No Search Marketing on Yahoo?

August 17, 2007 on 3:19 am | In Questions and Comments | 8 Comments

Anthony,

Just got some of my keywords denied on Yahoo.  I was referred to the following rules:

Web Site Ownership / Affiliates

All sites must follow the web site ownership / affiliate guidelines listed below:

  • We will send traffic only to an advertiser’s own web pages.
  • Submit only sites owned or controlled by you.
  • Do not submit sites that automatically redirect to a site owned or controlled by you.
  • We will accept grantor pages submitted by affiliates that are clearly co-branded or personalized with the affiliate’s name or business name.
  • Affiliates must list their business name in titles and descriptions when bidding on their grantor’s name or domain name.
It looks like Yahoo has decided they don’t want any direct search marketing at all!  Is this what you find to be true or am I misinterpreting things?  Do you think that search engines are moving away from allowing this kind of advertising?
Thanks for you thoughts,
Korak

8 Comments »

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  1. Korak,

    I just got the book Monday, and today my Amazon ad is running on Yahoo!, seemingly in violation of the above rules. I was told on the phone when calling about another matter that my ad would be rejected by the editorial department, but it hasn’t been… at least not yet. The person I was talking to at Yahoo! could not reference what rule he was sure would cause rejection, but he did say the URL has, “no personaliztion”.

    I want to avoid using a pesonnal landing page, because that would require two clicks, and it seems from Anthony’s comments in the book he has had little success w/ that model. However, from the rules you posted, it seems as long as you include your busines name in the ad copy, you would be in compliance.

    Anthony or other experienced users please comment on this thread.

    Korak… how did they notify you?

    Comment by D_Handley — August 17, 2007 #

  2. I’m not sure if that is still Yahoo’s actual policy or not. Lots of search – and affiliate – networks have told me one thing while still publishing rules that indicate the opposite. They aren’t great about keeping these things up to date. I can’t be certain what Yahoo’s policy is today (you should call to be sure) but I know that in practice they are allowing some sites to be direct marketed by affiliates (not owners) and not allowing others. From what I can see, I am guessing they only enforce that policy at the domain owners request.

    I don’t want to appear to be contradicting their STATED policy, however much it might appear to me that their actual practice is quite different. My OFFICIAL advise is to ask Yahoo.

    Comment by Administrator — August 18, 2007 #

  3. Hey guys… Some more details on my experience. I added about 140 keywords to a campaign in Yahoo. Of that, I got a notice that 5 were being declined for the above reasons. Based on the criteria that was applied, all 140 should have been declined it looks like. I thought maybe those were just the first five and they would soon drop the rest. It hasn’t happened. I don’t really get it but my ad is running for the rest of the keywords and to be honest I don’t want to contact them for fear of having them check the rest more closely. Now I just have to figure out if I can make money on the ad!

    Comment by Korak_1 — August 19, 2007 #

  4. Here’s an update on my experiences so far w/ this issue.

    After running 24 hrs, my ad was removed by Yahoo! w/ this email explanation.

    “We have researched this matter and found that your ad was removed because it is in violation of our website ownership guideline.

    Our website ownership guideline states that we will only send traffic to our advertisers’ own web pages. You may not list a site that you do not control (or an exact copy thereof). However, pages that are powered by, obtain content from, or are co-branded with another entity are acceptable.

    Keywords may only be based on the substantial content presented through your own web pages. Once we leave your page page (co-branded or otherwise) – we stop granting terms.

    Please also note that only one of the partnered parties may submit a given co-branded page. If duplicate listings are discovered, all but one will be removed.

    If it is determined that you do not control a submitted page, we will remove all listings for the page.

    The following are examples of what does qualify as “your own Web page”

    -A site/page/frame owned by, authored by or registered to you.
    -A site/page controlled by you through an SEO or agency agreement.
    -A page you have co-branded/personalized. Co-branding need not appear at the top of the submitted page – but it must be apparent.
    -Web pages that incorporate components of someone else’s page into their own are acceptable, and the substantial content they incorporate is eligible for search terms.

    You may refer to the attached word document for further information on all of our editorial guidelines.

    We will not be able to resubmit the ad for review until you make a change to the landing page.

