As we all know the Direct Traffic Center is the nemesis of advertisers and the worst aspect of Yahoo Search Marketing. PLEASE OVERTURE - KILL THIS PIECE OF GARBAGE ...here's why:

1) DTC (Direct Traffic Center) is excruciatingly slow.

2) DTC reporting is over 24 hours behind

3) DTC requires almost weekly updates *(see #4)

4) DTC updates always make DTC worse * (see #5)

5) DTC updates not only run longer than expected, but DTC will usually not work at all after an "update"

6) Your reps will "all-of-a-sudden" not be there to answer the phone when DTC is down. Are ya listenin M.A. ???

7) You can only create "one-word" categories for organization

8) Deleting keywords and phrases does not always do so ...trust me, finding out later that you spent $100 on words you thought you deleted is quite common and highly aggravating ...can i get a witness?

9) DTC is a joke with respects to User Interface Design. I have since learned that Yahoo inherited DTC from a previous acquisition. ...Know when to fold 'em big guys.

10) Direct Traffic Center is a stupid name ...much like Yahoo Search Marketing. Brand managers at Yahoo should be fired.

Thank you. Good luck with your trials and tribulations regarding the awful online management products offered by Yahoo Search Marketing.

bah.

I think I'll print this out and hand it to our rep in tomorrow's upcoming meeting :)

We actually delay our weekly paid search reports for a day to cover for the DTC lag effect.

11. DTC reports are a joke. Even when they are working, they don't always give you the information you need. In other words, "NO CUSTOMIZATION!" And, one of the recent "upgrades" has broken the "output to spreadsheet" function. You can't download a spreadsheet to Excel - you have to copy, paste and save the info from your browser into Excel, then hit the "back" button and hope it works without hanging. Argh!

Sorry OV, you are being blown away by the competition in this area. Even the 2nd tiers have better reports than you.

Melissa

I am in complete agreement with these statements. I like the traffic and conversions we get from Yahoo, but frankly, the whole system is getting old.

Why should I have to go three days without being able to log into my account?

Why doesn't my rep give me the service I deserve by answering her phone and/or returning my call on the same day?

There are many reasons to be unhappy with YSM, but they are still an important part of the PPC mix. I hope they get their act together and make this thing as great as it should be.

You can't download a spreadsheet to Excel - you have to copy, paste and save the info from your browser into Excel, then hit the "back" button and hope it works without hanging. Argh!


EXACTLY!!! What's more, if you ask your rep to run the report, it takes them weeks to do it!

hallelujah...

For the record, i agree with everyone who enjoys the conversions. I think Yahoo converts rather well and click fraud seems much less rampant (at least in my industry) than Google's teenage clicking machine; however, that can't allow us to become complacent in demanding top-notch tools and communication from our partner.

Yahoo is asleep on this issue and someone is not thinking "business relationships" very well. If Yahoo improved in these areas of reporting lag, user interface and application efficiency, advertisers would make more sales, be able to control ROI much better and would be singing the praises of Yahoo Search Marketing.

Instead, Yahoo chooses to continue on the path of thinking, "well, advertisers are making money, so they should just deal with it".

I know my rep will say differently, but let's all face it - most reps are merely zombies regurgitating what their sales managers pump into their heads during morning meetings, retreats and "seminars". If they were intelligent, free-thinkers they wouldn't be "followers" ...they'd be leaders. Reps only agree on the poor functionality of DTC in the most secret of communication.

Come on Yahoo reps. Print this thread out and show it to your managers. Stand up and get noticed in your behemouth company for going to bat for your customers. Show the tie-guys that the natives are restless ...that the product is garbage and that things need to change.

have some "kahones" and stand up for what's right ...don't just collect a paycheck and stare at your stock options all day.

Thank you.

I just had to jump in on this thread, both because I have been frustrated to no end with everything Yahoo, and because I'm forced to stay with them for the waning traffic they deliver.

Reporting is terrible, lagging and inaccurate.
Editorial review system is a joke.
The whole system of how one sets up campaigns and keywords is cluttered an confusing.
No ability to exclude specific domains from running ads is costing us thousands/month.
Same for not being able to exclude other counties.
Countless times I have been told by my rep, OK this is serious and I'm going to discuss it with...so and so and call you right back. Never get a call, not even an email.

The number 1 frustration though is knowing that there is a ton of high quality traffic hiding behind this atrocious interface. If they gutted this beast and offered some of these features we are discussing here Yahoo would once again rival Google in PPC. If MSN comes out with these features before this type of change occurs at YSM I'll be gone and I believe so will many of my peers.

ahhh i'm feeling slightly better
Any chance an YSM rep can respond like Google does so well in thier forum?

Greetings Discovery ...great point about the domains. I see these sites all the time in my logs: (spelling out domains to make sure these dogs get no search relevancy from this forum)

- AllTheVacations[dot]com
- resultsifter[dot]com
- trustedsearch[dot]net

Brace yourselves - Yahoo has openly partnered with these sites and worse, defends it tooth-n-nail. By many definitions, these are nothing more than duplicate content sites. ...especially the last two that i provided. The pages are just a bunch of popular search term links. NO content. NO contact info. NO internet responsibility. These domains all seem to be owned by shady offshore companies with no contact info and no "corporate identity" for which to associate them.

But Yahoo allows them to slap the Yahoo logo on 'em.

