Read: They fired people yesterday.
How many? No one is really sure. I know of 5 definites across production and engineering ... reports are up to 20 were asked to leave, including one very senior staffer.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/business/story/0,28124,24572546-7582,00.html
Edit: Just 6 days earlier Y7 told The Oz they had no immediate plans to make local redundancies - http://www.australianit.news.com.au/story/0,24897,24540225-5013040,00.html
Showing posts with label Yahoo7. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Yahoo7. Show all posts
Thursday, October 30, 2008
Thursday, October 16, 2008
September Nielsen data: Yahoo!7 takes a massive hit, other players hold
Nielsen has just released September Netview data and the numbers would be causing a few sighs over at Yahoo!7
Just over 6 weeks ago Yahoo!7 PR was out in force trumpeting the success of their Olympics initiative - and with good reason - it was pretty successful.
However most insiders were more concerned with what they could do with the audience once the Olympics were over. Could they hold enough of them and bring them into the Yahoo!7 fold (be it through Mail, Messenger, Answers, News, Homepage) to become regular users.
The first warning sign would have been last month when the Nielsen data showed Yahoo!7 didn't actually add any new users in August of 08 (when compared to July) - most would have expected an incremental gain in user numbers as a result of an official Olympics alliance at the very least. It wouldn't be too bold to predict internally Yahoo!7 would have forecasted a 10-20% traffic increase.
However this would have seemed like a minor blow compared to the traffic king hit the site experienced in September, down 9% from 5.35m uniques to 4.87m uniques.
This drop mirrors the drop Yahoo!7 experience just after the 2006 World Cup. Remember, the World Cup site in 06 was a Yahoo! co-brand and the traffic fell into Yahoo's topline. However once the action stopped in Germany, the traffic left and didn't return.
On these current September numbers, Yahoo!7 has less momentum with its audience than it did pre Olympics, which is undoubtedly the worst possible outcome for the site.
You can bet the financial investment required to secure the online rights to the Olympics was a mid term initiative financially - based on using the Olympic brand as a carrot to bring new eyeballs to the site and Yahoo!7 working out a way to transition these people into long term users.
Tough questions will no doubt be asked. How has this happened? Did the company have a real plan to try and keep the Olympics traffic it generated? Why, with the number 1 TV network is this JV not generating much traction with users over 2 years in? What has happened to Rohan Lund's vision of being a leader in news, homepage, mail and search?
These are prickly questions - but it seems now globally the Yahoo! brand is being forced to address them across the board as the share price flounders. How will it address these issues it is facing in AU?
The only question I have is, what is Yahoo7's strategy? It's hard to see a real direction from an outsiders point of view.
At the same time, Yahoo!'s main competitors either held their audience in September or grew marginally.
Ninemsn and Fairfax Digital held topline audience numbers, whilst News Digital Media grew 4% (up 150k users)
Just over 6 weeks ago Yahoo!7 PR was out in force trumpeting the success of their Olympics initiative - and with good reason - it was pretty successful.
However most insiders were more concerned with what they could do with the audience once the Olympics were over. Could they hold enough of them and bring them into the Yahoo!7 fold (be it through Mail, Messenger, Answers, News, Homepage) to become regular users.
The first warning sign would have been last month when the Nielsen data showed Yahoo!7 didn't actually add any new users in August of 08 (when compared to July) - most would have expected an incremental gain in user numbers as a result of an official Olympics alliance at the very least. It wouldn't be too bold to predict internally Yahoo!7 would have forecasted a 10-20% traffic increase.
However this would have seemed like a minor blow compared to the traffic king hit the site experienced in September, down 9% from 5.35m uniques to 4.87m uniques.
This drop mirrors the drop Yahoo!7 experience just after the 2006 World Cup. Remember, the World Cup site in 06 was a Yahoo! co-brand and the traffic fell into Yahoo's topline. However once the action stopped in Germany, the traffic left and didn't return.
On these current September numbers, Yahoo!7 has less momentum with its audience than it did pre Olympics, which is undoubtedly the worst possible outcome for the site.
You can bet the financial investment required to secure the online rights to the Olympics was a mid term initiative financially - based on using the Olympic brand as a carrot to bring new eyeballs to the site and Yahoo!7 working out a way to transition these people into long term users.
Tough questions will no doubt be asked. How has this happened? Did the company have a real plan to try and keep the Olympics traffic it generated? Why, with the number 1 TV network is this JV not generating much traction with users over 2 years in? What has happened to Rohan Lund's vision of being a leader in news, homepage, mail and search?
These are prickly questions - but it seems now globally the Yahoo! brand is being forced to address them across the board as the share price flounders. How will it address these issues it is facing in AU?
The only question I have is, what is Yahoo7's strategy? It's hard to see a real direction from an outsiders point of view.
At the same time, Yahoo!'s main competitors either held their audience in September or grew marginally.
Ninemsn and Fairfax Digital held topline audience numbers, whilst News Digital Media grew 4% (up 150k users)
YHOO dips below $12 a share
Has anyone else been watching the rapid descent of the Yahoo share price?
Well ... right now it's at $11.75 and its market cap is just north of $16b USD.
