musicfrisk Posted July 27, 2003 Posted July 27, 2003 With the Inktomi and Overture purchases, it's clear that Yahoo is going to eventually stop using Google search data. My question of the moment is this, does anyone know the date the current agreement expires? Stated a different way, how long can we expect to see Google search data still on Yahoo? Thanks. Anyone with thoughts on how to optimize differently for Inktomi is welcome - I see half of my hits comign from Yahoo and half from Google now - so now is a decent time to consider the potential ramifications of these issues. Quote
SEO Posted July 28, 2003 Posted July 28, 2003 Yahoo had been using Inktomi for their business service side prior to the purchase. It was a logical purchase to cash in on a service they were already providing (i.e. Inktomi's existence had a lot to do with Yahoo). Overture place their Pay Per Click (PPC) listings on top of Inktomi results. This 'arrangement' meant that Overture partners received a share of the PPC fees but had to pay monthly licensing fees for Inktomi results. Yahoo was obviously the biggest partner in the arrangement. Buying both meant that they no longer had the 'expense' of a middleman and in turn reap the awards of paid inclusion. Therefore, this was a strategic business move, which affect the paid inclusions. How this will affect the free search results is unclear at this point. It makes sense that all are scared of the power that Google has acquired in a relatively short period of time. However, Google has a beautifully branded product that offers arguably the best search engine results. It will be interesting how Yahoo weighs the threat vs. the benefit of such an association. Time will tell. I might add that I am not a proponent of paid inclusion. The following quote from Yahoo's CEO concerns me: "The acquisition enables Yahoo! to integrate world-class technology throughout the network as well as offer more value to consumers and businesses through programs such as paid inclusion, which provide higher- quality commercial search results." I feel that 'higher-quality' commercial search results should be based on relevancy not 'highest bid'. If Google can maintain their dominance on relevancy, we all benefit! [p.s. Google/Yahoo contract is up in September 2003.] Quote
musicfrisk Posted July 28, 2003 Author Posted July 28, 2003 Thanks for your thoughts. I totally agree with all of it - including the way you look at it. All this new CEO at Yahoo has done is destroyed and homogenized what was once a great brand - piece by piece - e-mail, personals, ads, etc. I see nothing to indicate he won't do the same in destroying search in the name of profit. Will he be successful? It all depends on how good a job the other organizations with an interest and people like you me do. How effective are we at convincing people that this is bad? Will the masses care? I for one will be sorry to see the association end - if only because I like the way Yahoo displays the top 20 items instead of the top 10 like Google.com does...can Yahoo even really replace it in two months? What search engines use Inktomi data now that one could look at to see where they'd stand in that world? Quote
musicfrisk Posted July 28, 2003 Author Posted July 28, 2003 I'd say Google has nothing to worry about if that is the best they can do, likely too simplistic I know... All that is indexed is a ton of message board links and almost zero relevant pages. Actually the big question is will people understand why there is a difference and know where to go? Quote
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