CEO Calls For AOL Paradigm Shift

An anonymous reader writes "The New York Times is reporting that Jonathan Miller, AOL's chief executive, is calling for the effective dismantling of marketing for their dialup service. In a new plan to be presented to the Time Warner board in a couple of weeks, Miller outlines a new direction for AOL which moves towards using advertising as the main source of revenue while offering most everything they have (software, AOL.com email addresses, etc) for free."

Re:Cancellation?

[ShecoDu]

Just stop using it, it's free, you won't notice the difference.

You cancel services when you dont want to continue paying for them.

Sad News

[Yaksha42]

No More AOL CDs [nomoreaolcds.com], while they may accomplish the goal of stopping CDs from being sent out, may not be able to achieve that goal of rolling up to AOL HQ with a million CDs.

Paradigm Shift?

[gamer4Life]

They can start by avoiding the words "Paradigm Shift".

Re:An ad for every surface on earth

[monopole]

The solution is better/targeted advertising. Advertising (and moronic network executives) are currently stuck in the same diminishing returns/kill the messenger cycle as the MPAA/RIAA is. Deprived of a captive audience, they freak out trying to further oversaturate the world in ads, which makes people turn off further. But there are three better ways:

a. Make people want to see ads. A good ad will make people stop and rewind their PVR and watch it over. It will make people send it to their friends. Remember, music videos used to be ads.

b. Target your ads and make people ask for them. Google AdSense is good and getting better at this. Arguably, eBays "favorite searches" featue is even better. Every day, eBay sends me new items which match my search terms. I WANT this information and I always read it, and often buy items based on the information, and that is perfect advertising.

c. Integrate feedback. Incorporate honest "Next!" and "Hooray!" buttons in PVRs and on banner spaces. Hit the "Next!" button and the ad disappears replaced by another, Hit "Hooray!" and it's in heaver rotation. The results are sent back to the advertiser. They get invaluable feedback, you get relief from ads you'd zap anyway. Guys get more beer ads, less tampon ads and a virtuous circle is achieved!