Blodget covers it here - http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/10/yahoo-cracks-12-valuation-now-officially-ridiculous
Lets not forget in February MSFT offered Yahoo! $31 per share ... and they declined. Since then the situation has gone from bad to worse.
What's causing the decline? The flogging the company is copping in search combined with large questions around Jerry Yang and Sue Decker and a very public stoush between those 2 and Carl Icahn earlier in the year. The Google AdSense distro deal being stalled wouldn't be helping either, nor would over 100 senior exec defections in the past 18 months.
Key thing to remember is in the US and most areas of Asia - Yahoo is still very strong. Very strong - a leader in many key categories across these large, critical markets. Even with this, many are expecting large layoffs and scaling back of operations. Some have predicted 20% of staff could go.
Have to wonder what might be about to happen in AU - where the company isn't a market leader and of late has seemed to lack longer term direction when compared to its competitors.
Well ... right now it's at $11.75 and its market cap is just north of $16b USD.
Blodget covers it here - http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/10/yahoo-cracks-12-valuation-now-officially-ridiculous
Lets not forget in February MSFT offered Yahoo! $31 per share ... and they declined. Since then the situation has gone from bad to worse.
What's causing the decline? The flogging the company is copping in search combined with large questions around Jerry Yang and Sue Decker and a very public stoush between those 2 and Carl Icahn earlier in the year. The Google AdSense distro deal being stalled wouldn't be helping either, nor would over 100 senior exec defections in the past 18 months.
Key thing to remember is in the US and most areas of Asia - Yahoo is still very strong. Very strong - a leader in many key categories across these large, critical markets. Even with this, many are expecting large layoffs and scaling back of operations. Some have predicted 20% of staff could go.
Have to wonder what might be about to happen in AU - where the company isn't a market leader and of late has seemed to lack longer term direction when compared to its competitors.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Yahoo!7 and other big players lose audience during Olympic period of August
New Nielsen data is out and it's big.
Yahoo!7 - who had the official Olympics presence in AU - actually lost audience numbers in August.
August 08 saw 5.35m Australia' s visit the site, down 41,000 from July.
This would be an annoyance to the Yahoo!7 management team, who rely on this Nielsen data as it's their only source of audited third party measurement to take to market. (as they don't use Market Intelligence)
It may also raise questions about the value of the Olympics to Yahoo!7 in terms of exposing the brand and their services to a new audience.
All of the main players took hits in August - ninemsn was down over 200,000 uniques, Fairfax Digital down 100,000 uniques, and News Digital down over 300,000 uniques. Relative to these numbers, the Yahoo! result doesn't look too bad ... but would still be a worry as it will raise concerns as to what the numbers will do in September without the Olympic traffic to pump it up.
It would also be a surprise for the other networks - who wouldn't have banked on them losing audience numbers of this volume as they enter the absolutely crucial back quarter.
All data sourced from Nielsen Netview, August 2008
Yahoo!7 - who had the official Olympics presence in AU - actually lost audience numbers in August.
August 08 saw 5.35m Australia' s visit the site, down 41,000 from July.
This would be an annoyance to the Yahoo!7 management team, who rely on this Nielsen data as it's their only source of audited third party measurement to take to market. (as they don't use Market Intelligence)
It may also raise questions about the value of the Olympics to Yahoo!7 in terms of exposing the brand and their services to a new audience.
All of the main players took hits in August - ninemsn was down over 200,000 uniques, Fairfax Digital down 100,000 uniques, and News Digital down over 300,000 uniques. Relative to these numbers, the Yahoo! result doesn't look too bad ... but would still be a worry as it will raise concerns as to what the numbers will do in September without the Olympic traffic to pump it up.
It would also be a surprise for the other networks - who wouldn't have banked on them losing audience numbers of this volume as they enter the absolutely crucial back quarter.
All data sourced from Nielsen Netview, August 2008
Thursday, September 11, 2008
Yahoo! challenges Google with Bigpond mobile deal? Really?
The Oz is reporting Yahoo! and Bigpond striking a deal for Yahoo! to power the Bigpond Mobile on deck search - http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24326440-26077,00.html
"The multi-year deal between Yahoo7 and Telstra's Sensis division means Yahoo's oneSearch technology will replace Sensis's search technology on 4.4 million Telstra BigPond 3G-enabled phones.
"Revenue from display and search advertising that appears on the mobile search service -- which will be accessible through a co-branded button on the content menus of all Telstra 3G phones -- will be shared between Yahoo7 and Sensis.
"The partnership will eventually be expanded to include Sensis's Yellow and Trading Post classified searches and Telstra BigPond content.
"Yahoo7 chief executive Rohan Lund said the deal was the most significant for the company in the mobile space and would give Yahoo's advertisers access to a much bigger audience."
Is this really much of a big deal. It definitely doesn't amount to a challenge to Google. Let's not forget Google is flogging Yahoo! in search globally and even more in AU.
People trust Google - they use it on their PC and will also use it on their mobile. It's questionable how much incremental traffic this will bring Yahoo! search and also about the real value/visbility it will give to its advertisers. It makes for nice PR but will it deliver much to their consumers - user/advertiser.
It's interesting to see the deals Lund is looking to strike - he is looking to build Yahoo! audience through distribution deals. It's not a bad play - it's generally cheaper than ATL marketing - and the new eyeballs generated can be added to the topline figure the large guys still like to throw around (we have 5m users etc) despite most marketers not caring anymore about topline network numbers.
