Yahoo-Newspapers: Ad Services To Be Phased In Over The Year

Following up this morning’s agreement among the Yahoo newspaper consortium’s expanded services – graphic ads, content distribution, ad sales and paid search – and the addition of McClatchy into the fold, members held a conference call to address some of the details. They were reticent on the expected revenue impact and since the services will be rolled out over the next year, the full impact won’t be known for a while. Additionally, some members still have existing arrangements for various ad services with other companies like Google. Once the terms on any current outside contracts expire, members will then take on Yahoo’s services. Nevertheless, Robert Decherd, CEO of Belo Corp., noted that the Yahoo newspaper consortium agreements have placed a premium on flexibility: “Except for exclusive portions of the agreement, the internet is an open environment and we’ll all continue to be flexible when it comes to using various technologies, but the focus is on Yahoo and this is a long term commitment.” Other highlights:

— The search and content integration activities will be launched during Q2. Content integration will be phased in over the course of the year with completion expected sometime in 2008. As for advertising, the beta phase is scheduled to begin as early as Q3 of this year. The sales teams will be engaged in some cross-selling of each others’ graphical ad inventory by the end of the year. The entire graphical ad platform will be completed by the end of 2008.

— During the call, a screen shot of a news article from Belo’s Dallas Morning News shown under the Yahoo heading prompted a question about whether newspapers are surrendering their brand identity to some extent, since it appeared that Yahoo was the content provider, not the DMN. Decherd responded: “You have to look at it holistically. The toolbar and the verticals that drive off of it will now have, in a preferred position, content from the newspaper consortium members. Our view is that the traffic that we experience there and the ability to click through to our content is a very powerful advantage compared to where we would be within a standalone basis or as an newspaper group within an individual company. The fact is, our content appears in a lot of places already, without a lot of influence and control on our part. In this instance, we’re using Yahoo’s technology and global platform to put our content in a preferred position and then be able to sell ads into that network in ways none of us could do on our own.”

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