Around the Net
AOL's Tim Armstrong Says "We Will Not Be A Walled Garden"
- The Drum, Tuesday, September 20, 2016 10:19 AM
AOL CEO Tim Armstrong told The Drum that he expects his company's new union with Yahoo to reach 2 billion consumers by 2020 and that the company will differentiate itself "with a brand-first focus and an open data strategy." Armstrong also said that the AOL/Yahoo offering will have an open approach to data vs. so-called "walled garden" models of companies like Google and Facebook. “AOL got into a lot of trouble as a company when it went to a walled garden mode back in the early 2000s,” Armstrong said. “We're taking the total opposite approach. We want to be the company without walls: the open company. ...If Facebook is about social and Google is about search, then we want to be about brand. ...We will have a totally differentiated strategy and that strategy will enable the best brands in the world to have brand metrics, brand planning, brand ROI and brand interactions with consumers that are very unique from Google and Facebook."