Why would Yahoo partner with these sites? and worse, why can't we (as Discovery mentioned) choose to be or NOT be associated with such sites. I'll tell you why - no advertisers would opt-in and thus, those sites would be useless and would not make any revenue on clicks...

Lastly, as these "nothing-but-link" sites garner more traffic and the owners of them see more revenue, what is to stop them from creating a thousand of the sites, a million of 'em ...a billion of 'em?

Isn't that muddying the internet and making it more difficult for users to find what they're looking for? Do we really need billions of mortgage, travel and pharmaceutical link sites? Isn't that awfully similar to the SPAM we all get daily in email?

Yahoo is making some very big mistakes with regards to brand and like i said before, Yahoo should fire it's brand managers. ...they should stick to yodeling contests on TV. ...at least that made us laugh.

I know my rep will say differently, but let's all face it - most reps are merely zombies regurgitating what their sales managers pump into their heads during morning meetings, retreats and "seminars". If they were intelligent, free-thinkers they wouldn't be "followers" ...they'd be leaders. Reps only agree on the poor functionality of DTC in the most secret of communication.

My favorite Yahoo Search Quirks:

1. Inconsistant, pointless editorial policy. This became apparant when I tried to change the ad text on an existing paid ad. The ad was rejected "because of the url". The problem with this? The url had been approved before!

2. Poor Explanation for Editorial Decisions. When called to account for rejections, customer service just kept repeating the rule.

3. Puritanical nonesense. Our dating review site was rejected because the site mentioned sex. I am not exaggerating. We were told that dating sites "must only be about love and romance." Thanks grandma.

funny post 128hotkaties....

I guess we can sum your comments up as the "editorial process" of the DTC is your biggest gripe. ...and many would argue rightfully so. I am still on the fence regarding editorial. I am not saying I like it, but I do believe an argument could be made for its' existence and its' association with better conversions than most of the competition.

BUT, that being said - the editorial process, since it's done by humans, is not consistent. What gets banned for you could easily get through for others ...including your competition. I have seen this happen. the "editorial process" is really, "a specific editor's interpretations" and this leaves too much possibility for error. It gets compounded when you have an industry in which the editors are unfamiliar. They just guess.

Thanks for all comments and everyone sharing. While I would love to take people up on the PMs regarding a collective bail-out from Yahoo PPC for a specific number of days, I would have a hard time rationalizing that above. I still believe Yahoo has ample time to heed our warnings, to listen to what we are saying and take a logical approach to fixing the problems.

If they don't ...well then, we have hella ammunition to substantiate why we feel Yahoo is mistreating us as advertisers and their salary providers.

Without advertisers, Yahoo is just a second rate search engine with a bunch of fluff products. Think the stock sucks now - wait 'til advertisers start leaving.

Yeah, my guess is Yahoo has no idea how much money it is losing with its inconsistant "editorial status" stuff. I am being serious that my company's marketing budget is virtually unlimited. But Yahoo has done virtually no work to get our ad dollars. They have only given wildly variable reasons for rejecting our ads. Another thing? They apparantly have no process to provide advertisers with discrete, actionable steps to ensure acceptance. Even when they did throw out vague recommendations, and we followed them, they found yet another reason to reject us.

Thanks for all comments and everyone sharing. While I would love to take people up on the PMs regarding a collective bail-out from Yahoo PPC for a specific number of days, I would have a hard time rationalizing that above. I still believe Yahoo has ample time to head our warnings, to listen to what we are saying and take a logical approach to fixing the problems.
Like many of you, we do get good ROI from Yahoo/OV, and significant volume, so a pullout is unrealistic. However, you are all correct in that it is high time they stand up and take notice that they are being out-classed all over the place. Their interface is clunky, outdated, and annoying to use. Their editorial process is inconsistent (we, too, have had ads rejected that had been running for literally years, because I had updated the prices in them and nothing else!). Their customer service is god-awful - even those of us who are supposed to be Platinum or Diamond or whatever don't get replies to our emails or phone calls, nor are we notified when our rep quits and we've been assigned a new one.... Like I said, I've gotten better reports and better service from the 2nd tiers than I get from OV. OV's saving grace is they do get results - but they shouldn't sit on their laurels or they'll get left behind.

Melissa

My favorite Yahoo Search Quirks:
3. Puritanical nonesense. Our dating review site was rejected because the site mentioned sex. I am not exaggerating. We were told that dating sites "must only be about love and romance." Thanks grandma.
I have a similar experience with a popular culture website. They sell a few things that I guess would be classed as "soft porn" - adult anime and the like. Ads would be approved then disapproved then approved again. This was for ads for products such as a Britney Spears calendar. In fact we never advertised the adult stuff. Finally I was told if we wanted to continue with YSM a warning page with Click to Proceed had to be before every page. Every page! It was just madness.

They sell a few things that I guess would be classed as "soft porn" - adult anime and the like.

Please let's try to keep the thread focused on the Direct Traffic Center as much as possible. I say this because in the past, it seems that threads can wafer off into other areas and I would really like Overture / Yahoo Search Marketing to take notice regarding these Direct Traffic Centers issues.

For problems with the editorial process, perhaps either a new thread could be developed and/or add to ones already started regarding this topic.

Direct Traffic Center has been such a problem for all of us for many years and I am dedicated to getting Yahoo to give a hoot. Even on this same forum I have complained over the years and nothing seems to get fixed. I am afraid they will take our problems less seriously if we turn it into a ***** session about Yahoo PPC... (trust me it's tempting but...)

