An Interesting Idea?
Maybe I'm missing something, but I'm having a hard time getting past the first obvious question that comes to mind as I read this announcement. If this is such a breakthrough business concept, then how come it's being sold on…
YPG’s Annual Meeting
Here is a write-up of today's Yellow Pages Group annual meeting. I am traveling today and have not yet been able to listen to the call.One interesting item is the C$2.5 million purchase of 389 Canadian domain names across vertical…
Putting Things in Perspective
What is the best way to bridge the so-called digital divide? • Provide a sub-$100 notebook computer for educational use in developing nations?• Introduce an ultra low-cost computer that is a combination phone and personal organizer that can be fitted…
Yahoo! Panama
The following is an excerpt from an article we prepared for Local Media Journal regarding Yahoo!'s new ad engine. It was published last month for our client advisory service. Given Yahoo!'s announcement today, we thought that a portion of the…
What’s in a Name?
Om Malik also reports on the quickly consolidating telecom landscape and the corresponding branding game being played. It seems now that AT&T-owned Cingular could soon change its name to, well, AT&T. Many questioned the name change from SBC to AT&T,…
Bundling: a Boon for Cable Cos. II
To add to Wednesday's post of the same name, Om Malik has some interesting data about the battle that is heating up for bundled services between cable and telecom companies.
adCenter: Open for Business
After months of testing, and a very limited rollout to an invite-only list of small businesses, Microsoft's today announced the details of its adCenter SEM platform. The press release is here. AdCenter's selling points include better targeting options than Google's…
Go Long on Traditional Media
Bob Garfield, editor at large for Advertising Age, tried hard (perhaps too hard) to entertain the audience at the recent Yellow Pages Association annual convention. It was one of those multimedia presentations where he used a combination of PowerPoint, video…
Bundling: a Boon for Cable Cos.
Just as Comcast's first-quarter revenue growth (announced last week) was attributed to bundled service packages, this CNet article today points out that Time Warner Cable has experienced something similar. Quadruple-play offerings (voice, data, video and wireless) will become standard in…
Microsoft To Tie the Knot With Yahoo!?
A Wall Street Journal article today is receiving a log of attention for its speculation that Microsoft could be interested in a sizable equity stake in Yahoo!. The combined forces would be meant to battle Google. Here is additional commentary…
McClatchy and WebVisible Link Up
On the Heels of McClatchy's purchase of Knight Ridder (and subsequent sale of four of its papers to MediaNews Group), the publisher announced a partnership with WebVisible late last week at the AdTech conference in San Francisco. WebVisible's Geneva platform…
Spotback Launches
A new personalized news site called Spotback launched yesterday that will customize news based on the aggregate tracking of an individual user's behavior. This will involve tracking how users manually customize their news and rate stories they have read. Techcrunch…
YPG Expands Classified Holdings
Canadian publisher Yellow Pages Group announced this mornings that it will acquire Classified Media Holdings (Trader Canada) for C$760 million. You can read the release here. The deal expands YPG's classified footprint nationally following last year's acquisition of Trader Media…
MyNewPlace Launches
Another player has launched in the online real estate vertical. MyNewPlace deals with rentals only and specializes in apartment complexes where it can form relationships with a single point of contact that represents many units. This strategy has allowed it…
Yell to Buy TPI
This just in: Yell will acquire Spain's Telefnica Publicidad e Informacin for US$3.9 billion. Here is a Bloomberg article with some details. We will cover this in more detail in an Advisory. This is a new direction for Yell, which…
AT&T News Everywhere
Yahoo! and AT&T have extended their current relationship (Yahoo! exclusive content and an optimized My Yahoo! portal are offered to AT&T broadband customers) to now also offer integrated voice services. The voice-enabled Yahoo! messenger will be offered free to AT&T…
More on Video Game Advertising
We've written about the concept of inserting advertisements in video games here. The Washington Post has a piece today about the current state of the art.From the article: While most online advertising revenue comes from banner ads or sponsored links…
Washington Post on SEO
Washington Post Tech columnist Leslie Walker has an interesting piece today about search engine optimization. Worth a read.
And the Winners Are …
Here is the press release detailing the winners of this year's Yellow Pages Association Industry Excellence Awards. This year's crop includes many very well-deserved honors, and we congratulate all the winners. It's fair to say that the list of winners…
Thursday Morning News Roundup
Some news from the past couple of days:—It's official: McClatchy has found buyers for some of the big market papers it acquired with its recent purchase of Knight Ridder. MediaNews Group (Publisher of The Denver Post) and Hearst are the…