Also, does this mean Telstra is putting Sensis search to bed? It's been a rough 4-5 years for Sensis search - it might make more sense to utilise Yahoo!'s better technology and enter into a revshare deal with them on advertising. Would cut a sh*tload of salary cost and they could no doubt negotiate a pretty good deal with Yahoo! as Sensis/Bigpond Internet distro could increase Yahoo!'s total search audience in AU by 50-100%.
"The multi-year deal between Yahoo7 and Telstra's Sensis division means Yahoo's oneSearch technology will replace Sensis's search technology on 4.4 million Telstra BigPond 3G-enabled phones.
"Revenue from display and search advertising that appears on the mobile search service -- which will be accessible through a co-branded button on the content menus of all Telstra 3G phones -- will be shared between Yahoo7 and Sensis.
"The partnership will eventually be expanded to include Sensis's Yellow and Trading Post classified searches and Telstra BigPond content.
"Yahoo7 chief executive Rohan Lund said the deal was the most significant for the company in the mobile space and would give Yahoo's advertisers access to a much bigger audience."
Is this really much of a big deal. It definitely doesn't amount to a challenge to Google. Let's not forget Google is flogging Yahoo! in search globally and even more in AU.
People trust Google - they use it on their PC and will also use it on their mobile. It's questionable how much incremental traffic this will bring Yahoo! search and also about the real value/visbility it will give to its advertisers. It makes for nice PR but will it deliver much to their consumers - user/advertiser.
It's interesting to see the deals Lund is looking to strike - he is looking to build Yahoo! audience through distribution deals. It's not a bad play - it's generally cheaper than ATL marketing - and the new eyeballs generated can be added to the topline figure the large guys still like to throw around (we have 5m users etc) despite most marketers not caring anymore about topline network numbers.
Also, does this mean Telstra is putting Sensis search to bed? It's been a rough 4-5 years for Sensis search - it might make more sense to utilise Yahoo!'s better technology and enter into a revshare deal with them on advertising. Would cut a sh*tload of salary cost and they could no doubt negotiate a pretty good deal with Yahoo! as Sensis/Bigpond Internet distro could increase Yahoo!'s total search audience in AU by 50-100%.
Monday, August 25, 2008
Beijing 2008 over: Yahoo!7 release audience data
Yahoo!7 today released some figures on the popularity of their Olympics presence this year.
The topline ...
- 1.2m unique users for Week 1. 1.15m unique users for Week 2
- 32m pageviews
- 4m video streams
What we don't know ...
- engagement stats (time spent, repeat visits)
- most popular time of day
- how many of the users were AU based (you'd estimate around 80%)
Yahoo! would be happy with these numbers. And they'd be happy with the way they utilised the TV coverage to push to web - which they did very well.
For next time (well, next big event as 9 has the next Olympics) they would probably want to add search capabilities to the online video, as this is the only area I think may have fallen short.
4m streams isn't bad, don't get me wrong. But on a site that was claiming around or above 300k users every day it's not great. 4m streams over the 16 days of the games equals 250,000 streams a day. Personally, I think these numbers would have been greater with a search function as finding some videos was very difficult. Also remember, they had some very strong content (all the good content) which would have been in demand from users - if they could find it easily. I also think they could have integrated video search for Olympic content into their own search engine - if you searched for Usain Bolt the day after the 100m there was no reference to watching the video on Yahoo!
However, the AU streams hold up well when compared with the stream data for the NBC Olympics site in the US (which had a load more content).
The US NBC site had around 75m streams (I am basing this number on 56m streams after day 12, extrapolating the number out to 16 days - http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2008/tc20080820_627259.htm?chan=technology_technology+index+page_digital+entertainment)
The US has 223.1m Internet users ... which works out at .29 video streams per total ppl online (US).
AU has 11.65m Internet users ... which works out at .34 video streams per total ppl online (AU)
If you apply a $60cpm to the 4m streams and assume a 90% sell through, if the Olympics were sold on normal CPM (which they weren't) it would have meant a $216,000 pay day for Yahoo!7 - which still means online video is small potatoes when compared to its broadcast cousin.
Still, Yahoo!7 held their own during the Beijing Olympics and no doubt surprised many on how well they delivered. Now we wait to see just how much incremental traffic the Olympics delivered for them, and whether they can hold onto them and push them across the network into their key areas of News, Mail, Search, Answers and Entertainment.
The topline ...
- 1.2m unique users for Week 1. 1.15m unique users for Week 2
- 32m pageviews
- 4m video streams
What we don't know ...
- engagement stats (time spent, repeat visits)
- most popular time of day
- how many of the users were AU based (you'd estimate around 80%)
Yahoo! would be happy with these numbers. And they'd be happy with the way they utilised the TV coverage to push to web - which they did very well.
For next time (well, next big event as 9 has the next Olympics) they would probably want to add search capabilities to the online video, as this is the only area I think may have fallen short.
