In an October 13 article, Mike Shields from MediaWeek provides his opinion on Yahoo!, the new APT platform and future direction for the struggling, Web media monolith.
Shields reveals that, to-date, no agencies have signed up for the platform and “only the San Jose Mercury News and the San Francisco Chronicle newspapers” – presumably on the publisher side rather than trying to extend their reach through the platform as advertisers buying on the behalf of their directs.
What remains unclear to AdExchanger is how the Right Media Exchange fits into the puzzle here. APT is built with Right Media’s model in mind according to Yahoo! (see below). RMX already has made prominent deals with agencies such as the deal announced last May between WPP and Right Media. This will help bring agencies to APT presumably.
Yahoo!’s APT FAQ offers this explanation:
How is APT from Yahoo! different from the Right Media Exchange?
APT from Yahoo! will leverage the systems of the largest internet publisher, the first and largest exchange marketplace and the leading online video platform, as well as the combined experience of the teams that built them.
APT from Yahoo! is a new platform that expands on the principles of the Right Media Exchange (RMX) open ecosystem, combining the concepts and functionality of RMX with Yahoo!’s ad network. It is a more comprehensive ad management platform with regard to guaranteed inventory, support for rich media, support for targeting, and ad inventory quality controls. While it is a separate exchange, there are future plans to link the two exchanges together.
Through APT from Yahoo!, customers will have the ability to buy and sell premium, guaranteed, and non-guaranteed inventory. Businesses can use APT from Yahoo! as an end-to-end solution, or as a supplement to existing solutions. Clients can access Yahoo! and other exchange members’ behavioral targeting, contextual targeting, and standardized systems of ad classification.
Shields focuses his article on Yahoo! returning to what it does best in his opinion: building content: “To me, it’s clear Yahoo knows how to launch and program the hell out of content sites, which major brands love.”
Until RMX fully integrates into APT (and its given some time “cook”), it’s too early to say it’s over for Yahoo!’s advertising platform ambitions. But, his point on Yahoo!’s content creation abilities is spot on.
