What did HowStuffWorks and Discovery see in each other?
Arnold: Discovery wanted to own curiosity across all formats, and they saw HowStuffWorks as already owning it online. We had the potential to be the cornerstone of Discovery’s digital media strategy. As for us, we realized that to take it to the next level, we needed video. We wanted to add Discovery’s great nonfiction video to our site. What we perfected after we bought HowStuffWorks, before the acquisition by Discovery, was the art of doing content so well that search engines put us on the front page of results for a multitude of search terms. We’re one of the rare companies aside from Wikipedia that ranks very high on all kinds of topics. So we could approach a manufacturer or dealer of hybrid cars and say, “You should advertise on our site because we draw a wonderful target audience.” When you add all of those great Discovery Channel videos to that, the quality becomes even higher. Any news item can also drive interest to us. Somebody recently was attacked by a shark in San Diego.
