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Tag: CreativeBug

  • Demand Media Sells Creativebug, CoveritLive

    Demand Media Sells Creativebug, CoveritLive

    Demand Media announced the sale of a couple of its properties on Monday: Creativebug and CoveritLive.

    The company acquired Creativebug just last year. The service provides online video workshops for arts and crafts. Think of it like a Google Helpouts for stuff you’d see on Etsy.

    At the time of the acquisition, a Demand Media spokesperson told us, “They are on the leading edge of two big growth opportunities: e-learning and crafts. The overall market opportunity is huge – the crafts industry has grown into a $30 billion dollar industry and the worldwide e-learning market is around $90+ billion. The Creativebug acquisition accelerates our expansion into e-learing, one of the paid content models that we plan to aggressively invest in during 2013.”

    Apparently that plan doesn’t extend any further into 2014. Demand Media has sold Creativebug to Otter Media, the newly named venture between AT&T and The Chernin Group.

    Demand Media acquired CoveritLive back in 2011. It’s a real-time event coverage provider, which at the time was being used by brand like Yahoo, ESPN, Ford, Time, News Corp., FOX News, and the BBC. Demand positioned the acquisition as a way to expand its social reach. It’s now been sold to ScribbleLive.

    Demand Media’s interim CEO Shawn Colo said, “These divestitures allow Demand Media to refocus attention from nascent businesses in emerging markets to opportunities that are more in line with our overall growth strategy. By streamlining our approach to the business, we can more effectively connect passionate audiences with engaged experts, artists and opinion makers across our consumer lifestyle brands and our Content Solutions partners.”

    The company did not disclose terms of either sale.

    Image via Creativebug

  • Demand Media Launches eHow Crafts, Google’s Algorithmic Effects Remain To Be Seen

    Demand Media has launched a new channel for its popular eHow site – eHow Crafts.

    “We’ve seen explosive consumer demand for craft-related content on eHow, which is why we’re bringing together and adding a wide variety of helpful content in a single destination on eHow,” a spokesperson for the company says. “It will include everything, from tips on making felt flowers to learning how to make a yarn painting. The new channel will offer step-by-step text articles, video demonstrations, original photography, and even templates for printable coloring books.”

    eHow Crafts

    “With the launch of new channel and the acquisition of Creativebug earlier this year, we’re brought together one of the largest arts and crafts audiences on the Web,” the spokesperson adds. “We believe there will be synergies between both sites, as users go back and forth and enjoy the task-oriented, short-form content on the Crafts Channel to the project-oriented, long-form content on Creativebug.”

    More on the CreativeBug acquisition here.

    Crafts seems like an obvious vertical for how-to content. One might wonder why eHow is just now launching a channel.

    “We’ve been focused on growing our dominant position in other categories, and it’s paid off,” Paul Lively, SVP and GM of eHow tells WebProNews. “We hold a top 10 position in the top categories, including home (#1), personal finance (#2), health (#3 with LIVESTRONG) and pets (# 5). We’re now turning our attention to the crafts category and we plan to build up this channel (as we believe that crafting is an essential category for eHow, which is a resource that people turn to everyday to learn how to do things). We invested in the multi-billion dollar, arts and crafts market when we acquired Creativebug earlier this year. We believe in this opportunity and we plan to dominate the the crafts category with a dedicated channel that can serve as an online hub for this passionate community.”

    “Our entire business is built on listening to our consumers and giving them what they want,” he says. “This includes listening to what people want and giving them that content, which is what we’ve done by giving people more crafts content on a dedicated channel on eHow.”

    Last month, Demand Media launched eHow Now, a paid platform where users can chat directly with so-called experts, and get advice and guidance. Crafts seems like a natural vertical for such an offering. It’s not available for Crafts yet, but it’s in the cards.

    “We do have plans to make eHow Now available in the Crafts Channel for users who have questions they want answered by experts,” says Lively. “This will complement the 6 key categories currently available on eHow Now: auto, tech, health, legal, personal finance and pets.”

    No word on when that availability will happen.

    As those who follow the search industry may know, Demand Media and eHow in particular have been key properties of interest in relation to Google’s famous (or infamous if you prefer) Panda update. It was believed by many that “content farm” sites like eHow (at least the eHow of old) were largely responsible for the update to begin with, and the update made a significant impact on the company’s earnings, though it has managed to weather the storm. Last year, it returned to record profitability.

    More recently, however, Google’s algorithms have been affecting Demand Media’s properties again. On the company’s Q2 earnings call, CEO Richard Rosenblatt said that they were impacted by 30 algorithm changes since March, but noted that some were negative and others were positive.

    When asked about the new channel’s vulnerability to Google’s algorithms, Lively tells us, “We don’t break out traffic for individual categories on our sites. We do see fluctuations in traffic across all our sites over time, both up and down. Our primary focus is to provide the best consumer experience.”

    When asked if Demand Media has been affected by any Google algorithm changes since the last earnings call, he said, “We can’t specifically comment on Google’s practices. Our goal is to provide the best consumer experience, and that’s where we’ll continue to focus.”

