When Teen People was shuttered in 2006, publisher Time Inc. said the magazine would continue to exist as a web destination; now, less than a year later, TeenPeople.com will be folded into People.com.
Visitors to the teen site will be directed to People.com, where they will be able to find teen-focused stories that will still be branded as TeenPeople.com, writes MediaWeek (via MediaBuyerPlanner). TeenPeople.com advertisers will be offered the chance to move their ads to People.com.
The thinking behind the change is that teen-centric stories on People.com do very well, says Mark Golin, editor of People.com. If there is teen traffic to TeenPeople.com, as well as to People.com - which is a larger site - "why not combine and have the teen traffic going to one place?" he is quoted as saying.
TeenPeople.com had 435,000 unique visitors in March last year, but this year it didn't meet the minimum sample size standards needed to project audience size per Nielsen/NetRatings.
ElleGirl, which also folded its print edition last year, is on track to double its revenue in 2007 over the previous year, and has claimed new advertisers such as Target and CoverGirl since its relaunch in October.