Microsoft plays catch-up against Yahoo and Google in advertising
Microsoft is playing catch-up against Yahoo and Google -- its chief competitors in the booming online advertising market -- with a new program called adCenter Excellence introduced today.
Microsoft's announcement comes just about two months after Yahoo's acquisition of BlueLithium, producers of an extensive ad toolkit, and not much more than a year after Yahoo's acquisition of the Right Media advertising network.
Yahoo's earlier attempts to add better analytics to its services date back to the acquisition of Overture in 2003, through which it obtained a package called Keylime. In 2005, Google was seen to play catch-up through its acquisition of Urchin.
As for Microsoft's new adCenter Excellence, beyond giving advertisers a chance to become certified adCenter experts, the new program provides two new tools -- Webmaster Center and adCenter Add-in for Excel 2007 -- which are designed to help advertisers get better results from search advertising campaigns and optimize Web sites for Live Search.
Like the maneuvers of Yahoo and Google, Microsoft's program is a bid to make customers jump ship. But although Microsoft's tools offering comes later than those of either Yahoo or Google, the company's timing could still be good.
Some analysts are projecting that the surge in online ad spending which marked the period from 2001 to 2006 is likely to maintain its momentum for at least five years.
According to a recent report by Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS), "Alternative advertising and marketing will continue to spur growth in the communications industry in 2007 through 2011, as alternative media is expected to expand at a CAGR if 17.4 percent in the period to $197.11 billion, while traditional advertising and marketing will post an aggregate CAGR of 3.2 percent to $438.99 billion in 2001."
Microsoft's new AdExcellence tools are available for free download today, but only to users who are authorized by their sites as Webmasters.