AT&T Ad Solutions Posts Challenging Q1 Results

AT&T reported its first-quarter earnings this morning, and its Advertising Solutions unit, which includes the Yellow Pages business, recorded top-line revenues of US$1.3 billion, down 10.4 percent over Q1 2008. In its earnings briefing, the company attributed the double-digit revenue decline to “economic pressures” and the sale of The Berry Co. to Local Insight Media in Q2 2008. Excluding the impact of the Berry sale, the company reported that the decline would have been 9 percent.

AT&T posted Advertising Solutions online revenues of US$209 million in the first quarter, a 19.4 percent increase over Q1 2008. This represents 16.5 percent of total revenues, compared with 12.5 percent in Q1 2008.

In addition to print directories, the Ad Solutions business includes the Yellowpages.com IYP, Web site creation services, SEM programs, the U-verse IPTV platform and mobile search. It’s unclear how the revenues break down among these components, but we assume Yellowpages.com and SEM account for the bulk of online revenues.