Pixelrage.net

You may or may not have heard that Yahoo Search Marketing and Microsoft AdCenter (which serves ads on Bing.com) have announced a merger. To all those who have wondered for years why both programs’ dashboards have sucked so hard, now you know.

Just today, a 2^nd email blast went out from both services in less than an hour from each other. Yahoo’s email was more informative, actually stating that the companies intend to roll their collaborative PPC program out before the 2010 holiday season, unless they’re unable to create a smooth transition. According to their “window of time” blurb, current clients will be transitioned beginning late summer 2010.

If you’ve been a Google AdWords loyalist all of these years and have never touched Yahoo Search Marketing or Microsoft AdCenter, here’s a little opinion on each:

My Thoughts on Yahoo Search Marketing

Yahoo Search Marketing deviates in ways from AdWords. While there’s a good deal of reporting, there’s one fatal flaw: you can’t compare present data ranges vs. past data ranges. This truly sucks if you’re looking to prove your worth to your boss, or present some comparisons to your group, or to upper management. You’ve got to break out a pencil and paper (and MS Excel) in order to do this.

Yahoo Search Marketing has a bunch of strange metrics thrown into the fray that are entirely worthless: a metric called “assists” tracks the number of times a keyword contributed to the conversion of another keyword. This metric would be worthwhile if we could see what it contributed to,  but we can’t; so, it’s nothing but a number.

Yahoo Search Marketing is also obsessed with dollar amounts: there’s a column for Revenue, ROAS, and an ROI metric. If you’re 100% sure that the number of conversions its reporting is correct (which is never the case) and you’re selling tangible products, this number might give you a clue as to how well the campaign is doing. If you’re simply counting “conversions” to be a brochure going out or a PDF being downloaded with no idea whether or not those actions became new customers, then these are just pretty numbers cluttering the already crowded dashboard.

Yahoo Search Marketing’s GUI is less than desirable, a veritable 1990s-ish looking control panel that’s incredibly boring to look at and difficult to navigate. What’s even more incredibly boneheaded is that Yahoo Search Marketing only allows you to access 6 months worth of data. Everything before that time period goes into the black hole. Great. I mean, being in marketing and all, who needs past data anyway? :/

Don’t get me wrong, though: if you’re in the right market, Yahoo can really perform for you. The same keywords that are insanely expensive and untouchable on AdWords might be surprisingly affordable on Yahoo. As a search marketer, these are all things you’ll want to test out!

My Thoughts on Microsoft AdCenter

Microsoft AdCenter is like the uglier stepchild of Yahoo Search Marketing: equally as flavorless, it’s obvious that Microsoft never even bothered to have a web designer present when this dashboard was put together. It screams “designed by an IT programming team.” Sharing Yahoo’s fatal flaw: Microsoft AdCenter also has no way of comparing previous data ranges to present data ranges. Another thing that annoys the hell out of me is how it constantly logs you out after a few minutes of no usage.

Also, no matter what I do, I can’t get the log-in box to auto-save my username and password like every other website I use. There’s a fine line between security and annoyance, and it crosses this line greatly. Beyond these issues, the program itself is as barebones as it gets: it simply manages ads and keywords, nothing else. If you’re looking for bells and whistles, you came to the wrong place with AdCenter.

Just like Yahoo, AdCenter doesn’t even give you the courtesy of letting you save a custom report as a PDF file with charts, graphs and statistics. I won’t even get into how awful the conversion rate seems to be on Bing.com, because I don’t want to be unfair – it’s possible that my company’s industry simply doesn’t do well on Bing. However, it’s a broad industry we’re targeting, and the conversion rate is far lower than both Google and Yahoo.

So, Is the Merger Good or Bad?

I think it’s a little of both. It’s good because YSM and MAC both suck so badly. They look like crap, perform awfully (sit through the “swirling wheel” of their dashboard tables for a few minutes and you’ll know what I mean), and are the complete antonym of “feature rich.” The reporting features are god-awful, and the simplest things are missing…even printing a simple invoice will involve printing the screen: at least AdWords auto-generates one for you. So, in these respects, I’m looking forward to the change.

On the flipside, there’s one major thing to be afraid of, here: Google, Yahoo and Bing all have different audiences. They all convert differently with different markets. Now, Yahoo and Bing will both be running off of the same ad program.

In other words, the keywords that do well on Yahoo that didn’t do well on Bing will be running on Bing anyway (unless there’s a way to opt out of using certain keywords on either search engine). I foresee this translating to more worthless clicks and missed opportunities.

This scenario can be argued into oblivion. Just think about the mobile market for a second: certain devices use Bing as their default search engine. Perhaps you’ve found some “secret sauce” in reaching the demographic target that typically buys the phones that use Bing. Now, you’ll be forced to show the same ads on Yahoo (once again, unless you can opt-out).

Overall, I’m optimistic about the change. I’ve hated using Yahoo and Microsoft PPC for years, have incessantly wondered why neither program ever seemed to get an upgrade, and have cursed their lack of features, praising Google AdWords for their 2010-ishness and overall embrace of Web 2.0 function and design. Time will tell if these two competitors will fuse together to form something equally as effective.