Overture API Redux: Deeper Reflection on Yahoo’s Intention
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Written By Reprise Media | March 24, 2005 | Share This
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With the recent stir over Overture’s possible policy changes regarding access to its API/Web Services program, the one question that hasn’t been addressed is: Why?
The easy answer is that it’s a move to recapture revenue lost to the bid management intermediaries that have grown around Overture’s paid search programs. Overture has a lot […]
With the recent stir over Overture’s possible policy changes regarding access to its API/Web Services program, the one question that hasn’t been addressed is: Why?
The easy answer is that it’s a move to recapture revenue lost to the bid management intermediaries that have grown around Overture’s paid search programs. Overture has a lot of technology sitting on the bench, resulting from its acquisition of Web analytics company Keylime Software back in January 2003. This led to the formation of the Overture Performance Marketing group and subsequent launch of the Search Optimizer bid management tool, which provided the foundation for this transition.
While short term revenue growth appears simple and straightforward, this quote from Tom HockSteatter of Overture suggests that Yahoo! is looking at the bigger picture: “We look at offline media as our competitors.”
And what does this ‘bigger picture’ look like? The competitive marketplace has become, well…competitive. Google has reached a near $50 billion market capitalization in a very short amount of time. MSN made the announcement of the MSN adCenter, which features paid search coupled with demographic data and will eventually be adding Web Media management. There’s also the pending acquisition of Ask Jeeves by the deep pockets of IAC and small and upcoming paid search providers, such as BlowSearch, that range from contextual to vertical specific. It’s easy to wonder if Yahoo! is ceding search ground by streamlining itself in order to lessen its dependence paid search revenue.
With Yahoo’s pending response to Google’s AdSense contextual ad network product, the rebranding of Overture to Yahoo! Search Marketing Solutions, the establishment of a sizeable office within Hollywood and recent comments by Jerry Yang on Yahoo! as the Platform and not the Portal, it appears that Yahoo! is repositioning itself under one brand as the primary conduit for all things interactive. This is symbolic of the fight shifting from paid search ads vs. banner ads to offline advertising vs. online advertising.
Only time will tell if all these actions amount to Yahoo’s efforts to elevate Interactive Advertising to a higher ground. What do you think?
Topics: Advertising: Distribution, Search: Innovations, Yahoo! |
This is something you have to hope Yahoo has enough sense to back off of. I think they are really trying to bring the agencies and print advertisers into a darkroom.If you cannot live by the metrics what are you selling?