4m streams isn't bad, don't get me wrong. But on a site that was claiming around or above 300k users every day it's not great. 4m streams over the 16 days of the games equals 250,000 streams a day. Personally, I think these numbers would have been greater with a search function as finding some videos was very difficult. Also remember, they had some very strong content (all the good content) which would have been in demand from users - if they could find it easily. I also think they could have integrated video search for Olympic content into their own search engine - if you searched for Usain Bolt the day after the 100m there was no reference to watching the video on Yahoo!
However, the AU streams hold up well when compared with the stream data for the NBC Olympics site in the US (which had a load more content).
The US NBC site had around 75m streams (I am basing this number on 56m streams after day 12, extrapolating the number out to 16 days - http://www.businessweek.com/technology/content/aug2008/tc20080820_627259.htm?chan=technology_technology+index+page_digital+entertainment)
The US has 223.1m Internet users ... which works out at .29 video streams per total ppl online (US).
AU has 11.65m Internet users ... which works out at .34 video streams per total ppl online (AU)
If you apply a $60cpm to the 4m streams and assume a 90% sell through, if the Olympics were sold on normal CPM (which they weren't) it would have meant a $216,000 pay day for Yahoo!7 - which still means online video is small potatoes when compared to its broadcast cousin.
Still, Yahoo!7 held their own during the Beijing Olympics and no doubt surprised many on how well they delivered. Now we wait to see just how much incremental traffic the Olympics delivered for them, and whether they can hold onto them and push them across the network into their key areas of News, Mail, Search, Answers and Entertainment.
Excessive: AU Homepages Ad Count
I have voiced my concern with the volume of ads appearing on publisher homepages in the past, and today I thought it'd be an interesting time to see whether ad messages are dominating publisher homepages still.
As an agency guy, I think the less ad units a publisher has on their homepage the better. I think as an advertiser if you're forking out between 50-130k for a homepage execution, it devalues the placement for it to be surrounded by countless text ads for credit cards and debt consolidation.
Plus, I think the user deserves the frontpage to be clean and easy to navigate.
So, effectively, the publishers are failing both their stakeholders.
And you would never see the front page of a newspaper filled with ads.
Anyway - lets look at the totals for Monday 25 August.
Yahoo!7 - 16 total ads
Excessive ad units add more clutter to an already cluttered experience. Overwhelming.
ninemsn - 14 total ads
Biggest positive is that the area above the fold is pretty clean - still, a lot of text placements here.
theage.com.au - 16 total ads
Admittedly, 8 of these placements are Sponsored Links ... and the page is pretty long ... but Fairfax are squeezing every penny out of their eyeballs and advertisers.
smh.com.au - 17 total ads
We have a winner! Optus have a med rec + OTP ... as well as the Sponsored Links placements and the awesome bottom leaderboard. More finance sales pitches than a bank manager.
news.com.au - 8 total ads
Good effort. Marks deducted for news still considering the 468x60 banner to be acceptable as well as two display ad units above the fold.
Bigpond - 4 total ads
Bigpond only have 4 external advertisers on their homepage - not bad. Let down unfortunately by their horrendous Bigpond Shopping page dominant ad.
Google - 0 total ads
And this is Australia's most popular page ... which says to me users enjoy less clutter.
I would like to see a publisher look to place LESS ads on their homepage, but extract more yield from these placements. Both advertisers and users would value less ad clutter and advertisers would be prepared to pay more.
Right now the amount of ads on homepages makes the industry look amateur and greedy in the eyes of most. And excessive ad placements effectively devalue these "premium" placements in the long term.
As an agency guy, I think the less ad units a publisher has on their homepage the better. I think as an advertiser if you're forking out between 50-130k for a homepage execution, it devalues the placement for it to be surrounded by countless text ads for credit cards and debt consolidation.
Plus, I think the user deserves the frontpage to be clean and easy to navigate.
So, effectively, the publishers are failing both their stakeholders.
And you would never see the front page of a newspaper filled with ads.
Anyway - lets look at the totals for Monday 25 August.
Yahoo!7 - 16 total ads
Excessive ad units add more clutter to an already cluttered experience. Overwhelming.
ninemsn - 14 total ads
Biggest positive is that the area above the fold is pretty clean - still, a lot of text placements here.
theage.com.au - 16 total ads
Admittedly, 8 of these placements are Sponsored Links ... and the page is pretty long ... but Fairfax are squeezing every penny out of their eyeballs and advertisers.
smh.com.au - 17 total ads
We have a winner! Optus have a med rec + OTP ... as well as the Sponsored Links placements and the awesome bottom leaderboard. More finance sales pitches than a bank manager.
news.com.au - 8 total ads
Good effort. Marks deducted for news still considering the 468x60 banner to be acceptable as well as two display ad units above the fold.
Bigpond - 4 total ads
Bigpond only have 4 external advertisers on their homepage - not bad. Let down unfortunately by their horrendous Bigpond Shopping page dominant ad.
Google - 0 total ads
And this is Australia's most popular page ... which says to me users enjoy less clutter.
I would like to see a publisher look to place LESS ads on their homepage, but extract more yield from these placements. Both advertisers and users would value less ad clutter and advertisers would be prepared to pay more.
Right now the amount of ads on homepages makes the industry look amateur and greedy in the eyes of most. And excessive ad placements effectively devalue these "premium" placements in the long term.
Thursday, August 21, 2008
Yahoo!7 Olympics video frustrates ...
