NEW YORK (Axios): Verizon Media Group, the media division within Verizon, has 3 million people that pay for subscriptions across its portfolio of Yahoo-related products, like Yahoo Fantasy, Yahoo Finance and others, executives tell Axios.
Why it matters: Moving forward, the goal will be to rebrand most of its media franchises as Yahoo products, and to focus on selling subscriptions to those products via a rebranded subscription portfolio called “Yahoo Plus.”
Driving the news: “Yahoo is the future of our consumer facing brand,” says Joanna Lambert, Head of Consumer at Verizon Media.
“Over time, we will be moving non-Yahoo brands and centralizing them around Yahoo,” she says. The company has rebranded its media studio RYOT as Yahoo Ryot Lab, as well as its women’s brand “Makers” as “Makers by Yahoo.”
Other media outlets, like TechCrunch, AutoBlog and Engadget have not yet been renamed or rebranded. Those niche brands are now integrated across the Yahoo ecosystem in relevant categories.
As part of the “Yahoo Plus,” portfolio, Yahoo will offer several subscriptions — some already offered in beta — including:
Yahoo Fantasy Plus: Research tools, trade insights for Fantasy games
Yahoo Finance Plus: Formerly called Finance Premium, which will offer tiers for retail investors (Plus Lite) and seasoned traders (Plus Essentials)
Yahoo Mail Plus: Ad-free email, as well as customization features, like disposable addresses or domain blocking.
Yahoo Plus Protect: Device protection and tech support plans in conjunction with Asurion, a device insurance company.
TechCrunch: ExtraCrunch, a members-only community from TechCrunch, charges users for access to investor surveys, market analysis, expert interviews, etc.
What to watch: For now, all Yahoo-branded products are offered as separate subscriptions. In the future, the company may consider combining them.
For each additional subscription a user buys within the Yahoo Plus, they get a deeper discount to others, allowing consumers to mix and match subscriptions.
Yahoo News products do not have a subscription, but the company is doing user exploration on what that could look like right now.
