Yahoo’s Earnings Down 78%; Gross Down 13%: 5% of Workforce to Get a Axe - Yahoo reported that its gross revenues fell 13% to $1.580 million, compared to the first quarter of 2008 Yahoo also reported, that its first-quarter net income fell to $117.6 million, or 8 cents a share, from $536.8 million, or 37 cents a share in the same period a year earlier. However, net income for the first quarter of 2008 included a non-cash gain of $401 million, or $0.29 per diluted share, related to Alibaba Group’s initial public offering of Alibaba.com. Marketing services ... read more ...

Google’s Earning Set For Thursday: Will It Be Google’s 1st Down Quarter? - With Google scheduled to report earnings after the close of the market on Thursday, the question is will this be Google’s first down quarter? Yes amazingly, since going public in August 2004, Google has never had a down quarter; a quarter in which  its gross revenue was lower the previous quarter. However, according to TechCrunch at least one analyst, J.P. Morgan’s Imran Khan predicted that Google’s revenues will decline 2% from last year,  13% from last quarter and earnings per share will ... read more ...

WSJ: Yahoo’s May Lose 15% Of Its Search Traffic & Keyword Prices May Fall - According to the Wall Street Journal, Yahoo may lose up to 15% of its search traffic over the next 12-to-18 months after failing to renew deals with two computer makers. Yahoo was the default search tool on HP and Acer computers. However those deals expired last year and Yahoo’s failure to renew them, according to WSL, could cost Yahoo,  as much as 3% of U.S. search market share. In February, Yahoo conducted 20.6% of U.S. online searches, according to comScore Inc. Therefore if Yahoo loses 3% ... read more ...

Google: Revenues Won’t Decline - Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt said the economic storm will affect all forms of advertising, including the online ads that Google depends on, but said that he doesn’t expect Google to experience a decline in revenue. “We don’t predict things like that,” Schmidt said in a CNBC television interview on Wednesday, when asked if the company’s diversity would shield it from the economic slowdown. But, he added, “from my perspective it’s hard to imagine why you’d see a decline.” Schmidt also ... read more ...

Google’s CEO Schmidt: “Economic Situation is Pretty Dire” & Mobile Search Will Surpass PC Based In A “Few Years” - Google’s Chief Executive Eric Schmidt said Tuesday the economic situation is “pretty dire,” adding that he does not expect to see improvement until 2010. “Everyone is assuming 2009 is a tough, tough year,” he said during an appearance at the Morgan Stanley Technology Conference in San Francisco. Schmidt went on to say while Google and other Internet advertising giants may be better positioned than offline counterparts, “we are not immune” to current economic conditions. “I view the ... read more ...

Yahoo Rolls Out New Targeted Ad Products For PPC and Display: Will It Effect Your Bottom Line? - Yahoo announced today the launch of three new targeting products for advertisers. Two of the products are for display advertising, and one if for the PPC channel. The new products include: Search Retargeting, which gives advertisers the ability to target display advertising based on user search activities; Enhanced Retargeting, which allows advertisers to deliver dynamically generated display ... read more ...

Marchex Down Over 15% on Earnings - Marchex, Inc. one of the stocks in our Domain Parking Stock Index, is down over 15% today after reporting earnings, yesterday. Marchex as of noon is trading, at $4.25 down $.78 Last night after the market closed Marchex announced earnings for the 4th quater of 2008. Highlights from the earnings report were: Revenue was $34.8 million for the fourth quarter of 2008, compared to $37.0 million for the same period of 2007. GAAP net loss applicable to common stockholders was $128.7 million ... read more ...

New Yahoo CEO: My Gut Tells Me Not To Sell - The Wall Street Journal is reporting that that during her first company meeting yesterday, new CEO Carol Bartz told employees,  her “gut” was telling her not to sell Yahoo’s search business to Microsoft. Moreover, according to the same report, Yahoo directors don’t feel “there’s any pressure at all,” to get the Microsoft deal done soon. Yahoo’s Shareholders “gut” feeling in reaction, has been to sell. Yahoo shares are down almost 8% today, more than double that the percentage ... read more ...

