David Kaplan: After a series of quarters of double-digit revenue growth, About’s revenues were down in the last two NYTCo earnings releases. How would you characterize those losses?

Cella Irvine: We were down about 5 percent in Q1 and Q2. You never want to celebrate being down, but we have fared better than many. And we’re grateful for it.

Why do you think you fared better?

About.com has more than one revenue stream. We have display and we have cost-per-click. If there’s any lesson we’ve learned this year, it’s the value of having more than one revenue stream, especially when the dynamics of those revenue streams behave differently at different times.

After some of the NYTCo earnings calls this past year, it almost sounded as if About was abandoning display in favor of a larger cost-per- click model. We’ve spoken about this before and you and NYTCo execs have insisted that there is no wholesale move to CPC from display. What’s the current balance now between display and CPC?

I think that there has been a perception that we are changing our revenue mix. I want to make it clear that About.com is not changing its revenue mix. Display advertising has been growing for About.com for several years. It will continue to be an important part of our revenue mix. As for the exact percentages of how display and CPC are coming out, we don’t comment on that. But we can say that display is looking better and the CPC business continues to grow.

Generally speaking, what’s the value of building up CPC?

The entire media industry is sold on content adjacency. Context equals relevance for consumers. We believe we are the masters of relevancy, in terms of being able to drive consumers to specific information and connecting them with advertisers. And yes, we are an expert on content-oriented CPC advertising. In a year like this, we are relying on that strength. This is a year in which accountability matters to advertisers more than ever.

We have done some things to enhance the CPC offering. We have optimized some pages by adding an extra link or two for CPC advertising, for example. But those changes have mainly been around the edges, as opposed to a wholesale strategic shift. Think of it as tweaking, with an eye toward what is going to work best in the current environment.

What’s the outlook on display? A number of studies have suggested that the category might have hit bottom and things may be looking up, at least slightly.

I think we’re starting to see some thaw in the arctic chill that descended earlier this year. Throughout Q2, we saw things getting better. We’re beginning to see more success in specific ad categories like consumer products and even retail is coming around.

That said, this is an environment where, on the display side, every online publisher needs to sell smarter and better. The economy has constrained all display sales. I just saw a study that says fewer interactive publishers are making it onto any given media buyer’s plan. On top of that, we’ve been impacted on the display side by rising ad-network sales.

How has the conversation changed between the company and ad agencies and marketers in this economy?

One of the things we have done this year is recast the way we talk about About.com to advertisers and agencies. It’s a matter of answering three questions: First, who is the About.com user? Roughly 80 percent of our users come from search. In today’s environment, that’s a benefit for advertisers, because that consumer is looking to get a specific answer and to then take action. Our users are completely lean forward. They’re not thinking, “Hmmm, maybe I’ll download some music at this site.” No, they’re looking to get something done. So they’re very receptive to an advertiser’s message.

Two, we have very contextual, high-quality content. If I’m going to About.com as a mom looking for an answer about solving my daughter’s acne issues, in essence, I’m looking for a product. On our CalorieCount site, which is all about healthy eating, a lower-calorie dessert or sugar substitute is a good contextual fit. They come to our sites thinking about a particular category.

The third is reach. We have 40 million unique users a month. With those kinds of numbers, we can offer an advertiser real impact while at the same time we can use our narrowcast content to offer them focus.

What else can you offer besides data about usage?

We just did a survey panel online of About.com users. Considering the volatile markets and joblessness right now, we asked them to tell us how they feel about the tone advertisers are taking in ads that mention the economy. People told us that they don’t like ads that try to scare them. They liked ads that mentioned the economy, but did so with a more neutral tone. So we can do that and take a very nuanced view of the site.

How is About.com marketing itself to consumers?

We have some outdoor marketing and co-marketing initiatives with our celebrity experts. We also have broader trade-industry campaigns ongoing on media websites. We also have ads in the NYT magazine, which helps.

It seems like there are always rumors circulating that About might be sold because of the NYTCo’s significant debt and financial issues…

[Laughing, gesturing as to “zip her lips”] I don’t comment on the New York Times, the same way we don’t comment about acquisitions.

Is there anything you can tell me about the advantages for About that come from being owned by a major newspaper publisher?

Being part of the New York Times offers a great deal of assurance to advertisers that our content is of high-quality. There is a definite halo effect there. And for the NYT, the only thing I can say is that the company has a very forward-looking digital strategy. And we’re a significant component of that digital operation.