ValueClick discusses content and acquisitions; a reaction to the Adware problem? (VCLK 2Q05 conf call quotes)

Like other Internet companies, ValueClick  (ticker: VCLK) has benefitted from the rising cost of Web advertising, allowing the company to raise its guidance for the year when it released its Q2 results.  CEO James Zarley discussed his acquisition strategy on the conference call, asserting that it is driven by the desire to drive increased traffic to its affiliate marketing and comparison shopping businesses. Nobody on the call asked about ValueClick's potential exposure to adware and spyware - traffic acquired through adware can be monetized through affiliate marketing and comparison shopping - despite the recent revelation of the impact on InfoSpace. Could ValueClick's desire to acquire legitimate properties to drive traffic to its other businesses be at least a partial reflection of concern about its current traffic sources? Excerpts:

…we are getting more lift in the media area, and we're experiencing some additional lift in affiliate marketing, as well...

Now… acquisitions… we are still interested in taking a look at content-driven businesses… we would look at vertical sites… that would blend in and fit well with the traffic requirements that we're looking for here at ValueClick.

But… I think the other drivers for us are going to… areas… that would be synergistic to bringing traffic to our comparison shopping site in a significant way or expanding our affiliate position throughout the world, if those opportunities were to come up.

Before this past quarter we did have some significant interest in expanding the comparison shopping, but as you know there have been a few acquisitions there that have taken a few of the players out of the market. And then on the affiliate side, over in Europe, there's been a few smaller players on the affiliate side that have also been gobbled up, and at pretty high multiples. Let's say it this way, their multiples would have been that they sold at would have been higher than we could have ever acquired them for and so make them accretive.

(Quotes are from the CCBN StreetEvents transcript.)

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