Microsoft decided to muck its high stakes poker hand and the wager that it could induce Yahoo’s board to accept a $33 a share takeover offer and abruptly “left the table” last Saturday.
Apparently spooked by the prospect of a widening ad share arrangement between Yahoo and Google, and the unfavorable possibility of other defensive maneuvers that would further diminish Yahoo’s value, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer turned on his heels. Only afterwords, did Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang, tail between his legs, try to explain he was open to the deal all along. Yeah, Right!
Defending his company against allegations that they didn’t try hard enough to deal with Yahoo, Bill Gates spoke out in Tokyo yesterday, “A lot of effort” was put into trying to work out a deal and that the pair should pursue “independent paths”. Gates continued, “Now at this point Microsoft is focused on its independent strategy.”
To this observer, Microsoft made the right move. Not to devalue what Yahoo could have meant to a Microhoo alliance, but the prospect that 1+1 would equal something other than 1 in this equation was speculative at best.
Ironically, many in the Search advertising world credit Microsoft with the more sophisticated technology when comparing the sharply innovative adCenter system with the often klugey Yahoo upgrade of a year ago, code named Panama. Microsoft’s keyword research tools, demographic targeting options, and the potential of visual search with Photosynth are, for starters, all more impressive than Yahoo’s technology. What Microsoft was seeking with Yahoo was simply popularity: the brand recognition (something it would ironically replace), and Web traffic,which can be fleeting. The joke on the street was that, for the asking price, Microsoft could buy the allegiance of Yahoo’s installed base by paying each user a handsome bounty.
What would a combined Microsoft-Yahoo alliance do for Microsoft that Microsoft could not do for itself? That question was far from easy to answer. Only now it will be up to Microsoft to find the path on its own. The results could come as quite a surprise for the stakeholders. Stay tuned! [24×7]
Seattle’s Mixpo Launches Online Video Advertising Platform
Seattle’s Mixpo is looking to do for video advertising what text-based ad technology has done for keywords. The Seatle-based online video advertising company is dedicated to serving the local small and medium-size business (SMB) market with a remarkable online video advertising platform consisting of five integrated components.
The Mixpo VideoAd is a dynamic video advertising player that businesses can easily embed into in-banner video ads, search engine landing pages, Web pages, or blogs. Each VideoAd includes interactive triggers, designated areas where users click to request more information or reach the business directly, generating highly qualified and measureable leads. The online Mixpo Studio lets companies easily create high-quality VideoAds from existing video, photo, and audio files, from a broad range of stock media options, or through the services of Mixpo’s video production partner.
Through Ad Rotation, the Mixpo system allows companies to test and compare different versions of a VideoAd for effectiveness by running, or rotating, the versions simultaneously. Clients can measure how a VideoAd is performing by tracking the number of impressions and views, playthrough and conversion, viewers’ geographic locations, and referring sites on a Dashboard. Mixpo’s business model is based on share of revenue. [24×7
