Dear Partner,
We have had an eventful summer! Verizon officially closed the deal to acquire Yahoo on June 13th and we have been busy integrating ever since the close.
Yahoo is now part of Oath, a subsidiary of Verizon, and one of three media and technology companies in the world to reach over 1 billion users worldwide. Oath's portfolio consists of over 50 media and technology brands, including Yahoo, AOL, Tumblr, Flickr, Flurry, BrightRoll, Gemini, RYOT, TechCrunch, HuffPost and Verizon Digital Media Services.
We are excited about the new opportunities we'll be able to offer Partners under the new Oath umbrella, including a few laid out below. But first, a welcome from our new leader, Tim Lemmon, Head of Operations and Search Partnerships at Oath.
CORPORATE | Welcome to Oath
Hello Partners and welcome to Oath!
We are incredibly excited about this new chapter and the opportunities created by combining two of the oldest and largest media and technology companies in the world.
I have had the pleasure of meeting many of you already and look forward to meeting the rest of you soon. I was the Chief Operating Officer at AOL before joining Oath, where my role has expanded to overseeing search partnerships as well as operations.
We are in a major growth phase here at Oath and a key part of our growth strategy is Partnerships. We currently reach over 1 billion consumers worldwide, and are working to double that number to 2 billion by 2020.
In order to reach that goal, we need our Partners to help us scale by driving additional high quality search traffic and expanding into new areas, like video and display. We own some of the top content brands and platforms (i.e., Gemini and ONE by AOL), and want our Partners to leverage these resources as much as they can.
We will continue to update you as we unpack the new opportunities created by Oath. Please continue to proactively reach out to myself, Josh and the Partner Management team if you have additional ideas or requests. I look forward to working with you so that we can grow our business together as Partners.
Thank you for the warm welcome thus far.
Tim Lemmon
NEW | Video Activation Network (ONE by AOL: Video)
As part of Oath, one of the most exciting new opportunities we have to offer Partners is the ONE by AOL Video Activation. The Online Video Platform allows Partners to build a video player, including content and ads, that can then be embedded with JavaScript code.
The content is sourced from top tier sources, like ABC, CBS and Conde Nast, and the video player can be programmed several ways:
- Editorial/Cherry Picked: choose individual videos to include in your pages
- Categorical: choose videos by category or vertical (i.e., travel, health, auto)
- Optimized: videos automatically optimized for highest monetization value
Partners will share in the revenue earned from pre-roll advertisements that play before the video content. The ONE by AOL video activation is available across platforms.
Please review the ONE by AOL: Publishers Video Activation one-sheeter and reach out to your Partner Manager if you are interested in this video opportunity. We will share more in-depth details later this year.
UPDATE | Yahoo Partner Ads ("YPA")
We want to remind Partners that they have access to Yahoo Partner Ads (YPA), a product custom-built for Partner needs. YPA can be added to existing web pages across devices (including Mobile YPA) and offers the following:
- Option for Ads Only (or Ads + Algo)
- Quick 5-step setup process
- Ability to customize font and ad features
- Cut and paste code for easy implementation
Please contact your Partner Manager if you are interested in utilizing the YPA product.
UPDATE | Partner Insights Removal of Sync API Calls
You should have received an email earlier this month regarding an update to Partner Insights. As part of the next phase of updates for PI, all reports will need to be pulled with the ASYNC API, which is more secure and efficient than the retiring SYNC API.
If you are currently using the SYNC API, you will need to migrate to the ASYNC API before August 30, 2017. Please download the API Migration from SYNC to ASYNC documentation for more details.
Additionally, in order to prevent abuse of the system, the rate limits have been updated to allow no more than 5 API calls per second per user. If a user exceeds this amount, they will not be able to make calls for 10 minutes.
COMING SOON | New Sponsored Search Features Webinar
We have new sponsored search features available for Partners!
We are testing them now and will hold a webinar with David Weinman, Senior Product Manager, at the end of the quarter to present the following:
- Callout Extensions
- Review Extensions
- 4th Line Annotations
- Top Ad Annotations
- Security Badge Annotations
- Brand Annotations
- Smart Annotations
When launched on fully hosted Yahoo Hosted Search pages (US Desktop), the first 3 features (Callout Extensions, Review Extensions and 4th Line Annotations) led to an increase of +1.7% CTR and +2.1% RPM, and the second 3 features (Top Ads, Badge and Brand Annotations) led to an increase of +0.9% CTR and +3.6% RPM. Partner results may vary depending on market, device and implementation.
Stay tuned for an invitation for a webinar covering these features soon. If you want to view any of our previous webinars, please click the "Webinars" tab above.
Finally, if you are sending an email or calendar invite to any of your contacts here at Oath, please make sure to use their new @oath.com email addresses.
Thank You,
Yahoo Global Partnerships Team