AOL Open To Ditching Tarnished Brand Name
AOL has a reputation that precedes it, and that's not necessarily a good thing. When most people think of AOL, they remember the dial-up service from years ago. Heck, some of you reading this might even still have those trial CDs that AOL flooded the market with. But there's more to AOL than that -- much more -- and for that reason, a brand change could be in AOL's future.
Verizon owns AOL these days, having acquired the company last year in a deal worth about $4.4 billion. The sum takes into account AOL's various media properties, such as The Huffington Post, TechCrunch, Autoblog, Moviefone, Engadget, and others. It even owns MapQuest. The AOL of today is very much a media giant.
Now that a new year is upon us, AOL is thinking about its future and whether or not it wants to keep its brand name.
"I actually don't think there's a bad choice, but we have to make the choice," Allie Kline, AOL's chief marketing officer, told Business Insider. "Are we going to keep the AOL brand or are we going to bring a new brand to market?"
As of right now, Kline is in favor of keeping the AOL brand. She's attached to the legacy behind it. At the same time, she's more than willing to embrace a new name, if that's the direction AOL ultimately decides to go.
A change in branding isn't unprecedented by any means, and there are many reasons for such. One of the more recent examples is the creation of Alphabet, which is the parent company of Google and other properties. AOL could follow a similar path by creating a new parent firm to oversee its many media outlets and ventures.
Verizon owns AOL these days, having acquired the company last year in a deal worth about $4.4 billion. The sum takes into account AOL's various media properties, such as The Huffington Post, TechCrunch, Autoblog, Moviefone, Engadget, and others. It even owns MapQuest. The AOL of today is very much a media giant.
Now that a new year is upon us, AOL is thinking about its future and whether or not it wants to keep its brand name.
"I actually don't think there's a bad choice, but we have to make the choice," Allie Kline, AOL's chief marketing officer, told Business Insider. "Are we going to keep the AOL brand or are we going to bring a new brand to market?"
As of right now, Kline is in favor of keeping the AOL brand. She's attached to the legacy behind it. At the same time, she's more than willing to embrace a new name, if that's the direction AOL ultimately decides to go.
A change in branding isn't unprecedented by any means, and there are many reasons for such. One of the more recent examples is the creation of Alphabet, which is the parent company of Google and other properties. AOL could follow a similar path by creating a new parent firm to oversee its many media outlets and ventures.