Why doesn't Yahoo!7's Olympic video content have video search functionality?
Try finding the video you're after - it's hard work ploughing through the pages when it would be easiest to tag everything and allow access via a simple search mechanism.
Better user experience and no doubt way more streams would have been generated.
Weird.
Monday, August 18, 2008
The online Olympics? Or is it ...
Many of us (including me) thought that the Beijing Olympics would be a huge shot in the arm for online.
It makes sense ... daytime events, people are at work and wanting immediate information. Online is the channel they turn to?
Right?
Well ... I'm not so sure after looking at last weeks Nielsen Market Intelligence data across the News and Sport categories.
Above are the Nielsen figures for the Sport category, Domestic browsers, 11/8-17/8
Foxsports is at number 1 at 654,834. SMH Sport and afl.com.au are at 2 and 3 respectively.
The interesting things about the above for me are ...
- The entire category sits at 3.5m UBs, only up 8.7% on the week prior. Last week was when the Olympics really heated up ... but it hasn't really brought any incremental traffic to the category
- Fairfax Digital's SMH Sport is up week on week 216% to 578k weekly users. Their The Age Sport is also up significantly, up 151% to 310k weekly users.
- ninemsn's WWOS is down 40% week on week, to 207k users
Now take a look at the News category ...
As a category, News is sitting at 5.8m domestic users a week for 11/8-16/8 ... a decrease week on week of 3.14%
Most Masthead News sections or web news sources are either flat traffic wise, or down. I personally expected News traffic to spike during the Olympics.
Interestingly, UB frequency is relatively flat, so are page views per person. Both key engagement metrics.
What does this mean? I'm not so sure ...
I would suggest a high proportion of Olympic traffic is going through to Olympics.com.au and also the beijing2008 site - both of which Nielsen does not have access to.
Yahoo!7 is claiming they had 1.2m unique visitors through to their Olympics site in week 1. Problem is these are internal figures and don't specify whether they are AU eyeballs only. I find it odd that Yahoo!7 chose not to put their Olympics site on Nielsen when it's 100% localised.
Yahoo! is also spruiking incremental traffic to their front page as well. Again, no audited data on this.
So ... maybe the Olympics isn't pulling in any NEW eyeballs for these providers. Already loyal users of sites like The Age, ninemsn etc are moreso visiting their Olympic sections as they navigate through the site as per usual.
Or maybe everyone is just watching it on TV in the office and at home?
What are your thoughts?
It makes sense ... daytime events, people are at work and wanting immediate information. Online is the channel they turn to?
Right?
Well ... I'm not so sure after looking at last weeks Nielsen Market Intelligence data across the News and Sport categories.
Above are the Nielsen figures for the Sport category, Domestic browsers, 11/8-17/8
Foxsports is at number 1 at 654,834. SMH Sport and afl.com.au are at 2 and 3 respectively.
The interesting things about the above for me are ...
- The entire category sits at 3.5m UBs, only up 8.7% on the week prior. Last week was when the Olympics really heated up ... but it hasn't really brought any incremental traffic to the category
- Fairfax Digital's SMH Sport is up week on week 216% to 578k weekly users. Their The Age Sport is also up significantly, up 151% to 310k weekly users.
- ninemsn's WWOS is down 40% week on week, to 207k users
Now take a look at the News category ...
As a category, News is sitting at 5.8m domestic users a week for 11/8-16/8 ... a decrease week on week of 3.14%
Most Masthead News sections or web news sources are either flat traffic wise, or down. I personally expected News traffic to spike during the Olympics.
Interestingly, UB frequency is relatively flat, so are page views per person. Both key engagement metrics.
What does this mean? I'm not so sure ...
I would suggest a high proportion of Olympic traffic is going through to Olympics.com.au and also the beijing2008 site - both of which Nielsen does not have access to.
Yahoo!7 is claiming they had 1.2m unique visitors through to their Olympics site in week 1. Problem is these are internal figures and don't specify whether they are AU eyeballs only. I find it odd that Yahoo!7 chose not to put their Olympics site on Nielsen when it's 100% localised.
Yahoo! is also spruiking incremental traffic to their front page as well. Again, no audited data on this.
So ... maybe the Olympics isn't pulling in any NEW eyeballs for these providers. Already loyal users of sites like The Age, ninemsn etc are moreso visiting their Olympic sections as they navigate through the site as per usual.
Or maybe everyone is just watching it on TV in the office and at home?
What are your thoughts?
Thursday, August 7, 2008
Blog for sale - $3117 USD
According to Websiteoutlook.com my blog has a valuation of $3117 USD.
http://www.websiteoutlook.com/www.mimelbourne.blogspot.com
May as well sell out whilst the market is hot ...
Have a play around with the tool - according to it ninemsn is only worth around $4m USD! Facebook $481m USD. Interesting.
According to websiteoutlook, my blog is worth more than Yahoo!7 - flattering stat but hardly accurate - http://www.websiteoutlook.com/www.yahoo7.com.au
Any prospective buyers can email me.
http://www.websiteoutlook.com/www.mimelbourne.blogspot.com
May as well sell out whilst the market is hot ...
Have a play around with the tool - according to it ninemsn is only worth around $4m USD! Facebook $481m USD. Interesting.
