Bing Ads announced a number of updates last month, including new campaign filter options, improved search query reports, more visibility with appealable ads, and new keyword competition insights. Also, the Keyword Suggestions feature was made available to Bing advertisers in the UK. New Filter Options The new filtering options let advertisers filter and search from the Opportunities tab on the Campaigns page. Now, advertisers can view a subset of bids and keyword suggestions that meet specific campaign criteria without browsing through individual suggestions. Improved Search Query Reports [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Microsoft: Bing | Microsoft: Bing Ads | SEM Industry: General | Yahoo: Display Ads

Yahoo held its second now annual "Product Runway" event, mc'd by product chief Blake Irving. Irving was assisted by some younger executives from companies that Yahoo had acquired in the recent past. There were four announcements, lead by the formal unveiling of Livestand, Yahoo's long-promised tablet news reader application. It competes with Flipboard, CNN's Zite, AOL Editions, Taptu, Pulse and others. Here is a quick summary of the four announcements: Livestand: Described as a "personalized living magazine," it's a mix of Yahoo's own content and third party content. There will b [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Yesterday Yahoo released Q3 revenues. While they generally met expectations, and operating income came in at the "high end" of Yahoo's guidance, overall revenues and profit declined: Revenue excluding traffic acquisition costs ("revenue ex-TAC") was $1,072 million for the third quarter of 2011, a 5 percent decrease from the third quarter of 2010. Income from operations decreased 6 percent to $177 million in the third quarter of 2011, compared to $189 million in the third quarter of 2010. The year over year decreases were primarily due to the revenue share related to the Search Agreement wi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Features: Analysis | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads

Yahoo reported Q4 2010 earnings this afternoon. Revenues were slightly up vs. the previous quarter but down compared to the same period a year ago. CEO Carol Bartz called them "encouraging." Gross revenues were $1.53 billion, down 12 percent from 2009. Search revenues were down; though in a surprise bright spot for Yahoo display ad revenue was up 17 percent and so were operating margins and income. CEO Carol Bartz is doing a good job of managing costs but there's not really a growth story (save display). Outlook for 2011 is weaker than expected. Right now Yahoo shares are down in after [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads

Yahoo to Offer Media Links from the Wall Street Journal reports Yahoo will create a similar tool to Facebook connect for their media publishers, web developers and other websites to integrate with. Yahoo would not comment on the new system, but the purpose behind it is to help Yahoo better track users around the web, so they can offer more tailored ads and offer advertisers better ad targeting options. Y Connect allows users to register and log into web sites by clicking on a Yahoo button. After the user logs in, their activity on the web site can be shared with Yahoo. This shared data [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Social | Facebook | Legal: Privacy | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Other

Yahoo has launched a new portal dedicated to online advertising. It's called, you could've guessed: Yahoo! Advertising Solutions. Yahoo says the content on its new ad portal is meant to inspire and educate advertisers. It features demos, articles, videos, and a "keynote video" featuring Seth Godin. Yahoo touts the new site as ... a leap forward in communicating and showcasing Yahoo!'s advertising solutions for mid-to-large tier advertisers and agencies, giving Yahoo! a powerful vehicle to drive B2B Marketing goals and re-establish the company as a thought leader in the industry. Most [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Search Ads

AllThingsD is reporting that Yahoo is negotiating with mom-oriented social network CafeMom for a potential $100 million acquisition -- the price Yahoo recently paid for Associated Content. Yahoo has of course tried to buy other companies unsuccessfully in the past (most recently Foursquare, according to rumor) so it's not clear it will happen. But this deal strikes me as a particularly good fit for Yahoo and could represent the company's way in to a bona fide social network play that has long eluded it. Google has been getting all the attention for the rumored Google Me and its bid to br [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General

The HotJobs for sale rumor has been around for some time. Yesterday a deal with Monster was finally announced. It is being widely hailed as a smart move by Yahoo to gain cash and divest itself of another "non-core asset." Except for payment and other terms the deal is conceptually analogous to what Yahoo is doing with PriceGrabber in shopping and with Microsoft in search: outsourcing content or fulfillment. Yahoo will continue to have a career site (at least for the next three years) but it will be powered and populated by Monster: Monster and Yahoo! have also entered into a three year [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Partnerships

In November, Google surprised many when it announced that it was buying mobile ad network AdMob for a massive $750 million in stock, bringing mobile advertising suddenly into the consciousness of people who'd simply not paid attention before: "Hey, maybe this thing IS for real." Now Apple is reportedly buying another tier one mobile ad network, Quattro Wireless, for $275 million. That immediately raises the question: What will Yahoo and Microsoft Do? Yahoo already is a top mobile ad network and so is Microsoft -- in both traffic and estimated revenues. Both rank in the top five in terms [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Acquisitions | Microsoft: Marketing | Microsoft: Partnerships | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Top News | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Yahoo has introduced what it's calling "Ad Interest Manager." It's a new kind of privacy and advertising dashboard for consumers where they can opt-out of behavioral targeting or, alternatively, indicate to Yahoo what they're most interested in. Here are the features according to the press release out this morning: Yahoo!'s new Ad Interest Manager tool: Provides a central point where Yahoo! visitors can assert even greater control over their online experience. Gives visitors an unparalleled view into the information used to deliver interest-based advertising. Shows the visitor bot [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Legal: Privacy | Yahoo: Display Ads

