Toyota are utilising the Yahoo ‘Living Ad’ format, to encourage increased interactions with users by incorporating digital media advertising as part of their product launch strategy, relying on photography and sequenced videos that are designed to be read on the iPad and encourage user engagement with the product.  Livestand was launched by Yahoo earlier this month, and is a key product in their continued focus on a mobile-centric business strategy.  Livestand was built using HTML5, CSS3, and JavaScript.

The national media manager for Toyota, Dionne Colvin, said that they expect utilising Yahoo’s LiveStand and Living Ad format will work in conjunction with the announcement of their new model, capitalising on the new platforms novelty factor: “this ad unit takes advantage of how users interact and explore with the iPad as opposed to other digital and mobile devices”.

According to Mashable’s Marketing news site, user engagement with digital interactive display marketing is far more effective than static advertisements; a number of studies have been conducted to identify whether the cost of this expensive and sophisticated ad platform is a worthwhile investment, including one conducted with clothing line Denim & thread:

“In an ad effectiveness study conducted by Yahoo and Ipsos prior to the official launch of Living Ads, users were considerably more likely to interact with a Living Ad for jeans brand Denim & Thread versus a static ad. Forty-four percent of those who saw it had a higher opinion of Denim & Thread after seeing it, versus 36 percent for the static ad.”

While the statistic provides compelling evidence to suggest a strong audience engagement with dynamic over static ads, any advertisers that are interested in publishing their own Living Ad, and looking for similar results, need to be aware of the significant production investment that is required to develop such an advertisement in a “motion poster” format.  In some cases it can take up to a year to produce dynamic digital media advertisements from start to finish, and the costs associated to this platform (aside from those associated to actually buying the ad space) are often priced from $200,000 and upwards.

According to Alex Linde, Yahoo’s director of mobile and tablet advertising, their Living Ads are priced from anything between $200,000 to $500,000 running throughout the first quarter of 2012. According to Linde, the prices will vary depending on the look and feel of the ad.

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Following in Google’s digital ad footsteps, Yahoo have focused renewed energy into providing interactive experiences for viewers, by partnering with Alexx Henry Studios in the production of their latest ad product.  Alexx Henry, who specialise in developing platforms suitable for the iPad and other tablet devices, created a ‘digital magazine motion cover’ earlier this year, enabling the publication of content that is mobile centric.  As Yahoo explained at their latest conference: “reaching today’s connected consumers is a rapidly growing and constantly evolving challenge”.

According to Yahoo, their Living Ads format will provide users with an interactive experience that is driven by the advertiser; achieving improved user engagement with a product or brand:

“With Living Ads, advertisers drive the creative process, maintaining control over the entire experience consumers have with their brands. Living Ads combine the allure of television, magazine spreads, the Web, and tablets to provide an immersive environment with deeper consumer engagement.”

The launch of Yahoo’s Living Ads comes at the same time as the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) pushes two initiatives in the hope to achieve standardised tablet ads.  Currently the production of quality, tablet friendly display ads, requires financial investment as well as a lot of development time, that is not practicable, or feasible for most organisations.  Often, the results are not enough to deliver a return on investment, requiring custom work that can’t later be duplicated across other advertising formats.

According to the IAB These formats have the potential to revolutionise the way advertisers engage with their audience, through interactive, quality content, however there is currently a distinct lack of standard metrics to make the platform more accessible to advertisers.  The first of these initiatives is the publication of a roadmap for marketers to navigate the tablet market, as well as an interactive creative gallery providing insights into the best existing tablet advertisements.

The investment of time and money is worth considering, as a number of recent studies have revealed that tablets can offer even greater potential than standard mobile screens; this might just sway budgetary decisions when it comes to investing in the custom work that is required.

According to the Online Publishers Association almost 80% of all tablet owners have paid for an app, with paid content accounting for over a quarter of apps downloaded; according to their statistics, in the last year 43% of app downloaders spent more than $20, and 23% invested more than $50, compelling statistics for those looking to secure an ROI in the development of mobile friendly ads.

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Recently, Yahoo has lost some of its popularity, having been knocked from second to third place in terms of search engine popularity, by Microsoft’s Bing service. In addition, the company are losing page views, and recent attempts to gain customers through the launch of new products have all fallen flat.

