Tim Sullivan, CEO of The Generations Network, Inc. just made the following announcement concerning the planned move of RootsWeb.com to Ancestry.com. Before anyone panics, this isn't a plan to change the free RootsWeb site or experience. Basically, they are just combining both sites under the primary Ancestry.com domain. To me the reasons for this move are not exactly clearly spelled out - navigation between the two sites, for example, can be easily integrated no matter which domain name the site is under, or which server is hosting the sites. My guess is that it has more to do with boosting traffic metrics from market research sites such as ComScore and Nielsen that do not combine the TGN properties when considering their total Internet reach. Recent data from ComScore Media Metrix actually shows nearly as many (and sometimes more) visits to the RootsWeb.com domain as to the Ancestry.com domain. Combining the two sites under a single domain will effectively double the traffic to the Ancestry.com domain. As reported in the announcement, "only 25 percent of visitors to Ancestry.com visited RootsWeb in January 2008, while only 20 percent of visitors to RootsWeb visited Ancestry.com (according to Comscore Media Metrix)." By combining the two sites under a single domain (URL), they not only increase traffic ("hits" or page views), but will also greatly boost the number of unique users (all of those people visiting RootsWeb who are not also visiting Ancestry), which is the Internet metric many consider the most important. In other words, this is a smart business move.

Below is the full text of the TGN announcement. It's also posted on the RootsWeb blog:

"As you know, The Generations Network has hosted and funded the RootsWeb online community since June 2000, thereby maintaining RootsWeb as the world’s oldest and largest free genealogy website. TGN remains committed to this mission and believes that RootsWeb is an absolutely invaluable and complementary resource to Ancestry.com, our flagship commercial family history site. We believe in both services and want to see both communities prosper and grow.

As part of this goal, we have decided to “transplant” RootsWeb onto the Ancestry.com domain beginning next week. This move will not change the RootsWeb experience or alter the ease of navigation to or within RootsWeb. RootsWeb will remain a free online experience. What will be different is that the Web address for all RootsWeb pages will change from www.rootsweb.com to www.rootsweb.ancestry.com. Again, the RootsWeb experience is not changing.

The decision to host RootsWeb on Ancestry.com is being made for one primary reason: we believe that the users of each of our two main websites can be better served if they have access to the best services available on both. Simply stated, we want to introduce more Ancestry.com users to RootsWeb and vice versa.

Today, despite the fact that Ancestry.com and RootsWeb.com are the two most frequently visited family history sites on the Web, only 25 percent of visitors to Ancestry.com visited RootsWeb in January 2008, while only 20 percent of visitors to RootsWeb visited Ancestry.com (according to Comscore Media Metrix). We think we will serve our users best by doing a better job of letting them know what is available on both Ancestry.com and RootsWeb. Hosting RootsWeb on Ancestry.com is the first step towards making this happen, but we will absolutely look for more and better ways down the road to advance this goal.

Hosting RootsWeb on Ancestry.com will also make it easier for us to make changes and improvements to the RootsWeb experience in the future.

All old RootsWeb URLs will continue to work, whether they are bookmarks or favorites, links to or from a hosted page or URLs manually typed in your Internet browser. We will have a redirect in place so that all old URLs will automatically end up on the appropriate new RootsWeb URL. You will never need to update your old favorites or links unless you want to. We have worked to make the transition as seamless as possible for our users, and this change should have a minimal impact on your experience with the site.

RootsWeb will remain a free online experience dedicated to providing you with a place where our community can find their roots together. If you have questions regarding this change please email them to feedback@rootsweb.com."

Thanks,

Tim Sullivan
CEO
The Generations Network, Inc.