Hopefully, that makes sense. Let's really try to express just how awful this DTC application really is and work diligently to get some action from Yahoo.

If anyone can remember back as far as February, to when Yahoo! locked advertisers out for upgrades during the Super Bowl weekend!! Only the single biggest day for advertisers during the year!

How many brand managers trying to time campaigns online/offline were jammed into higher CPC's or were one-upped by competitors who had better timing?!

After an upgrade last year, I discovered my program somehow had reverted back several months to ads/editorial/bids I had since changed quite a bit. If I didn't have a backup, if I'd made all changes in the DTC instead of downloading the listings and working on the .csv file, I would have been toast.

The update before last, I was unable to generate reports for 11 days.

I agree that DTC sucks 100%. On the other hand due to the $ amount I spend Yahoo made their search optimizer available for free. So whatever account management function I do perform I do it directly through Search Optimizer.(including adding/removing keyords and etc.) It still is not the most friendly tool but more "real-time" and accurate.

here are my additions:

12) Reporting by category has repeatedly not worked. Over the last several months, I have had clicks reporting to an "unavailable" category. Every time I complain, the reps start with a canned answer about how it's my fault for moving keywords between categories (which I NEVER do). Then they promise that the reporting will eventually correct itself (which it NEVER does).
13) Cannot edit and resubmit rejected ads. Instead, you have to recreate every ad from scratch; ridiculously time consuming.
14) Newly created ads end up in the Unassigned category. For various reasons, I need to report clicks by category. Why can't I assign the category for the ad during the creation process??

here are my additions:

12) Reporting by category has repeatedly not worked. Over the last several months, I have had clicks reporting to an "unavailable" category. Every time I complain, the reps start with a canned answer about how it's my fault for moving keywords between categories (which I NEVER do). Then they promise that the reporting will eventually correct itself (which it NEVER does).
13) Cannot edit and resubmit rejected ads. Instead, you have to recreate every ad from scratch; ridiculously time consuming.
14) Newly created ads end up in the Unassigned category. For various reasons, I need to report clicks by category. Why can't I assign the category for the ad during the creation process??
Actually, you can sort of edit and resubmit rejected ads by downloading them into Excel from the Editorial Status page (although this is harder than it used to be - see my previous post! :D ). Then you can make your changes in the spreadsheet and just resubmit it as a bulk upload, making sure you've deleted the columns that don't belong in a bulk upload sheet (see their template for specifics).

And when I've created new ads under the Add Listings function, the first thing it does is ask me what category I want the new ad to go into. Since I only have one category that's not "unassigned," and since I no longer use that category any more, it's kind of an annoyance for me. Are you using "Add Listings" to create new ads, or are you bulk submitting them?

And when I've created new ads under the Add Listings function, the first thing it does is ask me what category I want the new ad to go into. Since I only have one category that's not "unassigned," and since I no longer use that category any more, it's kind of an annoyance for me. Are you using "Add Listings" to create new ads, or are you bulk submitting them?

I should have been more specific. I almost always create new ads using Copy Listings, because my ads are similar, but not identical. Also, I only create a dozen or so at a time. You would expect those ads to end up in the category where you are copying the listings from, but they don't.

Good point, you're right. I sometimes do that too and it is indeed annoying. The "copy listings" also defaults to Advanced Match, even if the original listing is set to Standard. We have Advanced Match turned off at the account level, but if we didn't, I'd be very unhappy to have a listing go live as Advanced that I wanted to be set to Standard.

15. The "copy listings" function doesn't work right, because it does not copy all the settings from the listing you are copying.

16. The "Listing On/Off" function doesn't work either. We had a listing show up for days that I had turned Off. I did get a refund for clicks, but it caused some problems for us. Always use the "Delete" function if you don't want to get clicks on an ad! Which is a pain too if you just wanted to pause an ad and restart it later.

Do I hear "20 Reasons"?

Melissa

for what it's worth, if you reach a certain spend level, you can usually bypass the editorial component (or, our rep just but us a break once).

either way, i HATE working in it, but refuse to give up the traffic.

OK if YSM is reading please add these to the list of required fixes/upgrades.

I think we're at 17 so

17.) Allow advertisers to block domains and subdomains from running our ads.
18.) Allow advertisers to select the countries we want our ads to run in.
19.) Near real time, or at least a full days report at 12:01AM PT.
And please oh please, stop having one report have "all" the data and another report only yesterday, and another with just part of today's data but lagging by 3 hours... ahhhhhhh) Absolutely everything is out of synch.
20.) You should outright bribe many of us advertisers to go to your seminars and workshops for spending so many dollars on Overture, NOT charge us to go to a seminar on how to overcome your horrible interface.
21.) Listen guys you have basically 2 products, an ad network and a reporting tool, can you do away with the 500 brands for slight variations of the same thing?
22.) Editorial review is fine, but please put some software and more brains on it. 5 days is completely unacceptable. Or allow immediate publication with stiff penalties for abuse, even exclusion from using "instant approval"
23.) we appreciate the heads up for maintanence, but how often are you guys going down for upgrades... that we never seem to see?
24) Searching for keywords in campaigns. Give the ability for an exact search, heck if you are in a vertical industry, many of the keywords you have will have the same fundamental keyword! This search is useless.