Blodget: Yahoo-Microsoft Deal Will Get Done Now - It has been reported by several sources, that now that Yahoo has a hired a New CEO, an search deal between Microsoft and Yahoo will be announced possibly by the end of this month. Henry Blodget a frequent writer on the internet industry just published a story in the Silicon Valley Insider, that now that Yahoo has a new CEO that a deal with Microsoft should get done and soon. “””Sources close to Microsoft (MSFT) said the company has readied its proposal to be floated to the Yahoo board. And ... read more ...

Yahoo Names Carol Bartz New CEO; President Decker Resigns - According to the Wall Street Journal, Yahoo is going to name Carol Bartz, former chief executive of software company Autodesk, as the company’s next CEO. Bartz was chairman, president and CEO of Autodesk for 14 years and stepped-down in April, 2006. During her tenure, the company diversified its product line and grew revenues from $285 million to $1.523 billion in FY06. Bartz previously held positions at Sun Microsystems, most recently serving as vice president of worldwide field operations and ... read more ...

Google Has Only 1.5 Millions Advertisers?? - According to the New York Times blog, Google had 1 million advertisers in 2007, 600,000 in 2006 and 360,000 in 2005. At that rate, UBS Analyst Ben Schacter told the Times, Google probably had between 1.3 million and 1.5 million advertisers by the end of 2008. Between 2003 and 2007, Google advertisers spent, on average, about $16,000 per year and according to the article, that figure changed little between 2003 and 2007. “””In a regulatory filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, ... read more ...

Verizon Wireless Picks Microsoft Over Google - Verizon Wireless announced a five-year deal with Microsoft to be the default search provider on the wireless carrier’s phones, as well as handling mobile advertising services.Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer announced the deal Wednesday in Las Vegas at the Consumer Electronics Show. Effective in the first half of 2009, Microsoft will power search on Verizon’s mobile portal as well as local and Internet search on the carrier’s feature phones and smartphones. Depending on the device, Microsoft Live ... read more ...

Barclays: 2009 Ad Market To Be Worse Than Post 9/11; Bright Spot Internet Advertising - According to new report by Barclays, Domestic ad spending is expected to drop 10% next year,  worse than the declines felt in both the 1991 and 2001 recessions. The 10% figure comes a little over two months after Barclays pegged next year’s decline at the considerably lesser 5.5%. Barclays said in 2010, spending should increase 1%. The 1991 recession caused a 1.9% decline, while the 2001 slowdown brought a 6.2% decrease. Barclays’ now predicts that the decline next year, will be far greater ... read more ...

Is Google Still In Favor Of Net Neutrality Or Are They Working To Get In The Fast Lane - According to a report by the Wall Street Journal today, Google who has traditionally been one of the loudest advocates of equal network access for all content providers, known as network neutrality, has approached major cable and phone companies that carry Internet traffic with a proposal to create a fast lane for its own content Google . Network Neutrality under lying principle is that all companies that operated data pipelines, like cable and phone companies, are supposed to treat all traffic the ... read more ...

So Much For Google Dropping The Domain Channel - A few months ago the industry was on its heels, troubled by reports on some blogs that Google was about to drop the domain channel from its PPC programs. Today with Google’s announcement that it is actually opening AdSense for all domain owners, directly through Google, regardless of traffic levels, all domain holders should take a collective breath of fresh air. Here’s some of our thoughts: Some will think this will hurt Paring companies using Google’s feed. Let’s remember that all feeds ... read more ...

Yahoo Changes Severance Bonuses To Help A Sale - According to a regulatory filing that was made to settle a shareholder lawsuit, Yahoo overhauled a severance program it passed earlier this year to thwart an unsolicited buyout bid by Microsoft. The plan promised generous cash and stock benefits to virtually all of Yahoo’s nearly 14,000 employees if they were fired, took a pay cut or resigned after being involuntarily reassigned to another job within two years of a takeover. The sweeping coverage would have cost Microsoft an additional $462 million ... read more ...

