holy shit! have you seen the proboards stats?!

[sterl724]

It's pretty awesome.

[dcannie]

it's pretty neat. i feel very powerful; it's like a true revolt.
i hope the bump transitions over here as well next week.

[yellowcardigan]

That's crazy! Take that bump snatchleen!

[chedominique]

Awesome!

[margotmacomber]

I just wonder if they even care.

[karmasabiotch]

I wonder if any of their advertisers will drop them based on the newly reduced numbers if this continues.

[bonquiqui]

Ding dong and ditch yo!

[bumppkathleen]

They 100% care about the boards and the membership. Social media is the heart of their business plan. If they gut the boards their company is set back years, maybe a decade, as it grows its forums again. If we stay gone long enough they might even have to disclose it to investors. This is from the summary of their annual filing:


XO Group Inc. is the premier media and technology company devoted to weddings, pregnancy, and everything in between, providing young women with the trusted information, products, and advice they need to guide them through the most transformative events of their lives. Our family of premium brands began with the number one wedding brand, The Knot, and has grown to include WeddingChannel.com, The Nest, The Bump, and Ijie.com. XO Group Inc. is recognized by the industry for innovation in all media - from the web to social media and mobile, magazines and books, and video - and our groundbreaking social platforms have ignited passionate communities across the world. XO Group has leveraged its customer loyalty into successful businesses in online sponsorship and advertising, registry services, e-commerce, and publishing.

[MrsAxilla]

"...groundbreaking social platforms..?" LOL!

[CheshireGrin]

I think they're just assuming that a new, more easily controlled population will spring up where we left. They're counting on the constant influx of newbies to keep them afloat, and I don't think they realize that the boards as they are now (empty and soulless) are not as big of a draw to lurkers as they were when they were active.

But there will be newbies. And things will get moving again. It will just be a very different dynamic now. And I suspect they will exert more control to try to keep things "nice" than they did before.

[Deleted]

May 12, 2012 11:14:33 GMT -5 toledo said:

May 12, 2012 11:04:35 GMT -5 margotmacomber said:

I just wonder if they even care.

We should call them and hang up.

Lol!

[bumppkathleen]

20% of XO Group's revenue is from advertising, which is directly hit by our defection:


� Total net revenue increased 10.1% to $124.3 million.

� National online advertising increased 8.3% to $26.6 million.

� Local online advertising revenue increased 21.2% to $43.4 million.

� Registry services revenue decreased by 4.9% to $6.4 million.

� Merchandise revenue decreased 3.1% to $25.4 million.

� Publishing and other revenue increased by 14.9% to $22.4 million.

� We generated operating income of $10.1 million, compared to $6.7 million in the prior year. The year-over-year increase in operating income was primarily due to increased revenue and gross profit partially offset by increased operating expenses. The increase in revenue was driven by local and national online advertising and publishing and other revenue. These increases were partially offset by lower merchandise and registry revenue. The increase in operating expenses was due to increased personnel-related costs, consulting and marketing expenses to support our growth initiatives domestically and internationally. We also had increased occupancy expenses in connection with the move to our new corporate headquarters.

[bumppkathleen]

May 12, 2012 13:22:03 GMT -5 CheshireGrin said:

I think they're just assuming that a new, more easily controlled population will spring up where we left. They're counting on the constant influx of newbies to keep them afloat, and I don't think they realize that the boards as they are now (empty and soulless) are not as big of a draw to lurkers as they were when they were active.

But there will be newbies. And things will get moving again. It will just be a very different dynamic now. And I suspect they will exert more control to try to keep things "nice" than they did before.

I disagree. They care very much about getting us back. They especially care about posters who drive hits - I'm sure they'd pay for my Indian surrogate if I'd live blog it - but they care about the mass of us because they use us to project advertising revenue. The admins may not like us one bit but the people in corporate care a great deal about the numbers. And the boards are dead.

They think we will come back. That's not unreasonable based on past history. But they are counting on that. They definitely will care if we don't.

[drrn04]

"groundbreaking social platforms." Right.

I'm curious what exactly is groundbreaking about them. The non-functional search operation? The poorly managed roll out of new, untested formats? The exceptional customer service regarding those changes? The lack of a mobile app?

Or maybe they meant to say "grounded and breaking."

[bumppkathleen]

Seriously,look at these numbers. $68M in online advertising, with a 97% gross margin. For a company the size of XO Group that's huge.

[bumppkathleen]

"Groundbreaking" is puffery. But the point is they are guiding investors based on the boards. Online advertising is their biggest profit source. They have or are probably losing tens of thousands of hits each day. That is going to materially cut into their results if it continues.

[bumppkathleen]

May 12, 2012 13:50:23 GMT -5 nicbreeful said:

We need to get someone on the inside! Then they can leak some of the memos that are being sent around about the huge drop in hits. I'd love to see someone from corporate send Kathleen a dressing down for handling things the way she did..

I posted about this last night. The Big D called me into his office late yesterday and I thought I was going to get fired. Luckily, my HR file was saved on our internal system and it must have spontaneously deleted because Big D couldn't find it during out meeting. He wasn't even sure why I was in his office or who I was. But there have been a lot of emergency meetings and the other admins are excluding me even more than usual. Even HeatheratPampers doesn't want to hang out. I guess P&G is really mad at her too.

[speckledfrog]

Maybe they mean groundbreaking in the sense that they broke the ground so hard it all went directly to hell.

[pirate]

They got the "passionate communitites" part right.

[karmasabiotch]

Esentially we could create our own site based up the numbers that followed us on the day of TN change. Advertisers would come on board at some point if our numbers continue to increase. A start up company to rival TN.

Any financial/legal/business people to determin if this is viable?

[bumppkathleen]

May 12, 2012 15:31:32 GMT -5 karmasabiotch said:

Esentially we could create our own site based up the numbers that followed us on the day of TN change. Advertisers would come on board at some point if our numbers continue to increase. A start up company to rival TN.

Any financial/legal/business people to determin if this is viable?

Yeah, we could do it but it would take a boatload of time. Would the regs be the owners? Where will we host it? Does anyone know if we can host for free anywhere?

[Deleted]

May 12, 2012 21:34:01 GMT -5 @bumppkathleen said:

May 12, 2012 15:31:32 GMT -5 karmasabiotch said:

Esentially we could create our own site based up the numbers that followed us on the day of TN change. Advertisers would come on board at some point if our numbers continue to increase. A start up company to rival TN.

Any financial/legal/business people to determin if this is viable?

Yeah, we could do it but it would take a boatload of time. Would the regs be the owners? Where will we host it? Does anyone know if we can host for free anywhere?

DH would be all over doing that, for realz. He's been talking about doing it for a LONG time.

[sonrisa]

7,400 Active users in the past 24 hours (including both registered members and guests). That is insane. Especially when you look and see that ML is by far the biggest draw with the most posts and viewers at all times. Money Matters has a decent showing as well, but the rest are far behind.

I guess that answers the question "Will it get old without new blood?" With that quantity of posters to draw from it's all new blood.

May 12, 2012 21:48:43 GMT -5 asdfjkl said:

If someone burns down the entire farm, it's going to be years before your new crop is mature enough to makes you any money.

I love this analogy and the implication that we are mature.

[missyny]

Not a lot to add here...but I am still in shock at all of this!!! And elle!