No. They should keep it. It's byzantine, archaic, confusing, seemingly arbitrary, and difficult to learn. These are all qualities that encourage firms to outsource PPC management. :rolleyes:

Editorial review is fine, but please put some software and more brains on it. 5 days is completely unacceptable. Or allow immediate publication with stiff penalties for abuse, even exclusion from using "instant approval"

Just to sandwich in a small nugget of positive news for O! - In Australia at least, turnaround on editorial review has actually improved from an unworkable 5 days to under 2 days. Although this might depend on spend as we are one of their larger clients...

Please let's try to keep the thread focused on the Direct Traffic Center as much as possible. I say this because in the past, it seems that threads can wafer off into other areas and I would really like Overture / Yahoo Search Marketing to take notice regarding these Direct Traffic Centers issues.

For problems with the editorial process, perhaps either a new thread could be developed and/or add to ones already started regarding this topic.

Direct Traffic Center has been such a problem for all of us for many years and I am dedicated to getting Yahoo to give a hoot. Even on this same forum I have complained over the years and nothing seems to get fixed. I am afraid they will take our problems less seriously if we turn it into a ***** session about Yahoo PPC... (trust me it's tempting but...)

Hopefully, that makes sense. Let's really try to express just how awful this DTC application really is and work diligently to get some action from Yahoo.

Usability criticisms of the DTC are important. But how do you judge the DTC usability ? I say, you judge how well the DTC rules, functioning and processes accomadates the needs of advertisers, be they pornstars or the pope. I don't envy the DTC folks - because the needs of their users are incredibly diverse.

Editorial copy matters - copy in the ads, keywords you can bid on, etc.

...Looks like we have now got the list to 25. Allow me to add to the list further:

25) Please do away with the security code that we must enter as part of our login procedure. While I realize you think you are being crafty and prohibiting "Bots", you aren't. OCR tools can crack these in seconds. ...just ask Ticketmaster.

26) Please fix the Account Balance emails. Even if I have $8,000 in my account, I will get a random email stating that "my account may be getting too low" ...yet, when my account is actually low, I get nothing.

Happens all the time.

27) Why email me and tell me I have 1 keyword Approved and 28 keywords "pending" ...seems it would make more sense to email me when I have 29 keywords accepted. There is no rhyme or reason as to when or why emails are sent.

28) Why default to "current day" when logging into the system?" . Current day by Yahoo standards is yesterday, so what exactly are you telling me? Furthermore, The 7-day view of old was far more useful.

29) Some folks are saying, "well at least we get optimizer for free" ...so what? Optimizer is just a less functional Google clone. Worse, it is more clumsy than DTC as far as per keyword or phrase management and displays less information about the current state of those keywords and phrases.

30) Please let me delete more than one category at a time. Radio buttons are useless when you have 500 categories and you need to remove many quickly.

31) along that same line, give us the option to remove the keywords along with the category if we see fit instead of just throwing the keywords into "unassigned". It is so aggravating to do the keywords first, then the category ...and then cross your fingers that it all actually deletes.

...keep 'em coming folks. Let's spark some change. Whether they feel they need to respond is irrelevant in the end I suppose. They don't seem to dig my tone - but that's ok - I have been doing this a long time and I know that my points, as well as everyone else's so far are valid and on point.

All -

Please know that we hear you and do care about your feedback. We make our advertisers our highest priority, and we're always open to suggestions as to how we might improve our offerings. Thanks to all of you who posted on this thread about issues with DTC.

It's great to read that many of you have positive things to say about our traffic quality and conversions. We also recognize that significant improvements can be made to our advertiser systems to make your experience with us better than it currently is. I've spent the last few days checking in with many people in Pasadena, and here's what I can tell you (hopefully, it will shed some light on the various DTC updates you've cited):

Yahoo! Search Marketing has been aggressively working to upgrade our internal systems to allow us to roll out the next generation of our advertiser applications. What this means is, we're improving what we currently have and are investing heavily in new systems that will provide you with better matching and campaign performance, as well as a new interface and set of features. All of this is being done with the goal of making working with us easier and giving you even more value from your search marketing campaigns.

We're planning additional systems updates over the course of the next several weeks and months and we realize there may be some inconvenience in the short term. Please know that we're going to take all measures possible to give you advance warning and minimize their impact on you and your accounts. (And we really mean that!).

Thanks to all of you for your patience so far - our teams are confident that you'll like the changes we're going to roll out in the not-too-far future. I appreciate your bearing with us, and welcome your ongoing feedback on this board.

We are listening.

YahooSarah

It's comforting to know that Yahoo is at least listening.

I'm a little fearful of the YSM changes. I can't help but suspect that the "new" interface will be the Marketing Console and Search Optimizer. The plural use of applications, gives me great concern. Our IT team attempted to implement these two products and after a couple weeks they threw their arms up in disgust. I don’t need to go into details, suffice it to say this thread could be duplicated for MC and SO.

I understand YSM doesn't want to nor should they clone Google, however I'm a strong believer that when you see genius copy it.

I hope that you will qualm our fears hear Sarah and that YSM will turn this around in short order with a fresh new approach. As you can tell by the pointed comments made here, many of us have been promised change in the past only to see poorly implemented half changes.

Finally, we are not here to bash YSM I think you can see that most of these posts are about constructive criticism. Nothing could make us happier than to see you succeed. YSM has an incredible test group in this forum, I don’t doubt that just 25 of us here represent over a few million in annual ad spend. Perhaps you should create a more formal way for your core users to help you design/test your future offerings.

