Heads up, this Monday, Yahoo's search ads will begin to be powered by Microsoft adCenter in the US and Canada. So technically, all the results on the Yahoo Search pages will be served up by Bing/adCenter on Monday. Yahoo has a detailed post with more information on the adCenter transition.
Since I now like to beat up on Yahoo, I figured I go at them.
Did you know that you cannot differentiate your adCenter campaign to serve up different ads between Yahoo and Bing searchers? You can control your ads between 3rd party partners and contextual serving, I believe but no - you can't say I want this campaign or ad to run on Yahoo and not run on Bing and visa versa.
When I spoke with Yahoo about this they said it is on purpose, because it simplifies things for the advertiser. That is a fair argument.
But honestly, I am sick of hearing how Yahoo is still in search. They claim their UI is so different, which sets them apart from Google and even their partner Bing. Why would someone use Yahoo over Bing when Bing is powering Yahoo? Yahoo says because they have a better and different user interface (UI).
If that is so and if Yahoo's UI is so different and Yahoo's searchers are so different then why in the world would I not want the option to differentiate my ads for Yahoo searchers versus Bing searchers?
Different searchers, different UIs scream for different ad copy, different keyword sets, different landing pages!
I asked some advertisers, some really large ones, at the SMX event about this and they 100% agreed. They said if adCenter had the ability to differentiate between Yahoo Search and Bing, they would use it in a heart beat. But they don't and they work with what they got.
Do you agree?
Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.
