Yahoo Sports' Struggle Points to Starboard Opportunity

Of the 600 agency and advertiser executives completing the MyersBizNet survey which covered a total of 75 television and video media companies only 124 acknowledged doing business with Yahoo Sports including a small percentage of television advertising buyers planners and clients With video advertising growing exponentially Facebook YouTube AOL Hulu and other leading digital pure play companies are aggressively targeting TV ad dollars ESPN the video sports industry leader has business relationships with 395 of MyersBizNet39s survey respondents with a significant percentage having digital video responsibilitiesYahoo39s failure to target the TV media buying community is either a loss of opportunity or a blessing in disguise and probably both The premium value of Yahoo39s audience is positively perceived by 56 of network TV media buying decisionmakers second only to ESPN in the MyersBizNet survey Multiplatform agency buyersplanners and client brand execs who are assumed to be more familiar with the Yahoo Sports audience rank it behind all but one of the sports TV networks ESPN for premium audience valueAd industry perceptions of Yahoo Sports39 brand equity are generally positive with two glaring weaknessesamp160Source MyersBizNet 2016 Survey of Advertising Executives on TV and Video Sales Organizationsamp160Yahoo Sports 7th rank for quotEngaging Content Justifies Premium Pricingquot represents a significant opportunity In comparison to eight television news networks AOL Huffington Post ranks first in this category and first for Quality Sales Force in the MyersBizNet survey Google39s YouTube ranks fifth for Engaging Content and is tied for third for Quality Sales Team among all 75 Television and Video Sales Organizations Yahoo Sports ranks 31st for Engaging Content and is not among the top 35 sales organizations for support and customer serviceContent was the lynch pin of the Yahoo strategy proposed by Ross Levinsohn who was interim CEO until replaced my Marissa Mayer in 2012 after a hostile board initiative Critics in the ad community have consistently called on Yahoo to focus on its content While she made some noticeable moves such as the hiring of Katie Couric only Yahoo Sports has remained an industry leader Yahoo once a major presence at ad community events with highly respected ad sales leadership industry veterans Medialink39s Wenda Harris Millard and BuzzFeed president Greg Coleman among them has become progressively less visible and prominent which is reflected in the MyersBizNet survey Levinsohn before being ousted as president was an ad community favoriteAs reported in a recent New York Times analysis of the Starboard takeover effort quotYahoo is no stranger to activist shareholders who seek to change up a business39 strategy often by waging noisy public battles Nearly four years ago the hedge fund titan Daniel S Loeb took aim at the company and helped orchestrate the ouster of its chief executive Levinsohn eventually claiming three seats on the board and pushing for the hiring of Ms Mayer a former top Google executivequot Institutional investors tend to have a long memory specifically of the large payouts to Loeb and his two board comrades Michael Wolf and Harry Wilson when they resigned from the board with the approval of Mayer and several of the current board membersWall St analysts have become increasingly vocal about what they consider to be under delivery on Yahoo39s shareholder value beyond its Alibaba shares Under Mayer39s guidance and with primary focus on Yahoo39s Alibaba stake Yahoo39s stock increased to a high of 5282 on November 18 2014 As pressure grew on Mayer she reportedly has made several hiring and acquisition missteps the stock price declined steadily and is now resting uncomfortably at 3486 as of Opening Bell on Monday 32816MyersBizNet has been the leading businesstobusiness perceptions research resource for the media community since 1984 and also publishes the leading independent data and forecast of advertising spending Details survey methodology and original industry thought leadership commentary from more than 40 media companies are available at MediaVillage

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Yahoo Sports' Struggle Points to Starboard Opportunity

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