Until a couple of months ago, Yahoo had a range of mobile products and experiences in the market: Go, oneSearch, oneConnect and mobile web. With the launch of Yahoo Mobile earlier this year the company has been seeking to bring more consistency to the mobile user experience. Earlier today TechCrunch reported that Yahoo had "abandoned" Blackberry in favor of the iPhone: Score another one for the iPhone. Yahoo is abandoning its mobile apps for the Blackberry and other smartphones in order to focus more on its recently relaunched iPhone app. For every other phone, it is concentrating development [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Gomez, Inc. and dotMobi have joined together to rate mobile sites across several verticals according to how well they perform on the mobile internet. The criteria and ranking methodology used included the following benchmarks: Discoverability - how readily a consumer can find the mobile Web site using different URLs. Readiness - how well the mobile Web site renders on popular mobile devices. Availability - the percentage of successful transactions or the availability of a Web page. Response time - how long each page takes to download and the duration of an entire transaction. Consi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Top News | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

At the Mobile World Congress event in Barcelona in February Yahoo announced "Yahoo Mobile," a more integrated presentation of Yahoo's mobile assets and a successor to the ineffectual Yahoo Go. Mobile represents a more coherent integration of what what had been a fragmented collection of mobile properties: oneSearch, Go, oneConnect and onePlace. This evening the new mobile website and iPhone app formally launched; and they represent a dramatic improvement over what came before. There's also an iPhone version of Yahoo Messenger available this evening. The image above is of the iPhone a [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Top News | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Three intertwined stories appeared today about Yahoo. The first from Dow Jones Newswires picks up on a Thomas Weisel report about the company, following a meeting between analysts and CEO Carol Bartz. Ironically the report (as described) is highly positive but it sent shares down because it suggests that a Microsoft-Yahoo deal is not going to happen: "We believe she is focused on building Yahoo for the long term and is narrowing her sights on improving the product before anything else," the analysts said, adding they were bullish on her goals. "A mantra that has been missing at Yahoo for far [...]

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

The Yahoo Search Blog announced that my favorite search browser plugin, Inquisitor has made its way to the iPhone. You can get it right now on your iPhone in the iTunes Store for free by clicking here. The features include: Yahoo Search Assist search suggestions View search results in one click, within the application Site summaries load before the web site itself loads Yahoo News results (if applicable) Personalized search results based on your search history Search history shows you your search logs Clear results by shaking your phone So I had time to play with this iPhone app [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Toolbars & Add-Ons | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Search

AllThingsD is one of several sources reporting that the EVP of Connected Life at Yahoo, Marco Boerries, will be leaving the company ahead of the anticipated management reorganization. AllThingsD's Kara Swisher speculates that this may result in a "cut back" in mobile efforts at Yahoo: It’s unclear what the impact of Boerries’ departure on Yahoo’s Connected Life unit will be. But it seems more likely than not that Bartz will cut back, given it is a harder to monetize now and also because Yahoo does not have its own device, as both Apple (AAPL) and Google (GOOG) do, which might help it [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Features: Analysis | Yahoo: Employees | Yahoo: General | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

In Barcelona at the GSMA Mobile World Congress event, which has been mostly about new handsets so far, Yahoo announced what it's calling "Yahoo Mobile." I haven't yet been able to talk to anyone at Yahoo about this, but it appears to be mostly a rebranding and repackaging of existing Yahoo mobile assets, with a few new things in the mix. Yahoo Go, the company's downloadable mobile client, appears to be deemphasized or is being phased out (Yahoo will correct me if I'm wrong). There also appears to be a new effort to create more correspondence between the mobile Web and mobile applications. A [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile | Top News | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Partnerships

The Yahoo Search Blog announced that Yahoo oneSearch shortcut has been improved and expanded. A new auto-locate feature will detect your location on some mobile devicesEnhanced Search Assist that incorporates the user’s recent search history was added andExpanded availability on Windows Mobile client including the latest latest Nokia and BlackBerry This service also has voice search features. To give it a try on your mobile device, go to http://m.yahoo.com/voice. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Maps & Local | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Search

As the MicroHoo dance continues, here's a wacky idea that just occurred to me: why doesn't Nokia invest in or acquire Yahoo? It's partly suggested by this Fortune article that discusses the challenges that the world's leading handset maker faces in penetrating North America. Nokia has added a bunch of online services that try and bridge the internet and mobile. Indeed, Nokia is trying to position itself as an internet company of sorts. And mobile search will be a big ad-revenue driver in the medium term. It's already a critical element of an overall mobile offering. Yahoo, obviously, is [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Features: Analysis | Microsoft & Yahoo Search Deal | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Outside US | Yahoo: Partnerships

India is something of a parallel universe in terms of search and internet activity. It's a massive and incredibly dynamic market but distinct from the US and Europe in important ways. All the major engines are competing there and it's also often a testing ground for new products. For example Yahoo's "Glue Pages" were released and tried there before coming to the US. Now Yahoo has bought a 30 percent stake in a local information database and directory assistance provider in the market: Info Network Management Company, which runs the Call Ezee service. Seen as a way to secure local data and prov [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Microsoft: Bing Maps & Local | Microsoft: Outside US | Microsoft: Partnerships | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Yahoo: Business Issues | Yahoo: Maps & Local | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Outside US | Yahoo: Partnerships

