According to the Associated Press, Microsoft will use adCenter, its new system to sell online advertising, to serve all of the sponsored links appearing on its search engine, MSN Search, by the end of
the second quarter. Microsoft currently serves about a quarter of the ads appearing in its search results; the rest are served up by Yahoo! subsidiary Overture Services. In June, Microsoft's contract
with Overture, its pay-per-click provider, expires. Because PPC revenue is the way Google makes nearly all of its money and Yahoo! about half, Microsoft will be keen to bring the lucrative practice
in-house. Eventually, adCenter, which the software giant has been testing since last spring, will be a system that offers companies ways to buy ad space on multiple MSN platforms and in many different
formats. AdCenter will also provide marketers with tools giving them extremely detailed demographic and user data, with the aim of helping them target their ads more effectively. These tools are
expected to be made available in the next 6 to 12 months, a Microsoft executive said.
Read the whole story at Associated Press »
