• Ad Age, Friday, May 12, 2006 11:15 AM

While Yahoo CEO Terry Semel says it's possible to imagine Microsoft buying a piece of Yahoo, which some have said would be a good move for both companies, the relationship between the two corporate behemoths probably didn't grow any warmer this week when Semel announced he was thoroughly unimpressed by MIcrosoft's latest and much-ballyhooed search platform. "You have no chance," he said of his competitor. "You begin with no data and not a single advertiser in your system." He also said during an industry event that Yahoo, Google, and other like companies have a huge advantage over television when it comes to signing advertisers. The traditional CPM formula, based on particular programs, simply doesn't give the advertiser the most bang for the buck, not the way interactive technology does, Semel noted. Semel: "Did you ever hear of a single person who saw that auto ad on TV, stood up, put on his coat, and went to the dealer and said, 'I want to buy that car I saw on TV'?" But on the Web, of course, one can actually order a car--or practically anything else--as the immediate result of viewing an advertiser's message. Semel said he classifies Yahoo as a "media-exchange company," meaning it has great content but also the ability to distribute it globally with a speed that cannot be matched by any other media platform.

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