Chief Products Officer Blake Irving hopes that his intervention will change the way in which Yahoo is currently being perceived, making it more popular and much more widely used by customers, globally. He shared a three-year strategy at a recent event this week, stating: “You are going to see things that happen fast, that are innovative and that make customers and advertisers delighted. Yahoo in three years is a global series of web experiences across a variety of different devices that gives people what they want; the content, the folks that they care about. There is a bunch of bringing cool back to Yahoo saying a lot of the things that you want to do on the web are here.”

New products include a faster mail service, enhanced user interface, spam blocker, integration with Facebook and Twitter, entertainment search support, improved advertising and connecting to video-on-demand and gaming services.

Irving commented: “I think in the next 15 years more than half of users will be accessing services through mobile devices. I see it with my own kids who are just as comfortable typing on glass as they are on a keyboard. It’s going to be a different world and a huge percentage of what Yahoo will do will not be on PCs.”

“Yahoo is a technology company and an innovative technology company. It is in the digital media business and operates the largest digital media content on the planet. People should use this presentation as a pivot to say this is a technology capable company that has at its core technology as a key lever.”

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Yahoo has recently joined the data portability bandwagon, by launching a new tool: Yahoo Updates, which has been developed in conjunction with JS-Kit.

JS-Kit is a social networking facility which connects up over 600,000 sites, through a comment widget. The widget has now been linked in to Yahoo Updates, allowing users to show comments and articles from all over the web, through their Yahoo Updates feed. In addition, the Yahoo user ID will now have the capability to be used across the internet, with a similar portability currently deployed by Google and OpenID. Featuring new APIs, the latest development is available as part of Yahoo’s overall Open Strategy for users.

For those of us who are still not quite up to date with data portability and its features, RWW defines it like this:

“The vision for all these kinds of systems is that allowing readers to authenticate themselves with a trusted 3rd party makes them more likely to post comments, offers exposure to site owners when comments are syndicated into activity streams on bigger sites and should allow site owners to access verified information about their readers’ profiles and interests. That last part is still something we’re waiting for, but that should be part of the value proposition to site owners.”

The basic principle of all data portability is to make it much easier for us to navigate about the net without carting a load of log-ion details around with us. Software such as Roboform has made it easy for us to remember our details, but with this new technology, internet giants such as Yahoo and Google are going all out to make it easier than ever before for us to maintain a consistent online identity, wherever we choose to surf.

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The shut down will come into effect as of April 30th 2010 giving users of YPN only 1 months notice. Yahoo Publisher Network is the self service contextual ad network that Yahoo setup to compete with the mighty Google Adsense Network, offering a similar, if not inferior, service.

It would appear, from this evidence that Yahoo’s attempt at competing with Google has lost to a service that has always been far superior in almost every way, it was always only a matter of time before Yahoo were forced to throw in the towel and admit defeat.

In a statement Yahoo outlined what this announcement meant for its current users:

They confirmed that the decision does not affect large, direct publishers and partners, nor advertisers using Content Match. There will be no change for large partners/affiliate networks and there will be changes made to Content Match ads.

This will surely be a harsh blow to Yahoo, admitting defeat to one of their biggest rivals, but it will be a case of back to the drawing board for the internet search

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If you’re in this camp then allow me to have one last crack at persuading you otherwise with one good reason why you need to think of each as a new campaign and tailor your approach to match… Demographics.

The splits in terms of search engine use in the UK are pretty well known. Google have around 85 – 90% of the market, Yahoo come in around 5% and Bing fluctuate erratically below that. However, the mistake comes in believing that the pie is split along the same lines in terms of demographics. It isn’t.

A couple of examples of what I’m talking about…

Youth – For some reason, the average age of yahoo’s users has historically tended to be a bit younger than Gopogle’s. So if, for example, you sell products and have a certain selection that you think is going to appeal to younger consumers then it might be an idea to push those products more enthusiastically on Yahoo. By the same token, you may find that the results you get from saga holidays isn’t quite as good.

Experience – Many Internet Explorer users have Bing as their default search engine to begin with. Whereas experienced internet users will more often than not change the default settings to Yahoo, or (more likely) to Google the less experienced won’t. Ergo the users of Bing may contain be the less experienced users – perhaps not the venue for your ‘integrated IT business solution.’