    Image: eHow

  • Demand Media: Etsy And Pinterest Will Feed Interest In Creativebug

    Demand Media: Etsy And Pinterest Will Feed Interest In Creativebug

    As previously reported, Demand Media announced today that it has acquired arts and crafts e-learning site Creativebug as part of its push to expand into paid content offerings.

    During a recent earnings call, the company expressed such an initiative, leading us to believe that we’ll be seeing more of these kinds of acquisitions in the near future.

    “We plan to leverage our premium video expertise to launch Subscription and On-Demand e-learning content by mid-year,” a spokesperson for the company tells WebProNews. “We’ve already begun beta testing eHow Now, a product that offers real-time expert advice, where we leverage our studio’s expert talent to provide real-time answers. In our beta, we have experienced strong conversion rates and a 90% customer approval rating. We’re also developing a LIVESTRONG subscription service. We’ve hired senior executives from the makers of P90X to help develop this product offering, which we plan to launch in Q2.”

    With an increased interest in sites like Etsy and Pinterest, one can only imagine that consumers are hungry for the kinds of content Creativebug has to offer.

    “We believe there is a disruption and reinvention going on, as people become more interested in the craft movement,” the spokesperson says. “People will continue to turn to the visual inspiration provided by Etsy and Pinterest, which will feed their interest in expressing themselves and learning to create things.”

    Of course, as far as Creativebug is concerned, they have to care enough to pay to learn.

    Creativebug already has hundreds of videos. The top three categories, according to Demand Media, are sewing ,yarn and jewelry. The average video length is about 30 minutes.

    But with all the free content already out there, is this stuff really worth paying for? They charge $16.99 a month for access to unlimited workshops, and $9.99 and up to buy single workshops. When asked what users can get for their money that they can’t get from other sites, the company says, “They get to learn from world class experts in the craft field, which is not available on any other site.”

    Demand Media is not disclosing the details of the acquisition. They’re also not disclosing how many paying members Creativebug already has.

  • Demand Media Expands Into Paid Content With Creativebug

    Demand Media just announced that it has acquired CreativeBug, a provider of online video workshops for arts and crafts. The property should fit right into the company’s content network, which it plans to split away from its domain registrar business.

    “They are on the leading edge of two big growth opportunities: e-learning and crafts,” a spokesperson for Demand Media tells WebProNews. “The overall market opportunity is huge – the crafts industry has grown into a $30 billion dollar industry and the worldwide e-learning market is around $90+ billion.”

    “The Creativebug acquisition accelerates our expansion into e-learing, one of the paid content models that we plan to aggressively invest in during 2013,” she adds.

    During a recent earnings call, Demand Media said it intends to increase its investment in content production, and evolve its content production arm (Demand Studios). CEO Richard Rosenblatt indicated the company will double its investment in content this year. He said they would diversify into new content models, and expand the core ad-driven model with new paid opportunities, including subscription video and e-learning content. We can probably expect to see similar announcements in the near future.

    “We’re seeing a ‘disruption and reinvention’ in the way that people are learning new skills. They are increasingly going online to learn both practical and creative skills, and we believe this convergence has huge potential,” said Joanne Bradford, Demand Media’s Chief Marketing and Revenue Officer. “Instead of browsing at a bookstore or attending a class at the local community college, people are going online to learn from a world-renowned expert at a time that fits their schedule, accessing online videos from their smartphone, tablet or desktop.”

    “Creativebug represents a community of true believers. From our employees to our customers and instructors, everyone at Creativebug has experienced firsthand the obsession and addiction of being an artist/designer/crafter,” said Creativebug Founder and CEO Jeanne Lewis. “We take pride in doing everything thoughtfully, from filming high quality videos that illustrate the exquisite detail of hand-stitching to hand-delivering donations to our favorite local causes. We decided to join Demand Media because they care deeply about content and communities, and we are glad that we can offer our instructors a broader platform to reach more people.”

    Creativebug should appeal to the Etsy crowd (which has grown substantially over the past year).

    “Creativebug masterfully leveraged the e-learning and craft trend in the emerging ‘Create it Yourself’ movement to become a leader in this market,” said Dan Brian, Demand Media’s Executive Vice President of Media. “We’ve seen interest in craft-related content on eHow grow more than 20% on average every year over the last three years. We’re sprinting to keep up with demand, adding 29% more video content over the same period. Millions of people who visit eHow every month will be able to access Creativebug’s video workshops led by the top artists and designers in the world. We’re thrilled to add the passionate Creativebug team to the Demand Media family.”

    eHow itself continues to expand internationally as well, while Demand Media appears to be leaving the famous Google Panda update, which significantly impacted its business not so long ago, in the rear view mirror for good. That’s definitely a good thing for the company, considering that Panda is evolving into a rolling update.

    A major part of Demand Media’s strategy has been taking advantage of social media channels, and skills learned from a site like Creativebug would no doubt flourish on a channel like Pinterest.

    As far as e-learning, IBIS Capital estimates the market to be about $91 billion.

    Terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.