Yahoo Switching to Panama Platform Today

Monday February 5th, 2007, will be a day that goes down in search engine history. At 3pm PST today, Yahoo will bring together 30 to 40 engineers and start migrating the old Overture pay-per-click platform over to the new "Panama" model. Its future success or failure will depend on how well the new platform is received. Thousands of advertisers, and billions of dollars in ad spending, will be watched closely, as Yahoo finally moves from the pure "highest bidder wins" model, to the "bid plus quality" model. By making this switch, Yahoo hopes to increase the average revenue per click from 2.5/3 cents to something closer to Google's 4.5/5 cents. As successful switch could mean the difference between Yahoo's road to a comeback, or instead, further languishing behind Google - and facing a strong challenge from Microsoft's adCenter. There's certainly a lot at stake. Not only does the new Panama platform bring a better opportunity for Yahoo to build market-share now, but as Panama will be a huge success for the company. Will it see Yahoo catch Google in terms of ad revenue? Doubtful. It will, however, give them an opportunity to better monetize the advertisers they have and should help them steal a few more away from their rivals. If you're a Yahoo employee, cross your fingers and grab your lucky rabbit's foot. Today is a big day in Yahoo's history. internet marketing consultant and considered one of the world's most respected and interactive search engine marketing experts. Andy has worked with many Fortune 1000 companies such as Motorola, CitiFinancial, Lowes, Alaska Air, DeWALT, NBC and Experian.

You can read his internet marketing blog at andy.beal@gmail.com.