Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) will be spending $100 million to market its new ... nothing. The internet pioneer who wants out of the tech biz and solely into the media biz (sounds like the Terry Semel days) will spend that sum over the next 15 months to gain new customers to its plethora of web properties and keep them there as long as possible (and charger advertisers appropriately).
What is new about this? From initial review, nothing. Yahoo! has always wanted to gain customers to its extensive internet collection and keep them there. What's so compelling a change that it's worth $100 million? So far, nothing this writer can determine. Just using Microsoft Corp.'s (NASDAQ: MSFT) Bing search services across all its properties is surely not a compelling reason.
CEO Carol Bartz has hinted at buying audiences (way cheaper than organic growth), although nothing is really clear on that sentiment yet. All the while, Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) continues its stampede to displace Yahoo! with the largest and most diverse internet user base on the planet, while giving almost everything away for free and raking in billions in search advertising -- quite a difference from Yahoo!'s strategy.
Microsoft has spent a good penny on advertising Bing in recent months through multiple media channels -- and it's helped. Little by little, maybe Yahoo! can do the same.
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