On the 16th of January Wired Magazine published an article called “How Yahoo Blew It” which was a scathing review of the company’s drop in popularity and profitability. The article makes a strong case that “Yahoo fumbled, bungled, and mishandled its execution at every step” while trying to compete with Google.
The Wired article is an excellent essay on the trials and tribulations of Yahoo!’s growth and the potential reasons for its fall from grace; essentially concluding that there was not enough technological leadership. I highly recommend the 5 page read but do not forget Yahoo!’s rebuttal which tends to look positively on its situation:
“Negative press notwithstanding, Yahoo remains a leading force on the Internet. We continue to grow at a pace (20 percent from Q3’05 to Q3’06) that far exceeds that of many leading Internet and blue-chip brands. We remain the undisputed industry leader in graphical advertising — we have significantly outpaced the industry for the past five years and count the majority of the Ad Age Top 100 advertisers among our clients. We have the largest audience on the Internet — 1 out of 2 Internet users connects to his or her interests online through Yahoo!. We are also the leader in the majority of things that consumers do online — in the US, Yahoo in the #1 or #2 position in many vertical categories, including Mail, News, and Music.”
All-in-all, I truly hope that Yahoo! uses its new management team and the launch of Panama to gain some market share back from Google over the next couple of years. After all, it would be good for all of us if Google had some more serious competition. More importantly, I love a comeback … and a monster corporation rebounding would be a heck of a story!