• by David Goetzl  @dgoetzl, August 28, 2008

On a day that Lifetime announced its first-ever acquisition in the online arena, the company said it has tapped an executive to head all digital sales. Jen Duddy, the national sales director at iVillage, joins Lifetime in the newly created position of vice president, digital ad sales.

On Wednesday, Lifetime said it had acquired privately held ParentsClick Network, which operates MothersClick.com, a social networking hub--and also runs a site that allows mothers to launch their own blogs.

Lifetime is also acquiring the company's portfolio of over 200 parenting-related domains, including many brandable URLs, such as www.FathersClick.com and www.MothersGroups.com. The network plans to establish a host of sites in the parenting arena and a corresponding ad network.

The sales aspect of that will come under Duddy, who joins after Lifetime said digital sales in the recently completed upfront doubled.

Debbie Richman, executive vice president, ad sales, said Duddy will work to leverage Lifetime's brand equity on multiple properties, looking to increase integrated sales packages across them. She will also look to "develop customized offerings for clients."

One area where Lifetime has achieved some success online--opening new sales opportunities--is in the casual-games area. Before joining iVillage last year, Duddy held senior management positions in in-game advertising at Electronic Arts for four years.

With the ParentsClick acquisition, Lifetime Digital will now establish a San Francisco outpost. ParentsClick CEO Dietrich von Behren will head the operation.