A few of us are right here in San Diego near your MC and OS dev team...

Regards

Discovery

I too am glad Yahoo finally responded, and I want to start off by saying that I am not trying to be confrontational with YahooSarah, ...but these are the same type of responses we get year after year. Allow me, as a four-year client of Yahoo/Overture/GoTo to comment on Yahoo's response to us:

Yahoo! Search Marketing has been aggressively working to upgrade our internal systems to allow us to roll out the next generation of our advertiser applications.

- You guys have been saying this for 3 years now. "Aggressively" is not the correct adverb in this case. If it were so, there is no way that we would be stuck using the Direct Traffic Center month after month ...year after year. You may be "aggressively" taking the system down on weekends, but this aggression is not equating to anything useful for us - the advertisers - and in fact, many of us have see it get worse. In my world, this is not aggressively attacking the problem at all. All things being equal, If my web product was as poor as the DTC for as long as DTC, I would have been fired two years ago. Point is, nice "we are trying" responses make us feel heard and perhaps somewhat noticed, but at the end of the day what has improved? Where's the payoff?

...we're improving what we currently have and are investing heavily in new systems that will provide you with better matching and campaign performance, as well as a new interface and set of features. All of this is being done with the goal of making working with us easier and giving you even more value from your search marketing campaigns.

- Improving what you already have??? What exactly does that mean? Are we stuck with the DTC no matter what? Is it not obvious that it needs to be scraped ...thrown out ...tossed aside? It doesn't work, it's not even your core code, so how can fix it?

Moreover, most of our complaints are not necessarily "match"-related. We want a better Admin interface. A functional, easy-to-use and responsive one. One that deletes when you ask it to delete, updates when you ask it to update and doesn't take three months to build a decent size campaign nor an additional month to manage it.

Personally, I think Optimizer should be made more feature rich and easier to use and this application should replace DTC for everyone. It's more like the Google admin, which is far more efficient, intuitive and reactive. Sometimes basic and simple is just the way to go...

We're planning additional systems updates over the course of the next several weeks and months and we realize there may be some inconvenience in the short term. Please know that we're going to take all measures possible to give you advance warning and minimize their impact on you and your accounts. (And we really mean that!).

Grrr... this is simply not true. Again, I feel like the aggressor here, but i can't just sit here and read this and give any credibility to it. First of all, system updates are already quite common to all of us. Additional ones will even be more frustrating. How about ONE big one to fix all the outstanding issues in one fell swoop?...rather than every other weekend when I am prohibited from managing campaigns. I believe we all agree you have had more-than-enough time to get the ducks in row.

Once again, as a four year client, I feel 100% justified in my beliefs.

I not only get a plethora of email and conversation support from people in our industry, but also strong support from people within Yahoo. When your own company is feeling our pain, it's a pretty good indicator that it's time to act.


Thanks to all of you for your patience so far - our teams are confident that you'll like the changes we're going to roll out in the not-too-far future.

Number one, your welcome - but patience is wearing ultra thin. How about some real time lines? How about, by X, we will be rolling out a new system. the "not-too-far" future is not good enough. If it were the first response like this - ok - but it's not. We've heard all this before. Go comb the Overture archives of this forum ...same responses time after time.

YahooSarah, I ask you - plead to you - give us some concrete answers that we want to hear. Allow me to help you with what we want to know:

1) When is the "not-too-far" future? Please give us a expectation date ...time frame ...something...

2) Will all the points that we have all listed over the week be adequately addressed in the "new product"

3) Will Yahoo scrape the DTC and use something different? ...or continue to lumber along with a continually patched, slow application that just keeps getting "maintained"?

4) Will the reporting intervals improve so that we are not making decisions based on day-old data?

5) Will the editorial process speed up, improve and garner some consistency regarding acceptance/non-acceptance?

6) Lastly, Will you guys ever, ever have editors working on Sundays and holidays? A company so large and serving so many market segments, should have a weekend/holiday staff plan that consists of at least {some} workers.

Thanks for jumping in YahooSarah and we {at least, I} am happy to see a response, but again it doesn't really tell us anything at all. We already expected the "we are working on it" response. Now, perhaps we can get some real, concrete and less vague responses to our real questions and concerns.

Thanks.

Here, here Sebastian!!

Yes, here here.

Also, Yahoo - when will you "upgrade" your advertiser service levels? I sent an email to my "rep" Friday morning, and cc'd it to my "account executive" - and I have yet to receive a reply. While we are by no means Yahoo's biggest advertiser, we do spend a LOT of money there, and we are supposedly Diamond level. Is this any way to treat a "major" advertiser??? I mean, you could at least send me a canned "We have received your email and are working on an answer..." For all I know, both the rep and the AE have left the company - which has happened before, and my emails were going into a black hole. Pretty bad if you ask me.

I would like to know how Yahoo plans to improve the way they respond to their advertisers' emails and phone calls. Ignoring them is not exactly great customer service.

Melissa

I mentioned "random" Yahoo emailing in my list of Yahoo fixes, but I now have a very concrete example. Perhaps this example will shed some light for Yahoo and have this annoying bug fixed.

Situation: I add roughly $xx,000 to my account on a periodic basis (about twice a month) and my average spend is about $x,000/day

What keeps happening: On 7/31/2005, I got an email from Yahoo saying my account is getting low at $9,280.39 which at my current level of spend makes me good for over a week. Then, on August 1, I get another email stating that I am getting low. WHY?

