Press Release Collection

Yahoo’s Mayer: “Our Search Share Has Declined” But She’s Optimistic About Opportunities

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Yahoo is making progress in a number of product areas under CEO 
Marissa Mayer, but search isn’t one of them — a fact that Mayer herself 
admitted during today’s Q3 earnings call.
<br />
Yahoo’s US share of the search market was just 11.3 percent in September, according to just-released comScore numbers — that ties Yahoo’s all-time low set back in July.<br />

On the conference call today, Mayer essentially stated the obvious about Yahoo’s position in search:<br />

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<em>“It is true that, over the past several years, our 
search share has declined. In terms of the search alliance, we’re 
trading share with Microsoft.”</em></blockquote>
But Mayer and Yahoo CFO Ken Goldman both put on an optimistic outlook
 for the future, saying they feel good about Yahoo’s opportunities, 
particularly in mobile search.<br />

Earlier in the call, Mayer also touted some of Yahoo’s ongoing work 
in search. She said the company launched more than 100 search 
experiments in Q3 “to refine and enhance the search experience for users
 and advertisers.” She also talked up<br />

<ul>
<li>Yahoo’s new search results page design and new mobile (iOS) search experience
</li>
<li>Yahoo’s new search ad formats
</li>
<li>two new search distribution deals with IAC Mobile and AVG International
</li>
<li>the recently re-launched Yahoo Answers, saying that property has “seen a nice rise in engagement since the launch”
</li>
</ul>
Mayer said the company will try to reverse its continuing declines in
 search: “We’re endeavoring to gain share. We’re designing new 
functionality, differentiating functionality. We’re doing direct display
 units that bring the content right to the user in search results.”</div>

Yahoo’s Mayer: “Our Search Share Has Declined” But She’s Optimistic About Opportunities

Yahoo is making progress in a number of product areas under CEO Marissa Mayer, but search isn’t one of them — a fact that Mayer herself a...

How to Market More Effectively to Millennials

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<strong>Millennials with children have very different values and preferences, according to new study</strong></div>
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<span class="yom-figure yom-fig-right" style="width: 310px;"></span>Millennials are one big tribe of trend-savvy, brand-conscious consumers, right? Not so, says a new study into this coveted target audience of 18-to-34-year-olds by Barkley, a marketing agency based in Kansas City.<br />
<br />

The study looked into the consumer records and attitude surveys of 
nearly 11 million members of the older half of that demographic and 
found they have different values and preferences than the younger 
half---mainly because so many older Millennials are parents.<br />
<br />

Of the 78 million Millennials in the U.S, some 31 million are 
parents. The study found that Millennial parents are more pragmatic than
 younger Millennials and more conscious of health, the environment, 
social causes, saving money, and raising kids with strong family values.<br />

What does this mean to marketers? For one thing, you’re more likely 
to find Millennial parents prowling the aisles of Lowe’s and Wal-Mart 
than H&M and Sephora.<br />
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“The takeaway for marketers is that Millennials aren’t a monolith,” 
said David Gutting, Barkley’s strategic director. “And kids versus 
pre-kids makes a big difference.” Marketers should start adapting their 
strategies now, because the study forecasts that 80% of Millennials will
 be raising kids within 10 years.<br />
<br />

If you’re in the Chicago area next Tuesday, Oct. 22, you’ll have a 
great opportunity to gather more insights into marketing to Millennials 
when Yahoo leads a panel discussion at the Museum of Broadcast 
Communication that will dive deeply into the habits and concerns of this
 influential demographic. Register now, and if you can't make it, stay tuned to the blog for a recap of the panel discussion.</div>

How to Market More Effectively to Millennials

Millennials with children have very different values and preferences, according to new study Millennials are one big tribe of trend-s...

Google's Matt Cutts on Search vs. Social: Don't Rely on Just One Channel

<a href="http://cms.searchenginewatch.com/IMG/983/272983/matt-cutts-ranking-focus-video.png?1381859028" imageanchor="1"><img border="0" src="http://cms.searchenginewatch.com/IMG/983/272983/matt-cutts-ranking-focus-video.png?1381859028" /></a>You wondered if you should just throw in the hat when it comes to trying to rank in organic search results and maybe spend more time on other avenues of traffic generation, such as social media leads or pay per click? This is actually the topic of the latest Google webmaster help video from Google's Distinguished Engineer Matt Cutts.

Since Google is been actively updating its search results, it is hard for people to trust Google anymore. Should one start focusing on getting leads from social media other than search engine results?

Google will constantly be upgrading its algorithm, Cutts said. It's never going to be complete, they will continue to update it as spammers find new ways to rank and as they integrate new signals or change the weight of those signals in the algorithm.

Cutts added that since the start of the summer (when this particular video was filmed) Google has been trying to make it even harder for spammers to rank from black hat techniques.

"So we are always going to be updating, always going to change things to make things better, always trying to innovate the way that we record search algorithms, that's just the nature of the beast," Cutts said. "The goal is always the same, to return the highest quality set of search results."

He said webmasters could probably spend their time better than trying to figure out every little nuance of the Google search algorithm.

"So rather than trying to figure out reverse engineering our algorithm and trying to find all the different ways to rank higher and trying to take shortcuts, as long as you're trying to make a fantastic site that people love, that's really compelling, that there are always going to, that's the sort of thing that puts you on the same side as Google," Cutts said.

Now what about getting leads from other sources, such as social media leads? Cutts discussed this type of traffic generation next.

"I'm all for having eggs in lots of different baskets, because if your website goes down and then you can always have your brick-and-mortar business," Cutts said. "If your ranking on Google is not as good, then you can have other channels that you can use – from print media advertising, to billboards, to Twitter, to Facebook. So you should always have a very well-rounded portfolio of ways to get leads whether from people walking through your door or Yellow Pages or whatever it is, because you can't count on any one channel always working out perfectly.

"As long as you have great content you should do well in Google," he added. "But you know if people are spamming or you hire a bad SEO, that can lead to unpredictable results.

So yes, this is another case where Google is praising good content as being the best path forward, because that is what the end user wants to see. And Google is about making the end user – not the SEO company – happy.

Google's Matt Cutts on Search vs. Social: Don't Rely on Just One Channel

You wondered if you should just throw in the hat when it comes to trying to rank in organic search results and maybe spend more time on othe...