Yahoo has launched a service rather like Google AdSense adverts, but instead of being for web sites, they are for services published to a mobile handset. Yahoo will serve ads, offer a content engine for publishers, a media directory and a way of submitting content to mobiles.
The partners for delivering the adverts are MobiTV, Opera, and go2, a location-enabled content network in the US. MobiTV has 2 million users of is Java based video platform, while Opera is the default browser on a rising number of handsets.
The first advertisements will go live in the second quarter of 2007. Yahoo! plans to expand the number of partners in the Yahoo Mobile Ad Network over the coming months.
The Ad Network will allow mobile publishers to have syndicated advertising served with their mobile content and services, and presumably deliver some of the revenue back to them, while AOL and its partners keep a slice. Publishers will be able to select the ad formats they want to have run, such as display, sponsored links, video or in-game placements.
The Yahoo Mobile Content Engine will enable publishers to bring their content to Yahoo’s mobile audience. It will also help enable publishers who do not have a mobile site or only have a limited mobile offering to quickly distribute their content to consumers on their mobile phones.
The Yahoo Mobile Media Directory will allow publishers to make their mobile media content accessible directly through the new Yahoo oneSearch (see separate story).
Yahoo Mobile Publisher Services is now live across 19 countries, including Argentina, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Indonesia, India, Ireland, Italy, Malaysia, Mexico, Philippines, Singapore, Spain, Taiwan, Thailand, UK, US and Vietnam.