Now, Since I always wait until my account is depleted before adding more funds, conventional wisdom would have me thinking, "ok, so these emails are useless, but perhaps I will get one when I really am low on funds."

nope.

nada.

doesn't happen.

Why does Yahoo send these random emails about account status? They are incorrect for the most part and worse, when I am actually low, like within a day or two from depletion, I don't get an email ...and that's when it could actually help me.

What's up with this? YahooSarah or anyone with some insight - Why do we get these random emails stating we are low on funds when we are not - and NEVER get emails when we actually are low on funds?

Thanks.

32) After developing keywords and phrases in the "Add Listings" area of the Direct Traffic Center (DTC), there is no way to "add more" listings nor is there any way to "create a new set of listings".

One must actually click "manage bids" or some other area of functionality in order to return to "add listings"

Please add the capability for us to continue to both add more keywords for the campaign we just created and allow us to create a new campaign/keyword combination without having to leave and come back to "add listings"

a simple, "add aother campaign" button that simply took us to the "add listings" home page would be most logical, intuitive and helpful.

33) DO NOT automatically turn ContentMatch back on every time new listings are added/modified. Include the ability to select/deselect Search or Content match a part of the listings process.

33) DO NOT automatically turn ContentMatch back on every time new listings are added/modified. Include the ability to select/deselect Search or Content match a part of the listings process.

Phew - glad that one made it. I have been so burned by that little diddy that I simply abandoned "content match" altogether. That one can KILL you if you have words or phrases that are popular on high traffic sites. One small oversight could cost hundreds...

and to add 34...

34) Please allow us to customize {and have it stick} whether we would like to add separate ads for each keyword or phrase or one ad for all the keywords and phrases.

Currently there is a button for this toggle, but it's at the very bottom of the page which is not vey intuitive nor logical. So many times I have gotten to this portion of keyword addition and began typing my headline, body and URL only to realize I wanted "One ad for all" and had to select that button and start all over. PLUS, 99% of my keyword buying is done with one ad for multiple keywords and phrases so I would like my selection to stick across sessions.

You guys {Yahoo} seem to like cookies judging by the plethora of Yahoo cookies on my machine daily. Just cookie the selection preference. Done.

I mentioned "random" Yahoo emailing in my list of Yahoo fixes, but I now have a very concrete example. Perhaps this example will shed some light for Yahoo and have this annoying bug fixed.

Situation: I add roughly $xx,000 to my account on a periodic basis (about twice a month) and my average spend is about $x,000/day

What keeps happening: On 7/31/2005, I got an email from Yahoo saying my account is getting low at $9,280.39 which at my current level of spend makes me good for over a week. Then, on August 1, I get another email stating that I am getting low. WHY?

Now, Since I always wait until my account is depleted before adding more funds, conventional wisdom would have me thinking, "ok, so these emails are useless, but perhaps I will get one when I really am low on funds."

nope.

nada.

doesn't happen.

Why does Yahoo send these random emails about account status? They are incorrect for the most part and worse, when I am actually low, like within a day or two from depletion, I don't get an email ...and that's when it could actually help me.

What's up with this? YahooSarah or anyone with some insight - Why do we get these random emails stating we are low on funds when we are not - and NEVER get emails when we actually are low on funds?

Thanks.


This one is classic. I'm sure we can all relate. It's like those "bump" signs on the roads. You slow down for them, but there's never a bump there. Then, wham, you hit who knows what and blow a tire. No bump sign.

After reading the many previous posts I felt compelled to reply myself.

The latest DTC update created multiple issues within several of my campaigns. Many of the issues are small but are frustrating when compounded.

The first issue I have is with the bulk download of campaigns. I have opted out of content match on the keyword and campaign level, but when I download my campaign about half of terms are listed with Content Match turned on.

The second issue is that I am no longer able to modify my listings without receiving an error message that my excluded keywords exceed a 100 character limit. Now I am forced to submit a bulk upload to my Yahoo rep for any listing changes I need to make.

Third -- Yahoo's daily bugdet is horrible!

Another cautionary note -- The default setting within Yahoo is to have Content Match active -- this affects new camapigns and creating sub-camapigns from a pre-existing one. My Yahoo Rep advised me to turn off Content Match on the keyword level to avoid the issue all together as the system looks at keyword settings when breaking out current keywords into a new campaign. Tried this, but it didn't work. I still had to manually edit all keywords to opt out of Content Match and then turn off within campaign settings.

I think you can turn off Content Match at the account level, although that may not work if you want it for some campaigns and not for others. Either way, the defaults of turning on Content Match and Advanced Match when adding listings is a huge pain. We only use Standard Match, and if I didn't have Advanced turned off at the account level, I'd have to shut it off manually every time I add a new listing. Pain, pain, pain.

Melissa

so, logging into my Yahoo account this a.m., I am presented with the following message ....again: {which i almost have memorized}

"We are currently experiencing a delay in updating data in the DirecTraffic Center® reports and in the statistics on the "Manage Bids" page. Rest assured that we are working to resolve this issue so that your reports will be updated as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you."

Hmmmm... need we really say more? Yahoo, how long are we going to endure this? Please give us some time frames rather than sitting there collectively trying to figure out what to say...

My favorite part of the above paragraph is the "...Rest assured that we are working to resolve this issue" - right, you have been working to solve these problems for 4 years and it hasn't worked once. Good show.

