Yahoo Loops SmartAds To Clients

The new SmartAds from Yahoo’s advertising made some big promises to advertisers. Relevance by audience and interest is the name of the game for display ads.

We see this type of ad display on countless websites. The most sought-after space on a heavily-trafficked site usually resides in the top right side of a page, above the fold, just as it does in conventional print ads.

The one size fits all approach of those ad spaces draws a number of advertisers to them, but at the same time leaves money on the table. By making those spaces smarter, Yahoo will be able to dynamically serve ads that have more relevance to a given viewer.

Yahoo said this will allow clients to reach niche markets with specific messages. They also claim the personalized ad can carry over to the landing page, where the personal experience would continue.

Tony Hung asked some questions of the SmartAds product. He wondered whether cookie blockers will interfere with how SmartAds work, and if Yahoo has considered the idea that contextual ads are perceived as being more effective.

He also raised the issue of multiple users of a single computer. Multiple users of a default account, and their different interests, could negate the effectiveness of SmartAds.

That situation is probably more of an exception than a rule, as computers have reached a pricing level where having more than one in a household is not uncommon.

Yahoo just needs to continue making forward progress with its new search advertising as it rolls out its behavioral targeted SmartAds model. The company has generally done well with brand advertisers and display units, so SmartAds looks like it will fit well with Yahoo’s strengths.

Yahoo Gets Smart About Behavioral Ads

Behavioral targeting for ads has been an area of interest for the major search advertising companies. Google has been playing with it, while Microsoft made it a featured part of their new AdCenter service.

Yahoo has joined the behavioral game with a SmartAds product that should become available today. The New York Times said SmartAds is being tested on Yahoo’s sites by a couple of major airlines, which were unnamed in the report.

Advertisers buying their placements through RightMedia will have SmartAds technology available to them. Yahoo bought RightMedia by acquiring the rest of the company in April 2007; Yahoo previously owned 20 percent of RightMedia.

The Times cited Todd Teresi, senior vice president of display marketplaces at Yahoo, in describing how SmartAds will work:

"We’re doing real-time creative assembly that leverages what we know about our audience," Mr. Teresi said. "You can buy the entire Wall Street Journal site, and when a female shows up, we will create a different ad or when someone from New York shows up, another one."

Yahoo has enjoyed success with branded display advertising, even as its search advertising business faded behind Google’s dominance. SmartAds could make those display ad spaces more valuable to Yahoo and its brand advertisers.