advertising and sales team in a bid to boost revenue.
The 5-year-old dot-com, which is part of Entrepreneur Media Inc., recently underwent what its chief executive and president Tom Davin called a “minor restructuring.”
Last month, the company laid off six people and scaled back its push to offer new, service-related products. Instead, it plans to concentrate on more “traditional” departments,and revenue makers,like advertising.
Entrepreneur.com, which employs about 30 people,up from 22 in March,is putting together its first in-house ad sales team. The company recently hired three advertising employees, including a senior vice president of sales and a West Coast sales director, and is looking to bring on two more, at least one an executive.
The moves are designed to increase the site’s aggressiveness as it, like others, feels the pressure to sell ads, Davin said. Ad industry observers believe it faces a “soft landing” this year, particularly since dot-coms, which fueled a two- or three-year boom, have pulled back substantially on spending.
The new team, which will respond more quickly to proposals among other things, will work alongside two other groups to drive sales,Entrepreneur Media’s sales staff (offering Internet advertising to its print customer base) and New York-based Winstar Interactive Media, which will sell advertising for Entrepreneur.com. Winstar, a subsidiary of Winstar Communications Inc., replaces Andover, Mass.-based Engage Inc., which had handled ad sales for the site for about three years.
Gavin said that to date Entrepreneur.com,which he said will be profitable by the middle of the year,has had success with advertising because of its target audience: it reaches about 300,000 small-business owners online monthly. The site, which re-launched in April, generates its own editorial content and borrows from Entrepreneur magazine, which reaches about 2.4 million readers.
Meanwhile, Entrepreneur magazine has seen a few changes itself. Entrepreneur’s Start-Ups magazine moved to an online-only version (bizstartups.com) last Thursday. Rieva Lesonski, Entrepreneur’s editorial director, said the magazine’s audience of business professionals 35 and younger is tech savvy and prefers to receive information online. The publication also struggled with advertising, she said. No one was laid off in the changeover, Lesonski said, as three employees were absorbed by Entrepreneur magazine.
However, about two weeks ago the company did lay off two employees in its business guide division because fewer of the guides are being produced, she said.
RiechesBaird Lands Epoch
RiechesBaird Advertising in Irvine recently added Costa Mesa-based Epoch Internet, a high-speed Internet address and Web hosting company, to its client list.
The OC ad shop beat out four other undisclosed LA-area agencies to win the advertising and marketing account. Neither firm would place a dollar figure on the deal.
A new campaign will roll out in February and will include billboard and online ads, direct mail and print.
Nick Hulse, vice president of marketing at Epoch, said the 6-year-old company chose the OC ad shop because of its business-to-business experience.
“We believe that RiechesBaird’s creative strategies can help further differentiate us in today’s competitive marketplace,” Hulse said.
Online Cost-Cutting Continues
Ft. Lauderdale, Fla.-based Local-Business.com, a network of local business news and e-commerce portals, joins a host of other online news media companies making changes in hopes of becoming profitable more quickly. The business recently laid off 34 employees,about 30% of its work- force,and pulled out of four of its 28 markets: Pittsburgh, Kansas City, Detroit and Phoenix.
Editors and reporters nationwide bore the brunt of the downsizing, with one OC reporter being cut. The site, which reports breaking local news all day, still has five writers, including freelancers, covering the OC and LA areas.
Other media organizations to cut staff or otherwise restructure online divisions to cut costs and achieve profitability include Tribune Interactive, Freedom Interactive Newspaper Group, the New York Times Co. and Knight Ridder.
Saddleback Valley News Goes Weekly
The OC Register has cut back at one of its community newspapers, the 34-year-old Saddleback Valley News.
Beginning Feb. 9, the paper will become Fridays-only, and its Wednesday edition will be dropped.
Chris Anderson, the Register’s publisher and CEO, said the Wednesday edition had been weak from an advertising perspective for some time. Meanwhile, the Register launched the Rancho Santa Margarita News and, more recently, Canyon Life covering areas previously in the purview of the Saddleback paper and cutting down on the need for news space in the latter.
Bits and Pieces:
Tustin-based Hilary Kaye Associates Inc. has added Irvine-based Ultimate Security Systems Corp. to its client roster. The OC public relations firm won the company’s media relations program, worth an undisclosed amount, without a review. Hilary Kaye will target print, television, online and radio to spread the word about Ultimate Security Systems’ new product, Powerlock, an auto security device Les Goldberg, formerly vice president of corporate communications at Uniloc Inc., Huntington Beach, recently joined Irvine-based Maples Communications Inc. as vice president and general manager Hayes Martin & Associates, an advertising and public relations firm in Costa Mesa, this month will move to an 8,191-square-foot office Newport Beach. The agency signed a $1.1 million lease.