Please.

We cannot continue to experience these long delays, poor reporting and cost surprises day after day after day after....

Do something. Act. Don't stroke us - fix the problems.

Apparently this message is now a permanent fixture at Direct Traffic Center:

"We are currently experiencing a delay in updating data in the DirecTraffic Center® reports and in the statistics on the "Manage Bids" page. Rest assured that we are working to resolve this issue so that your reports will be updated as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you."

1) Why can't this be fixed?

2) What could possibly have professional programmers and engineers so perplexed that we must endure this message, along with it's expressed awful functionality, for years?

Yahoo, I and many others are not going away and we aren't going to let this thread die. Please give us some answers. Real answers as to when the DTC will work properly and our problems addressed expeditiously.

...O and FWIW, for those who think "Optimizer" is a solution, please be aware that it WILL ONLY WORK WITH INTERNET EXPLORER which is not a smart move. Yahoo should be aware that many corporate environments are moving from IE and the virus/trojan war and thus utilizing the better reliability of Firefox and Thunderbird ...along with many other IE alternatives.

The message has changed, but the sentiment remains.

Yahoo has warned us that they will be taking the DTC down yet again. Weekends in 2005 have seen the DTC down more often than it has been up. Check your records Yahoo as this is a fact.

So now we have August 19th as an "upgrade" weekend as opposed to the usual "maintenance" weekend that always equates to no noticeable enhancements at all; in fact, they usually break something during these periods. Again, Yahoo reps get all offended at my writing style, but I really don't care. These are facts. ...that they choose to hide from and not respond with regards to...

So please, Yahoo, I am sure everyone is dying to know. What is getting fixed this weekend? Hopefully, something important since I won't be able to monitor and manage campaigns over the volatile football weekend.

Can you please provide us with a list similar to what software companies do when upgrading their software?

Can we please know ahead of time what to look for?

And please, can we be assured that the upgrade will not break things nor have us waking up Monday morning with other advertiser's campaigns melded within our own? (as happened last big 'update')

Can you please say something?

I've split the details of the new Yahoo DTC over into this other thread: Details On New Yahoo Direct Traffic Center (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/showthread.php?t=7400).

I'll keep this thread open for further comments on the EXISTING system and desires to have it upgraded. Please use the new thread for comments specifically about the new system.

Also, from Yahoo is this comment in the other thread that's also relevant here:

As I mentioned before, we're working on replacing the interface you currently use (YES, this means a new DTC). Our plan is to begin introducing the new interface early next year. In the meantime, we know that you need to be able to run your campaigns successfully, so we're also addressing many of the points you’ve raised about the performance of our current system. Over the next several months, we’ll be making infrastructure improvements that will tackle issues like system speed, availability and reporting.

We’ll be holding a systems upgrade this weekend as part of these ongoing efforts. It's not going to provide a "quick fix," but it will lead to improvements that we hope will alleviate some of the burdens you've described and make it easier for you to work with us in the future.

35) Please make the "Listing On/Off" functionality smarter. For instance, if I select an range of keyword phrases that are already on, please have the application pop-up window only provide "Offline" as the option.

Currently, the dropdown defaults to online which is non intuitive and during a speedy day, can cause mistakes. Advertisers whom may believe they have chosen "offline" can easily inadvertently select "online" and nothing will happen to their keyword status. ....and no warning pops up to alert the advertiser that they are selecting an already current state.

Moreover, it's frustrating to delete words and then have the screen refresh showing the category still filled with the words you just deleted. Why is this, anyway? Makes no sense.

Most of the time we just end up deleting again just to be sure. ...once again, - counter intuitive.

Thanks.

"The Blob" aka the DTC is going to be replaced... the people at Yahoo! are as disgusted with it as we are... but we have to realise this is not something that can be replaced effectively overnight... they have been working on it for ahile now and are about to start beta testing the new one... let's hold off and give that a serious work through...

Coming from you, a person with some seniority here I trust your comments. I only wonder how Y! is going about determining what the new Blog will look like. I'm fairly certain that the people utilizing this forum are the most advanced users of DTC and likely spend a great deal of money there.

Is Y! pulling some of the SEW members into a focus group?
There is so much core knowledge and experience here that it would be foolish not to.

Is there anyone here that is participating in such a group?

Knowing that my peers are directly participating in such and effort would make me feel much better about the potential results.

Cheers,

Discovery

Great points, Discovery. I'm not aware of such a panel, but if one exists, I'd like to volunteer.

Melissa

Yahoo runs focus groups and has the Ad Council...

Unbelievable. If Yahoo's technical hiccups weren't so sad, I'd love to say, "i told ya so" {which I did upon announcement of these new fixes.}

Once again Yahoo failed to come thru and apparently advertiser accounts were once again inaccessible ...many, for over 48 hours. Glad I was out of town or I would have surely been more on top of this. Instead, we get the following email:

--

Dear Yahoo! Search Marketing Advertiser,

As you may know, we had a scheduled systems upgrade last weekend to
help us meet the needs of our growing customer base. Following this
effort, we know that you may have had difficulty accessing your
account, as well as managing bids and listings. I wanted to update you
on the nature of our system issues and what you can expect from us
going forward.

{sebastian says: we don't want updates on the nature of your systems. from day one we have just wanted it to work}

Let me begin by apologizing for any challenges that our systems
availability or performance have created for you. We know that many
of you count on us for an important part of your sales and marketing
efforts. We appreciate your trust and never take for granted the
fact that you have choices about where to place your marketing dollars.