According to websiteoutlook, my blog is worth more than Yahoo!7 - flattering stat but hardly accurate - http://www.websiteoutlook.com/www.yahoo7.com.au
Any prospective buyers can email me.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
NBCU's Digital Olympics - The Rundown
NBCU has an impressive array of digital content for their telecast of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, as outlined by paid content here - http://www.paidcontent.org/entry/419-10-days-and-counting-nbcus-digital-olympics-the-full-slate-of-offerings/#extended
The summary
NBCOlympics.com will provide approximately 2,200 hours of live streaming broadband coverage of Olympic competition where users can choose from up to 20 concurrent streams encompassing 25 Olympic sports. In addition, the site will offer more than 3,000 hours of on-demand access to full-event replays and extensive highlights, including daily recaps of key events, best-of montages, commentator analysis and athlete-specific clips. (By comparison, at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino, NBC streamed two hours of live footage.)
Yahoo!7 - it'd be great if you could let us know how much footage Yahoo!7 has of the Olympics in terms of live and on demand so we can see what we are getting compared to our US allies. I'm sure someone from Yahoo! reads this - it appears on my logs ;)
The summary
NBCOlympics.com will provide approximately 2,200 hours of live streaming broadband coverage of Olympic competition where users can choose from up to 20 concurrent streams encompassing 25 Olympic sports. In addition, the site will offer more than 3,000 hours of on-demand access to full-event replays and extensive highlights, including daily recaps of key events, best-of montages, commentator analysis and athlete-specific clips. (By comparison, at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Torino, NBC streamed two hours of live footage.)
Yahoo!7 - it'd be great if you could let us know how much footage Yahoo!7 has of the Olympics in terms of live and on demand so we can see what we are getting compared to our US allies. I'm sure someone from Yahoo! reads this - it appears on my logs ;)
Thursday, July 24, 2008
Monday, July 14, 2008
Misunderstanding the market
Why do a trade marketing campaign - prompting advertisers to 'Start Something Wonderful' on trade sites like AdNews - like Yahoo7 is currently doing - but then link through to a page that is off brand and offers no value or information into any of the areas you are promoting in the ads?
Yahoo7 - pushing potential prospects through to a page dedicated to digital ad specs is a massive waste of dollars and sends a signal to the market that potentially you are at a loss at how to use the channel. I cannot think of a worse possible landing page than this one - other than a page not found error.
Given the depth of resources Yahoo does have at its disposal globally - which give insight into net users and their motivations - why didn't they build an adequate trade marketing page which at least gives the user an idea of what is possible? Instead we get some irrelevant adops info useless to pretty much every marketer in the country.
Tuesday, July 8, 2008
RSS didn't kill the homepage
So ... 4 years ago it was predicted that the humble homepage would start to die a slow death as aggregation technology allowed used to tailor their own experience, and thus ... their true 'home'. RSS was going to kill the homepage star.
Thing is - the homepage in AU isn't dying. It's more popular than ever.
All of the main homepages are up year on year - ninemsn, The Age, SMH, News and Yahoo!7. Note - this is more about a unique user figure deduplicated over a month period. I don't know whether they are spending more time or visiting more often.
Yahoo!7 has intentionally pushed people through to its homepage - if you watch a 7 show it generally pushes you to the yahoo7.com.au domain and asks you to search for the show title you were watching. This doesn't sit well with me - it inflates their search numbers and seems a lazy way to increase numbers.
Of the RSS aggregators - My Yahoo is losing users year on year ... however iGoogle has grown 100% during the same period.
It surprises me that homepages are still strong. Maybe it's habitual or maybe AU net users like them being a cluttered mess or editorial, display ads and advertorial. Sure, they are good for reach for certain campaigns and generally they offer a solus display ad unit ... but contextually they offer nothing.
Will be interesting to see how the homepage is fairing in 4 years time.
Thing is - the homepage in AU isn't dying. It's more popular than ever.
All of the main homepages are up year on year - ninemsn, The Age, SMH, News and Yahoo!7. Note - this is more about a unique user figure deduplicated over a month period. I don't know whether they are spending more time or visiting more often.
Yahoo!7 has intentionally pushed people through to its homepage - if you watch a 7 show it generally pushes you to the yahoo7.com.au domain and asks you to search for the show title you were watching. This doesn't sit well with me - it inflates their search numbers and seems a lazy way to increase numbers.
Of the RSS aggregators - My Yahoo is losing users year on year ... however iGoogle has grown 100% during the same period.
It surprises me that homepages are still strong. Maybe it's habitual or maybe AU net users like them being a cluttered mess or editorial, display ads and advertorial. Sure, they are good for reach for certain campaigns and generally they offer a solus display ad unit ... but contextually they offer nothing.
Will be interesting to see how the homepage is fairing in 4 years time.
Tuesday, June 17, 2008
Yahoo!7 rebounds strongly in May off the back of Answers
After a rough April, Yahoo7 has shown some positive signs in May with month on month growth of 13.9% and Year on Year growth of 9.5%
What would be especially pleasing to the Y7 powerbrokers is the growth in products such as Answers, Homepage, Mail and News. Yahoo's search product was up month on month to 1.44m users, but down year on year by 83,000 users.
