Previously, About.com is one of the internet's oldest and most familiar websites. Now, it was. The go-to site for basic information on the web is now gone.
About.com was an American Internet-based network of content that publishes articles and videos about various subjects. Launched in April 1997 as a catchall answer site, it was born before powerful search engines like Google came to existence, and way before Facebook or any influential social media made their debuts.
About.com's trajectory was to serve as a road map of sorts for the short history of the internet. Claiming to have "Expert content on the Internet that helps users answer questions", it competed with other online websites such as resource websites and encyclopedias.
The IAC-based company that gets its revenue from advertising, has been slowly dismantling its content from an all-in-one site to branded vertical sites.
The news initially came on April 26, 2017. At that time, it was announced that About.com would shut down effective on May 2, 2017.
CEO Neil Vogel commented that when asked by IAC CEO Joey Levin about his opinion of the site, "my answer - in perfect arrogance - was 'I don't.' Who thinks of About.com? Nobody." Vogel stated that About.com wasn't growing and was kind of shrinking.
He said that as a broad omnibus site, About.com tends to underperform if pitted against social media platforms like Facebook and Snapchat that drive the internet, making it less valuable to advertisers.
"We had great content, but we were doing the wrong thing."
"We kept losing out on these deals because advertisers just couldn't bring themselves to put their brands next to ours. At one point, we had one of the biggest companies in the world tell us never to call them again."
As a result, on May 2nd, 2017, About.com is renaming itself, rebranding the old name for a new one: Dotdash. And because About.com is no more, any attempt to go to its URL redirects to Dotdash.
According to Vogel, Dotdash is an homage to the title red dot that has always been part of the About.com logo. He further said that the new name is also to represent the forward-looking sentiment of the company.
As a trading brand name, Dotdash is the umbrella corporation that will be used to speak to both clients and advertisers, as well as the name to represent all of its five media brands within IAC: Verywell (Health), Lifewire (Tech), The Balance (personal finance), The Spruce (home and food) and ThoughtCo (education).
According to Vogel that has led the company's transition since 2014, the rebranding process is going incredibly well, with DotDash currently serving more than 100 million users across its various brands.
He also sees an opportunity for Dotdash to enter the e-commerce market, as 15 to 20 percent of Lifewire's revenue is coming from affiliate sales. Since its debut in November 2016, Lifewire has increased its monthly unique visitors from 3.5 million to more than 7 million
However, the transition from About.com's all-in-one to vertical brands isn't done as of the announcement. The company has one more vertical to launch in the form of TripSavvy which is dedicated for travelers.
"Everyone at Dotdash has a little bit of a chip on our shoulder, in that we didn't inherit this," said Vogel. "We made it and we're incredibly proud of it, and we want to go toe-to-toe with big media brands and operate at that level. We want to mix it up and be in the fight."
The rebanding, while aims for the better, didn't initially appeal people. About.com is already a well-established brand on the internet, and dismantling a well-known brand can carry consequences, especially when it comes to marketing. However, according to Vogel, the response from advertisers seems to show the new approach is working
"We've been talking to people who have not talked to us since I've been here, which is four years," he said. "Advertisers want data, which we've always had, but now we have brands that advertisers can trust."