Yahoo has smartly launched a Spanish Language version of its mobile homepage. The company cites Census data that reflect a population of 46 million Hispanic people in the US. Yahoo also cited comScore data that show tremendous mobile internet growth among Hispanics, which is "outpacing that of all other groups, with 88% of Hispanics consuming content on their mobile phones." Here's the new Spanish language mobile homepage, which mirrors the look and feel of the English-language version: Here's the PC version; note the tile ad en Espanol: The ad below from the Spanish mobile si [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

A report analyzing traffic and click-through rates from ad network Chikita finds that "Bing users are over 50% more likely to click an ad on your site than Google users." What this means, according to the post, is those who arrive at third party sites via Bing click more frequently on ads on those sites than those coming through Google. TechCrunch offers a bit more detail and speculation about why this might be (i.e., "the law of large numbers"). According to Chikita, the respective click rates are: Google: .97 percent Yahoo: 1.24 percent Bing: 1.5 percent Bing appears has made some [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Microsoft: Business Issues | Microsoft: Partnerships | Stats: Compete | Stats: comScore | Stats: General | Stats: Hitwise | Stats: Search Behavior | Stats: Size | Top News | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Partnerships | Yahoo: Search Ads

Yesterday on the Yahoo Q2 earnings call, CEO Carol Bartz spent time talking about local and small business (SMB) advertising. She said that these overlapping segments were increasingly important to Yahoo and she announced a new deal with AT&T (to sell display ads on Yahoo to SMBs). She added that between AT&T's yellow pages sales force and the company's newspaper consortium partners Yahoo effectively had "13,000 sales reps" in local markets around the US. Here's the relevant verbatim Bartz quote from the earnings call transcript: We also know that local relevance of both content an [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Top News | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Other | Yahoo: Partnerships | Yahoo: Publisher Network

After an apparently successful limited trial, Yahoo is rolling out a program that targets small businesses (SMBs) for self-service display advertising on its network and through RightMedia, its ad exchange. The DIY portal is a collaboration between Yahoo and AdReady, which supplies the back end and the ad templates. (Google earlier introduced a similar, though less elaborate product.) The templates can be sorted by best performing (CTRs are exposed), most used and newest. Advertisers can use their own ads as well. Ads can be targeted by geo, content category or Yahoo property. They show on [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Partnerships | Yahoo: Publisher Network | Yahoo: Search Ads

Here's a change of pace: Some newspapers are making money online and crediting a search engine with making it happen. AdAge writes about the Yahoo-Newspaper consortium, and cites multiple cases where individual papers or newspaper groups are using Yahoo's ad targeting technology to increase online-only ad sales. The consortium has sold an estimated $50 million in Yahoo inventory so far, with about 150 papers using the platform and 350 more on the way. But what's most impressive is some of the individual reports from happy newspaper people: Scripps newspapers report a 30% jump in online [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Partnerships

As expected, Yahoo earnings were down, about 13 percent YoY. According to the earnings press release: Yahoo! Inc. today reported revenues of $1,580 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2009, a decrease of 13 percent from the first quarter of 2008.  Excluding the impact of currency rate fluctuations, revenues for the first quarter of 2009 would have declined 8 percent from the first quarter of 2008.  The Company’s non-GAAP operating cash flow for the first quarter of 2009 of $409 million exceeded the midpoint of the outlook range provided by the Company last quarter. Query volume was [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Top News | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Outside US | Yahoo: Search Ads

When the Yahoo-Newspaper consortium was announced in early 2007 both Yahoo and the newspaper industry were stronger and in better shape than they are today. (That's certainly true for newspapers.) Since that time Yahoo has suffered through the MicroHoo episode, gone through a couple reorgs, laid off a meaningful chunk of its workforce and gained a new CEO. The newspapers, for their part are mired in a well-publicized crisis, with ad revenues falling precipitously and major publishers making dramatic newsroom cuts, some declaring bankruptcy and even shutting down publications entirely. Now c [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Local | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Maps & Local | Yahoo: Partnerships

Ben Edelman, an assistant professor at Harvard's Business School, forcefully argues that "Yahoo's Right Media ad marketplace features widespread ads exactly designed to deceive." In his lengthy article he offers 10 examples and lots of specific documentation of the kinds of deception he alleges. The ad types in question feature the following kinds of copy according to Edelman: "You have been chosen to win a free…" "Free" and similar representations with NO disclosure language "Free" and similar representations with disclosure language Deceptive or questionably realistic offer Bai [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Legal: General | Yahoo: Display Ads

Not long ago, Google rolled out its "Geolocation API" (via Google Gears). Initially it was intended to enable third party publishers and developers to get location for their apps on mobile devices using a combination of the phone's inherent location-awareness technologies (i.e., GPS) and Google's cell-tower database (which has been expanded now to include WiFi locations). However it also works for destkop browsers, provided that Gears is installed on the computer. Here's the Google Code Blog discussing the impact: When we originally proposed the Gears Geolocation API our goal was to make i [...]

Related Topics: Channel: SEM | Features: General | Google: AdWords | Google: Maps & Local | Search Ads: Behavioral Targeting | Search Ads: General | Search Ads: Mobile Search | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Search Marketing: Local Search Marketing | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Search Ads

At various times it's been called AMP or APEX, but today Yahoo introduced its new "unified digital advertising platform," which the company is now calling APT. With the platform it gained through the Right Media acquisition at its core, Yahoo is positioning APT as a dynamic, open marketplace (dispensing with the term "exchange"). The central idea is very simple: simplification of buying and selling advertising across the internet. The first customers -- indeed the apparent drivers of the initiative -- are Yahoo's newspaper partners. Search is not a part of APT at this point. But previously [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Display | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Display Ads | Yahoo: Partnerships | Yahoo: SmartAds