    Please do not hesitate to contact us if we can be of any further assistance. We may be reached at 1-866-924-6676 Monday through Friday from 5am to 7pm, Saturday from 7am to 4pm and Sunday from 8am to 5pm PDT.”

    I did not have any issues with keywords, my issue is that my ad linked to a specific products page on Amazon. A page I neither own nor control. What are you linking to in your ad Korak?

    My next attempt will be to set up a page on my own domain name, that clearly has my company name on it, but consists of almost nothing but the displayed Amazon page my ad was linking to. I can’t just cut and paste the page onto my site though, that would violate Amazon’s affiliate agreement. But I believe I can have Amazon serve up the page and display it within my own. That will be today’s reasearch task. I’ll let you know how that goes this week as I get my own site up and running.

    If that doesn’t work, I’ll have to create some real content, and hope that readers click to buy from Amazon after reading my content. I don’t want to follow that model though as many people who are just researching a future purchase, and not necessarily ready to buy would click through a paid ad, incur expense to me, w/ no commissions earned… add to that the time and expense of creating useful content, and it may not be worth the effort.

    I’m treating this first ad as a test bed to see what I can make work, so I’m not that frustrated… yet. I have also applied to Affiliate Fuel following Tony’s advice given back in May and available here on the board. Maybe they will have programs that are easier to comply w/ Yahoo’s rules.

    BTW, complete yahoo! editorial guidelines can be found at this url.

    http://help.yahoo.com/l/us/yahoo/ysm/sps/start/editorial/index.html

    Comment by D_Handley — August 19, 2007 #

  5. If you want active content from Amazon on your website, consider Mpire’s widgets. They are free and easy to use, and I have an example at http://www.AffiliateMillions/com/web-design.html.

    Comment by Administrator — August 20, 2007 #

  6. Thanks Tony, and thanks a bunch for the book. I was pleasantly surprised to find it so well written, organized and a class act at a very reasonable price. There is a lot of junk out there, happily I bought yours first, and don’t need the rest now. There are plenty of good resources on the net you pointed us to in the book. With the books foundation, I can spot the fluff from the filet mignon.

    I have seen the widgets, and they are something to use, especially for somoeone with limited computer knowledge. I did some research on Amazon and can do exactly what I want through their free web services division. It requires solid programming skills in XML over HTML or SOAP, which I don’t know, but with a programming background can pick up easily. As long as Amazon is serving up live to my site this way, I can use any part of their site. Still brainstorming on what exactly I’ll do.

    Amazon is just a test bed for me. Might not be enough to be made there, I’ll just have to test and see. I’m hoping Affiliate Fuel will approve my app, might be better than Amazon.

    Thanks for all your help.

    Comment by D_Handley — August 20, 2007 #

  7. I’m doing the same thing you were. Straight to Amazon products. Well, actually that is partly true. I’m also running a test ad that goes to an astore to try and compare conversions. So far it looks like the astore isn’t converting as well. Interested in anyone else’s experience with it astores…

    I’ve been thinking about this issue a bit. I think I don’t care if Yahoo drops me. The way I see it, Google is my primary ad tool and yahoo is an experiment, if it doesn’t work out I move on. Yahoo is getting destroyed by Google in performance terms and they are trying to figure out how not to look like an “also-ran” in this kind of ad delivery. The policy they are following will only make it harder for them to gain ground so I figure they have to back off it eventually. I’ll go back to them when it does. Actually, I’m already staying clear of them for new ads I would have run. I’ll toss some money at Microsoft and maybe even Miva to try them out. Not to be crass, but F ‘em. We’ve got businesses to run and can’t waste time on them…

    (Feeling a bit harsh this evening!)

    Korak

    Comment by Korak_1 — August 20, 2007 #

  8. I want to let Handley know, if he (or anyone else) has any trouble joining Affiliate Fuel, send me an email at AffiliateSupport@AffiliateMillions.com, and I will work with my contact at AffiliateFuel to get you approved.  Their application process can be a little tough to get through for a search marketer (its geared -like a lot of network apps – toward website owners), but I have a great contact at Affiliate Fuel, and he can really help cut through the red tape.

    Tony

    Comment by Administrator — August 21, 2007 #

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