Another traditional media company likes what it sees in the Internet advertising market and makes a purchase.
How much is that comparison-shopping search engine in the Window? For diversified media company E.W. Scripps, a $525 million USD price tag looked just right.
Scripps seeks to capitalize on the rapid growth and rising profitability of specialized Internet search businesses, according to a press release. With the purchase, Scripps gets not only Shopzilla and its proprietary ShopRank algorithm, but the BizRate consumer feedback network as well.
The majority of Shopzilla’s revenue is derived from referral fees paid by participating online retailers. A fee is collected by Shopzilla when a consumer is directed to a retailer’s online store. Shopzilla also powers shopping search for many of the Web’s largest consumer sites, including AOL.
“Shopzilla is a significant Internet play for Scripps,” said Kenneth W. Lowe, president and chief executive officer for Scripps. “In many ways, like our other media businesses, Shopzilla is a content company.”
“By organizing shopping information so that consumers can buy almost any product from a wide variety of merchants, the Shopzilla team has taken commerce and content and melded the two together to produce an extremely compelling value proposition to consumers and merchants alike.”
Scripps already is one of the top-50 drivers of Web traffic through its combination of national and local online brands. Scripps TV network Web sites include FoodNetwork.com, HGTV.com, DIYNetwork.com, fineliving.com, gactv.com and ShopatHomeTV.com.
“Online shopping already is a $100 billion-plus industry in the U.S. alone, and it’s still the early innings,” said Shopzilla co-founder and chief product officer Farhad Mohit.
David Utter is a staff writer for Murdok covering technology and business. Email him here.