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Unsurprisingly, the announcement has caused very few waves within the community. Only this blog and a handful of others are even talking about it. The trouble is that just keeping up with Google is not going to cut it for Yahoo since it gives advertisers absolutely no reason to abandon the huge number of searchers on Google and schlep all the way over to Yahoo.

The struggling search engine really needs to do something to change the game, to give users some reason to move over from Google, or at least to use them as well. What that would be however, is anybody’s guess.

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Yahoo is divided up into three divisions, for Europe, Asia and emerging markets, it is thought that one executive will take control of all of them though who that is remains a mystery.

Things don’t look as bleak as they have at Yahoo, with various avenues such as internet TV looking like coming good, however, there is a feeling within the industry that this is going to need to yield some results if Yahoo is to survive long-term.

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In an email to its users Yahoo explained themselves thus,

“The decision to close Content Match underlines our commitment to focus on our Sponsored Search and Display business and to simplify our solutions to deliver a high ROI for our advertisers.”

This is clearly evidence of how bad things are at Yahoo, but we’ve known that for months. More urgent for the consumer is the fact that this move will drastically weaken the Yahoo Publisher Network, the closest thing to an Adsense competitor there is. What’s more, if this is the first step of a move to roll out this initiative across the company, then Yahoo are about to basically hand Google ownership of online contextual advertising.

It doesn’t take a degree in economics to know that monopolies are bad for customers, since a lack of competition removes the incentive to provide good customer service and low prices. Come on Yahoo, pull yourself together!

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We have a few more details on exactly what Yahoo’s planning now: the software, that has been developed by Intel and Yahoo, will be loaded onto new TVs and right off the bat will allow access to popular web pages and tools alongside regular TV programmes. Beyond that around 20 different ‘widgets’ will be available to download. These widgets will provide you with information on weather, stocks, etc. There is also scope for third parties to create widgets which can then be submitted to the “Widget Gallery,” much like the app store.

The gamble is big, but then again, what does Yahoo have to lose? By all accounts if they keep going the way they are they’re doomed. Plus, this looks like real winner. How many times have you had your laptop out while watching TV?

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It’s still not quite full access to the internet from your TV but it certainly sounds like an improvement. Also, significantly, it’s a new market for Yahoo, one that Google and Microsoft aren’t involved in… Yet.

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The shares fell below $10 after Steve Ballmer, CEO of Microsoft Corp again reiterated that Microsoft would not be seeking to buy any part of Yahoo. Microsoft had attempted a buyout of $33 dollars a share earlier in the year, which was turned down by Yang though it’s hard to see them doing the same now that their shares aren’t even a third of that value.

Ballmer has denied any intention to buy the ailing company once before recently. However, he apparently felt the need to re-state his position after news of Jerry Yang’s departure sent Yahoo’s share price up 12 per cent, as investors anticipated renewed interest from Microsoft.

The glimmer of hope for Yahoo is that Ballmer has not closed the door on the idea of some kind of partnership with Yahoo, describing the idea of the companies coming together in some sort of internet-search venture as ‘interesting.’ However, there are no talks currently in progress and no one is clear about the sort of shape that would take. Whoever ends up replacing Jerry Yang may have to think up a survival strategy that doesn’t involve Microsoft at all. Imagine that…

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It is hoped that the departure may spark a new round of Microsoft talks, though Yahoo has lost a huge chunk of its market value over the last year or so. If Microsoft is interested, Jang’s legacy is likely to be a drastically reduced offer from the computer giant.

Jang remains acting CEO until Yahoo can find a replacement and will remain a member of the board.

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That list has recently grown by one, with Yahoo dragging its ailing search engine into the local advertising fray. Disappointingly for some however, they have chosen to follow the Ask model and do so by allowing users to pick postcodes, rather than develop something like Google’s system which is thought by many to be much more precise.

It’s a good move for Yahoo, which should see them collect a decent number of new users, not just from the small business community but also from bigger companies looking to target geographically for other reasons – maybe looking for regions where people have a higher disposable income.

That notwithstanding, it’ll take more than relatively small new initiatives like this to avoid the widely predicted Yahoo meltdown.

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