Yahoo! (Nasdaq: YHOO ) still has a few dance moves left.
The transitional dot-com giant is paying $80,000 for the OMG.com domain name, according to Domain Name Wire.
OMG -- which any IM or texting jockey will quickly recognize as the acronym for "Oh my God" -- is a nice catch for Yahoo! It runs a slick entertainment and gossip site at its omg.yahoo.com subdomain, and this deal will give OMG a domain name of its own.
This is sweet timing for Yahoo! News Corp.'s (NYSE: NWS ) Rupert Murdoch wants to begin charging for some of his empire's newspaper sites, in a move that could possibly shrink the popularity of NYPost.com's popular "Page Six" gossip site. Web-based celebrity sites TMZ.com and Perez Hilton will probably avoid the tollbooths, but this is still a golden opportunity for Yahoo! to grow its reach into this space.
The purchase is a surprise, though, especially considering that Yahoo! has been retreating over the past year. It has shuttered sites, consolidated others, and even sold the valuable contests.com domain name.
Sites that focus on celebrity snapshots and chatter are also tricky to monetize, since consumers don't go there to buy things. This is a move that will fortify Yahoo!'s display-advertising strengths, but it won't make a dent in the more lucrative paid-search niche, where Google (Nasdaq: GOOG ) and Microsoft's (Nasdaq: MSFT ) Bing are the key players.
It's still a great move, though. Celebrity sites tend to have short domain names. Beyond TMZ.com, Time Warner's (NYSE: TWX ) Entertainment Weekly pitches its virtual tent at EW.com. Now that Yahoo! has OMG.com in its arsenal, it can actively promote the site, without having to explain the clumsy and awkward subdomain.
You're a star, Yahoo! Don't slip on the red carpet this time.
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