Google-Yahoo Agree to Concessions To Get The Deal Done - According to The Wall Street Journal‘,  Google and Yahoo have reportedly submitted a list of concessions that in an attempt to  appease antitrust regulators threatening to block the alliance. The companies offered their revisions to the U.S. Justice Department during the weekend. The Journal said Google and Yahoo are now willing to limit the amount of revenue generated from the partnership and shorten the deal’s duration. Google’s advertising customers would also be given the option to not ... read more ...

WSJ.Com: Yahoo-Google Deal Maybe Dead - The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Google may walk away from its proposed advertising deal. The Journal is reporting that both Yahoo and Google may walk away from the deal as early as next week because as reported here for some time, the Department Of Justice is looking to block the deal. On Wednesday, J.P. Morgan Internet analyst Imran Khan, in a note to clients said Yahoo should forget about the Google deal and sell its search business to Microsoft. Khan suggests that Yahoo can gain an additional ... read more ...

Lehman Cuts Google Price and Earnings Target - Lehman Brothers cut its price target on Googleto $600 from $620, and lowered its revenue and earnings estimates on the company for the second half of 2008 and 2009 based on the strong U.S. dollar. Google shares have lost more than 39 percent this year. For 2008, Lehman expects earnings of $19.21 a share on revenue of $15.93 billion, down from its earlier forecast of $19.46 a share on revenue of $16.15 billion. The brokerage lowered its 2009 earnings forecast to $22.41 a share on revenue of $19.71 ... read more ...

Happy Birthday Google - On Sunday Google will be 10 years old. Larry Page and Sergey Brin founded Google Inc. on Sept. 7, 1998, with four computers and $100,000 that they received from an investor. Today Google has 20,000 employees and a $150 billion market value. Page and Brin, are now both 35 now and worth nearly $19 billion apiece. A true “Only in America” rags to riches story. And as much as we complain about Google, its must be asked where would you be a domainer if Google never was. Where would the domain industry ... read more ...

Canada Launches Review of Google-Yahoo Deal - Canada’s Competition Bureau has launched a review of a proposed search engine partnership between Yahoo and Google amid concerns the deal will lead to rising costs for Canadian companies that advertise online. In July, the U.S. Department of Justice announced it was launching its own investigation into the deal Yahoo would outsource advetising placement to Google. Some experts say the deal could have more serious implications for the Canadian market. Google’s stranglehold on Canada’s search ... read more ...

ComScore: Baidu 3rd largest Search Engine in a World - According to comscore, Google’s worldwide search share declined from 67.9 percent in June to 64.1 percent in July. This drop was largely due changes in the way comScore measures search and Web traffic in China, Brazil, and Russia.  As a result, Baidu’s global search market share went from 7.7 percent in June to 12.9 percent in July (based almost entirely on its strength in China alone). That makes Baidu the third largest search engine the world after Yahoo. What the recalculation highlights ... read more ...

Marchex Connect Named a Winner of a “Best Search Engine Marketing Technology Platform for SMBs” during Search Engine Strategies - Marchex Connect owned by Marchex, a company in our Domain Parking Stock Index, was named a winner of the “Best Search Engine Marketing Technology Platform for SMBs” – small-to-medium-sized businesses at today’s Search Engine Strategies 2008 Conference and Expo being held in San Jose, California. “This honor is further recognition of Marchex’s position as the leading independent local advertising platform in the market and underscores our commitment and ... read more ...

T-Mobile 1st to Sell Google Phone - According to a report by the New York Times, T-Mobile will launch a mobile phone powered by Google Inc’s Android software, making it the first operator to do so and posing a direct threat to Apple Inc’s (AAPL) popular iPhone. The phone will hit the stores in the U.S. before Christmas, perhaps as early as October. The new device will have a touch screen like the iPhone and other smartphones that use software from firms like Palm, Microsoft and Nokia to allow users to access the Internet. But the ... read more ...