{sebastian says: sorry, but apologies don't cut it anymore. it has been constant apologies for years ...years, mr. yahoo president. YEARS!

forget apologies and start offering back compensation please. ...just like any other business would have to do}

The recent issues relate mainly to the capacity of our network and
systems. In order to meet the increasing level of demand and provide you
with new capabilities to help you grow your business, we are making some
significant changes. We are undertaking a series of updates to get more
performance from our current systems; as well as a comprehensive
technology upgrade that will make it easier to roll out and scale new
features globally.

{sebastian says: so boost capacity. your company is worth billions of dollars ...you can't boost capacity overnight? ...and stop trying to help me "grow my business" until you can help me "not lose money for my business"

and great, more updates to come? seeing as how every one of them has resulted in problems, we can hardly feel comfortable in the notification of many more to come. Have you even been following your own company's progress and performance?}

We have scheduled a number of projects for the second half of 2005 that
will enhance the performance of our current systems. Last weekend, we
undertook one of the largest of these projects, upgrading the core
databases that process and store listings. It was a complex, broad effort
to lay the groundwork for performance and availability improvements that
you will see over the coming months.

{sebastian says: ...and obviously planned poorly. your competition is slaying you in this area.}

While you may have experienced some problems over the last few days, we
wanted to let you know that we are also beginning to see the intended
benefits. At this time, we have resolved the majority of the issues and
core service has been restored. We are hopeful that any additional
service interruptions will be minor as we continue to fine-tune our
systems.

{sebastian says: thanks for updating us AFTER it was fixed. this is not a slam but it is typical of Yahoo!/Overture/GoTo communication with us.}

We absolutely understand that any system downtime creates difficulties
for you and we would like to hear from you. If you have any feedback or
comments, please send us an email at comments-ysm@cc.yahoo-inc.com.

{sebastian says: your darn right it causes us difficulties ...and embarrassment within our internal organizations. instead of generic email addresses for interns to read, why not field our emails yourself mr. president? i would like to be first in line.}

We value your business and appreciate your patience.

{sebastian says: ...this i have yet to see.}

Sincerely,

Ted Meisel
President
Yahoo! Search Marketing

--

{YAWN} ...same old crap.

We got almost the same email here in Australia on Monday evening - just the last paragraph was different....

SYSTEM SLOWNESS:

We are currently experiencing intermittent delays and slowness in our account management system. We apologize for any inconvenience this may cause you. We are working to resolve this issue as quickly as possible. Thank you for your patience.

--

This thread will end up being an ongoing example of the poor service and failing technical prowess coming from Yahoo. Perhaps even Yahoo itself will feel some level of embarrasment as new posts continue to collect each time they are down, slow or just plain impossible to use.

What happened to all these enhancements and improvements? vaporware.

October 1st is the date set for launching the new interface... the old DTC should be gone then.

...right.

We'll see, because I am not buying it. I really hope what you say is true, but in my four years throwing dough at this company they have done nothing but miss deadlines, lag behind in functionality and cause advertisers major headaches with their constant - and i mean CONSTANT - problems.

No denying that. So, if i seem skeptical, perhaps it is well warranted.

I am happy to eat crow should be I wrong ...you can pass me the fork, because while I am munching on bird, I'll be building and managing my campaigns like a champ.

Come on now, don't stroke us here, that wouldn't be nice.

Make me eat my words Y! and offer site exclusion!!!!
I will sing your praises to the masses and paint a big Y on my forehead and parade around your carlsbad campus letting your developers take pot shots at the biggest whiner of the year....
(although Sebastian may hold that title.)


Discovery

October 1, 2005, 2006 or 2007?

I just revisited this thread after YEARS.

I find it hilarious that I called them out so long ago, they continued (and "continue") to completely suck as an online advertising solution.

These days, AdWords isn't much better since competition has gotten INSANE, but at least the AdWords management tool is tolerable.

Yahoo's STILL SUCKS ...even today - but now I don't care, because I don't have any clients that care to be there.

Suckers!

one wonders what they will be doing once Bing takes over - am not too happy with their interface but like the results

Sebastian you have returned in true colorful form.

Yes, Yahoo has failed, but there are a lot of talented people at Yahoo that I hope will move on and push our industry forward.

I wanted them to be successful!

Having 3 viable advertising platforms competing for our business is a good thing. It was just so damn frustrating to watch Yahoo ignore what their customers wanted and fail into oblivion.

5 year old thread and they still never fixed site exclusion, nor created a full featured offline editor!

Seems like Yahoo Rep did not read this thread lol ;)



5 year old thread and they still never fixed site exclusion, nor created a full featured offline editor!

Best,

Ah, Sebastian.... thank you for your refreshing blast from the past! Indeed, 5 years later and nothing is much different. A few half-hearted attempts have resulted in little to no difference.

Nice post Mel :)

Has Yahoo Search Marketing Become A 'Dog'? (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/3640081)

Best,

Hello Jag-

Definitely stay out of their dummy click network a.k.a content network.

Yahoo advertising is on Bing and Bing is making some moves.

GAustralia

Nice post Mel :)

Has Yahoo Search Marketing Become A 'Dog'? (http://forums.searchenginewatch.com/3640081)

Best,

Thanks Jag! :) This thread gave me the idea.

That's a interesting topic to know about Yahoo traffic......:)