[thelist] "Content is king" - still true?

[Abbey]

Hi Michael,

Are you at all familiar with these sites:
http://www.oxygen.com/
http://www.ivillage.com/

I have not really looked at them -- for US members here, the first one is 
Oprah's site with a companion television station -- but as soon as you 
mentioned an e-zine for women, my first thought was to look at what others 
are doing. iVillage has been around for a very, very long time and I think 
it's fairly well-known from magazine articles, internet guides, etc.

Also, since I don't actually use these sites, I'm not sure what type of 
international viewership they have and I don't know how much or how little 
they would relate to your site.

However, if you're looking to do a little comparison, scope out some 
inspiration, find ammunition to support your point of view, these two sites 
might help in your discussions to make the site profitable.

And, rather than get too far into eCommerce, it is an e-zine and common 
practice for any 'zine is usually in ad sales for revenue generation.

HTH at least a little,
Tamara

At 09:12 PM 12/20/00 +0000, you wrote:
>Hi all
>
>I'm currently maintaining a site directed at women.  It's more or less an
>e-zine, with articles, tips, etc.  It's not the most interesting site in the
>world (partly, I suspect, because I'm a man), but it gets by, with hits
>meandering around 100 per day.
>
>Now, the guys who are funding the site (a whole 500 quid a year currently)
>are wanting to push to making the site profitable.  The only way they seeing
>of doing this is to have some sort of e-commerce solution on the site,
>possibly offering perfumes, makeup, stuff like that to our readers.
>
>I'm fighting this as much as I can, because I have a gut feeling that
>introducing B2C on a content site dilutes both aspects, and you're left with
>a half-arsed commercial site with some content tacked on.
>
>Of course, this is just a gut feeling, and I have no hard facts.  I'm
>willing to look into the possibility in the distant future (summer 2002),
>but for the moment, I'd like to concentrate on the content.
>
>Am I right?  Do all sites need to go to e-commerce in order to be considered
>'proper'?  Isn't it better to leave this kind of thing to the truly 100%
>e-commerce sites that do things a lot better?  Shouldn't a clear line be
>drawn between the 2 types, and never the twain shall meet?
>
>Or am I just being pig-headed, because in the end, it's a lot more work for
>me...?
>
>Your opinions are welcome.
>Michael