Microsoft + Yahoo = Opportunity

Microsoft and Yahoo will doubtless want to capitalise on their current successes. Yahoo’s increasing Display Ad business is interesting. If they can use stuff like the targeting piloted by Microsoft AdCenter, and improve the control and measurement systems, they can take away Google’s toys…. and advertisers.

In the UK, Google has over 80% of search share. But, as I’ve said before, the Content Network is a problem and it is often ignored by larger advertisers. Even worse, for Google, non-textual (display ads) are a small fraction of the Content Network. Google’s recent advice to advertisers will improve performance, helping increase advertising, but at the expense of higher costs to advertisers through building additional AdGroups with specialist techniques that may be uneconomic if recognised in accounting as a cost of sale - coupled with a lower click CTR and conversion rate, it’s usually a lethal combination for a small advertiser.

One of my biggest problems with advertisers and the Content Network, has been proving that the Content Network makes a difference. I have a feeling that Display Advert impressions make a difference to awareness. This may translate later into an increased CTR for paid search, or organic adverts, or affiliates, or even direct access to the site - but it is an invisible story unrevealed by attributable and measurable lead generation. This is a major problem for Google - they don’t like passing on information about users and have shown no indication of any willingness to pass on information about impressions (post impression tracking). Statistical treatments to prove that impression volumes have an effect, also need to take into account which sites are being used, and need large volumes of data to demonstrate statistical correlations. And it all gets much more complex when you consider latency (the time delay between beginning to think about buying something to actually getting around to it - can be measured in months or even years in parts of the travel industry).

Microsoft and Yahoo could steal advertiser hearts and establish a new standard in internet advertising by offering cookie tracking on impressions for display advertising. If I can show my clients that Display Adverts result in increased awareness, I can sell more advertising. I don’t think that MS and Yahoo would have the qualms that Google would have about this. As usual, I don’t care about identifying individuals - the goal of post impression tracking is to look for statistical correlations between adverts and response and offer ways to tune the delivery to users that are more likely to want to see the advert (win-win for user and advertiser). If I can deliver post impression tracking results and analysis, whew, I’ll be a much happier bunny.

The increased targeting options for Microsoft also play to segmentation concerns. I have huge doubts that Google’s content matching alone is enough to provide adequate segmentation. I’ve seen too much of “(named software) download” being matched to “(ripped music) download” and “(ripped video programme) download”, or other equivalent mismatching of content. Google’s pretty much unexplained “search behaviour” targeting, where they claim to improve performance through optimising based on recent searches… well, if I don’t understand it and can’t control it, I don’t trust it. I certainly don’t trust Google to do more than optimise their own revenue.

Microsofts targeting models also leave me a little concerned - but they are a step on the right path and frankly, without real information from Google about search history and targeting, I’d rather have the controls that MS offers, than the lack of control offered by Google. I can explain to clients what my errors are - but if Google is changing the game behind my back, I can’t justify changing response to clients. So a Microsoft model is much more interesting.

Much as I loathe Microsoft as a company (I’ve detested using Windows, for years), I do see real opportunities for Microsoft to work with Yahoo to improve targeting and measurement, and to steal advertising share from Google. Whether the world is better served with a Google near-monopoly of search advertising and a Microsoft near-monopoly of display advertising is a different question. But in the short term at least, this may require that Google treats advertisers with a little more respect, and that can’t be a bad thing from where I sit.