Yahoo's oneSearch will be the "default" search engine on T-Mobile's new Web2Go portal. Yahoo has such a relationship with T-Mobile in Europe already. In the US, Yahoo also provides mobile search to AT&T. Verizon and Google are battling for similar "default" status on Verizon handsets. Both Google and Microsoft have a relationship with Sprint. This brings to more than 80 the carrier relationships that Yahoo has cultivated around the world. It means that Yahoo has the capacity to reach approxiately 850 million people through those deals. In the US mobile search market share looks simi [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Partnerships

Yahoo has built a mobile Safari version of Yahoo Search for the iPhone. Ryan Grove, a Yahoo developer, blogged about the experience of building out the application. In short, the mobile Safari version gives you almost all of the features the normal Yahoo Search gives you, but with fewer ads and on a smaller screen. Included features are SearchMonkey, Search Assist, shortcuts, and much more. Do note that Yahoo has not built out an iPhone App; this is just a mobile Safari enabled version of Yahoo Search. Here are some screen captures of Yahoo Search on my iPhone: Yahoo Search front page: [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Top News | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Search

Yahoo made a range of mobile search-related announcements today at CTIA. At a high level, these include: Open oneSearch (Search Monkey for mobile), Search Assist for mobile, voice-enabled oneSearch, and "idle screen" search. I spoke this morning with Lee Ott of Yahoo's mobile/Connected Life group and he demonstrated voice-enabled oneSearch (initially only for Blackberries), which is first being offered as a separate search client and will later become part of Go. That capability, which was impressive, is being provided by startup Vlingo, in which Yahoo has also invested. (Yesterday, Microso [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

This morning Yahoo announced a new mobile application called "onePlace." The application isn't yet available but appears to be an elegant mobile bookmarking system that is highly customizable and features an RSS reader. It can accommodate any type of content: news feeds, web sites, videos, images, search queries. A shorthand way to think about it might be MyYahoo for mobile. While bookmarks have faded somewhat in their importance on the desktop, notwithstanding the rise of social bookmarking, it's a different story in mobile. The pain of searching on mobile devices means that personalization [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

At the IAB conference in Phoenix on Monday, Yahoo President Sue Decker made some tantalizing allusions to a new ad platform called "Apex." According to the NY Times, this stands for "advertiser publisher exchange." Perhaps analogous to AOL's Platform A effort, it attempts to knit all of Yahoo's recent acquisitions and ad network properties together (e.g., RightMedia, Blue Lithium). The Times quotes Decker on the potential capabilities and intention behind the platform: We are building a cutting edge ad platform that runs across all formats, whether it is search, display, video. It is capabl [...]

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

Coming out of the Mobile World Congress this morning are two major mobile search (and probably ad) deals involving Google and Yahoo. Yahoo appears to have replaced Google as the search provider for T-Mobile in Europe, and it also appears to be ousting T-Mobile search partner Medio Systems in Europe (the latter just announced an "on device portal" for T-Mobile USA). Google, for its part, has become a major search partner of Nokia, which is the world's largest handset maker and controls 40 percent of the market. From the press release: Nokia and Google today announced that Google's popular se [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Last night at CES, Yahoo made several related mobile announcements tied to its application Go and a new bid to become a mobile platform for third party publishers and developers. There are essentially three pieces to what Yahoo announced: Yahoo Go 3.0 (not yet live), an open mobile widget development platform for third parties, and a redesigned mobile WAP homepage that emphasizes personalization and customization. The first partners for Yahoo's new open mobile platform are eBay, MTV, and MySpace. There's also a bigger mobile display ad push by Yahoo in this set of releases. Yahoo's oneSearch [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Even as attention has been focused on Google's 700 MHz spectrum bid and its Android mobile platform, Yahoo has been aggressively doing business development with mobile operators and handset makers around the world, in Asia, Europe, and now Latin America. This morning Yahoo announced that it had inked another major wireless distribution deal with America Movil. Under the deal, which spans 16 countries and roughly 143 million mobile subscribers in Latin America and the Caribbean, Yahoo's oneSearch "will be the default mobile search service on America Movil's wireless carriers' portals." These [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go

Yahoo put out a dizzying slew of press releases today aimed at highlighting its carrier partnerships and what it claims is its mobile leadership position. The core of these releases is the announcement of nine new Asian mobile operators, adding to the company's other Asian carrier relationships. Yahoo's oneSearch will provide mobile search for these operators, with monetization and revenue sharing as well. The mobile search utility is now available in 19 countries throughout North America, Europe, and Asia. The new carriers announced today include: Aircel Limited (India), BPL Mobile (India), [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go | Yahoo: Outside US

Reuters interviews the head of Yahoo's mobile efforts, Marco Boerries, who emphasizes that Yahoo is building strategic partnerships with carriers and OEMs around the world and argues that Google is probably misguided in introducing Android. Boerries is quoted in the article as saying, "The race is going to be who builds the biggest arsenal of partners and numbers of page views." (This suggests an emphasis on display ads rather than paid search in mobile.) He also argues that Google risks being distracted by technology instead of focusing on ad revenue, the "lifeblood" of both companies. Yaho [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Google: Mobile | Yahoo: Mobile & Go