When you look closely at the number, it is the Answers product that is really driving increased usage
Numbers are below for May 2008 (source: Netview)
Yahoo!7 (total audience) - 5.6m (up from 5.15m in May 07)
Answers - 2.34m (up from 1.02m in May 07)
Homepage - 1.96m (up from 1.84m in May 07)
Mail - 1.49m (up from 1.36m in May 07)
News - 1.11m (up from 961k in May 07)
Search - 1.45m (down from 1.52m in May 07)
I think the key for continued Yahoo! growth is moving the Answers audience into other areas of the network. Right now - this isn't happening.
Only 24% of Answers users use the Yahoo homepage, 19.4% use Mail, 17.8% use News and 20.5% use search,
Another challenge is to make Answers 'stickier' ... users are only viewing 7 pages per person, visiting 1.87 times a month and spending 3 and a half minutes on the site. These metrics are far lower than those for the homepage, mail, news etc ... and suggest that most of Answers traffic is coming via search. Ie - in and out traffic ... not pursuing the rest of the network, merely getting an answer and leaving.
Still - it seems to be providing a steam of new network users which the group has needed.
What would be especially pleasing to the Y7 powerbrokers is the growth in products such as Answers, Homepage, Mail and News. Yahoo's search product was up month on month to 1.44m users, but down year on year by 83,000 users.
When you look closely at the number, it is the Answers product that is really driving increased usage
Numbers are below for May 2008 (source: Netview)
Yahoo!7 (total audience) - 5.6m (up from 5.15m in May 07)
Answers - 2.34m (up from 1.02m in May 07)
Homepage - 1.96m (up from 1.84m in May 07)
Mail - 1.49m (up from 1.36m in May 07)
News - 1.11m (up from 961k in May 07)
Search - 1.45m (down from 1.52m in May 07)
I think the key for continued Yahoo! growth is moving the Answers audience into other areas of the network. Right now - this isn't happening.
Only 24% of Answers users use the Yahoo homepage, 19.4% use Mail, 17.8% use News and 20.5% use search,
Another challenge is to make Answers 'stickier' ... users are only viewing 7 pages per person, visiting 1.87 times a month and spending 3 and a half minutes on the site. These metrics are far lower than those for the homepage, mail, news etc ... and suggest that most of Answers traffic is coming via search. Ie - in and out traffic ... not pursuing the rest of the network, merely getting an answer and leaving.
Still - it seems to be providing a steam of new network users which the group has needed.
Friday, June 13, 2008
Pacific Magazines take back production of their online assets
In a move that has been rumoured for the past 6 months, Pacific Magazines have taken back control of the production of their magazines web assets.
B&T article here - http://www.bandt.com.au/news/C9/0C0577C9.asp
No word on sales arrangements, whether Yahoo! will continue to represent the sites. Rumours circulated earlier in the year Pacific magazines were speaking to third part repping companies regarding sales arrangements.
B&T article here - http://www.bandt.com.au/news/C9/0C0577C9.asp
No word on sales arrangements, whether Yahoo! will continue to represent the sites. Rumours circulated earlier in the year Pacific magazines were speaking to third part repping companies regarding sales arrangements.
Monday, May 26, 2008
This just in: Blogs on the up whilst the News category remains flat
If you need more evidence that the line between semi-pro (or pro-am or whatever you want to call it) and professional journalism content is blurring rapidly, lets have a look at usage data between topline News (ie journalists) figures and the unduplicated audience of the top 4 blog platforms.
According to Neilsen Netview, the topline News & Information figures (which is a unduplicated figure taking into account News Digital Media, The Age, SMH, BBC, Yahoo!7 News, National Nine News, NY Times, Bigpond NEws, Google News, Conde Nast, Daily Mail, CNN etc) only saw essentially a zero usage increase from April 07 to April 08 - from 7.785m in April 07 to 7.786m in April 08.
Now lets look at the unduplicated figures of the top 4 blogging platforms - blogger, wordpress, typepad and livejournal.
April 07 - 1.839m
April 08 - 2.484m
That is a YOY increase of 35%. What does this show? Well .. people are turning to blogs more and more to get their information. Why is this? Well ... I don't have the definitive answer ... but I believe that blogs offer more credibility and passion than their larger counterparts - especially in niche areas (which we all know become quite big when there are enough niche's combined). And this doesn't even cover sites like Perez Hilton, TMZ, Gizmodo, Defamer, Slashdot etc - which I would argue are blogs by format and design.
It's not all bad for the News & Information category - page views per user per month are up YOY from 65 to 74. Still, if I had the choice between a marginal increase in consumption or a major increase in users I know which one I'd take.
Maybe we will start seeing large news site bloggers become more than just light entertainment 'columnists' and actual evolve to being actual experts on what they're covering.
According to Neilsen Netview, the topline News & Information figures (which is a unduplicated figure taking into account News Digital Media, The Age, SMH, BBC, Yahoo!7 News, National Nine News, NY Times, Bigpond NEws, Google News, Conde Nast, Daily Mail, CNN etc) only saw essentially a zero usage increase from April 07 to April 08 - from 7.785m in April 07 to 7.786m in April 08.
Now lets look at the unduplicated figures of the top 4 blogging platforms - blogger, wordpress, typepad and livejournal.
April 07 - 1.839m
April 08 - 2.484m
That is a YOY increase of 35%. What does this show? Well .. people are turning to blogs more and more to get their information. Why is this? Well ... I don't have the definitive answer ... but I believe that blogs offer more credibility and passion than their larger counterparts - especially in niche areas (which we all know become quite big when there are enough niche's combined). And this doesn't even cover sites like Perez Hilton, TMZ, Gizmodo, Defamer, Slashdot etc - which I would argue are blogs by format and design.
It's not all bad for the News & Information category - page views per user per month are up YOY from 65 to 74. Still, if I had the choice between a marginal increase in consumption or a major increase in users I know which one I'd take.
Maybe we will start seeing large news site bloggers become more than just light entertainment 'columnists' and actual evolve to being actual experts on what they're covering.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
April Neilsen data is out
Netview has released its April data ... And it's interesting!
- Facebook have overtaken myspace (see - http://mimelbourne.blogspot.com/2008/05/facebook-passes-myspace-in-au-for-first.html)
- Yahoo!7 shed over 450k users in one month (almost 10% of their audience)
- ninemsn have shed over 330k users in April (compared to May)
- Twitter has 49,000 users (April is the first time I have seen Twitter on Netview)
- Google search is down 197k users
- Yahoo! search is down 114k users
- ninemsn search is down 329k users
- Ten.com.au is down 44k users in April. However, this figure for some reason does not factor in the bigbrother.com.au traffic - which is at 267,000 users for April (up 101k year on year)
The AU Internet universe sits at 11,229,000 ... which is down marginally from the 11,443,000 in May.
- Facebook have overtaken myspace (see - http://mimelbourne.blogspot.com/2008/05/facebook-passes-myspace-in-au-for-first.html)
- Yahoo!7 shed over 450k users in one month (almost 10% of their audience)
- ninemsn have shed over 330k users in April (compared to May)
- Twitter has 49,000 users (April is the first time I have seen Twitter on Netview)
- Google search is down 197k users
- Yahoo! search is down 114k users
- ninemsn search is down 329k users
- Ten.com.au is down 44k users in April. However, this figure for some reason does not factor in the bigbrother.com.au traffic - which is at 267,000 users for April (up 101k year on year)
The AU Internet universe sits at 11,229,000 ... which is down marginally from the 11,443,000 in May.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Yahoo!7 alliance deals change
I've noticed that Yahoo! is back on board with Carsales and Seek for their Auto and Jobs alliance deals. Previously they were with Fairfax's My Career and Drive.
It appears they have retained their alliance with FD's Domain.
It also appears that they have abandoned their own branding (ie Yahoo! Jobs, Yahoo! Cars etc) in favour of just linking out to the partners external site.
It appears they have retained their alliance with FD's Domain.
It also appears that they have abandoned their own branding (ie Yahoo! Jobs, Yahoo! Cars etc) in favour of just linking out to the partners external site.
Wednesday, May 7, 2008
Yahoo!7 to launch Vertical Ad Network
So Yahoo!7 is getting into the vertical network game locally ... partnering with a company called Digital Niche to create "largest and most sought after publisher network".
Well - that is the plan - long term - from Markus Barnikel, Yahoo! Strategic Partnerships head.
"Yahoo!7 is committed to building Australia’s largest and most sought after publisher network, and we’re creating a unique form for advertisers to connect with their consumers, through delivery of premium inventory with diverse publisher categories."
The network isn't a blind buy - clients will be able to pick and choose which sites they want to appear on. This currently happens with the Google network and numerous other suppliers.
This is a sensible move for Yahoo! They have been doing this in the US and its logical they'd want to compete with Google locally as they have had this offering in market for the past 8 months. Plus networks like SellMedia, MediaSmart and Response Directive and built up strong vertical offerings which would appeal to clients looking for specialist areas.
How will it go? Who knows ... it really depends on the alliances they can forge ... which all depends on the deals they can cut with the sites that they need ... or if they can offer better yield for the site owners than their competitors. One would assume being late to get in on the game won't help them ... but as stated above, the jury is out until the strength of the network is shown.
Digital Niche - http://www.digitalniche.com.au/
Well - that is the plan - long term - from Markus Barnikel, Yahoo! Strategic Partnerships head.
"Yahoo!7 is committed to building Australia’s largest and most sought after publisher network, and we’re creating a unique form for advertisers to connect with their consumers, through delivery of premium inventory with diverse publisher categories."
The network isn't a blind buy - clients will be able to pick and choose which sites they want to appear on. This currently happens with the Google network and numerous other suppliers.
This is a sensible move for Yahoo! They have been doing this in the US and its logical they'd want to compete with Google locally as they have had this offering in market for the past 8 months. Plus networks like SellMedia, MediaSmart and Response Directive and built up strong vertical offerings which would appeal to clients looking for specialist areas.
How will it go? Who knows ... it really depends on the alliances they can forge ... which all depends on the deals they can cut with the sites that they need ... or if they can offer better yield for the site owners than their competitors. One would assume being late to get in on the game won't help them ... but as stated above, the jury is out until the strength of the network is shown.
Digital Niche - http://www.digitalniche.com.au/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
