the PPC Book|Pay Per Click Blog | Long Tail Thoughts in a Short Tail World

Overture Inventory Tool Going Away -

I just got off the phone with my Yahoo rep, and while he was handling something else for me, I asked him outright if the Inventory Tool was going away permanently. His response was that if the external tool doesn’t go away completely, it would probably be changed to a tool that doesn’t show exact search volume, but rather a bar graph style volume ‘indicator’. Ala the Adwords Estimator (my words not his).

He also noted you can get the search volume information from inside your Panama account. Obviously this is a strategic move by Yahoo, basically, you’re encouraging people to open a Yahoo account in order to have access to their ‘premium’ keyword tools. On the otherhand, you’re possibly discouraging people from ever coming to visit ‘yahoo search’ by ridding yourselves of the only external search advantage that you had over the Big Gorilla. Maybe a better move would be to host a trimmed down version of the inventory tool at a domain like estimates.yahoo.com, and integrate the new tool with panama marketing and branding, and hey, here’s an idea- A direct link to sign up and create a Yahoo Panama account!? Ah, what do I know, I’m just an advertiser…

Honestly, Google Adwords estimator has been my tool of choice for some time, mostly due to the ease of exporting the data into excel format. Overture was always a pain with cutting and pasting, not to mention the dubious accuracy of that data in the first place. Researching a keyword niche with volume indicators instead of exact query data is like looking at a clock without numbers on it. If you’ve done it long enough, you just kind of know what time it is, and looking at the hands on the clock tell you all that you need to know.

Here are some other tools to help in your keyword research:

Larry’s Little Keyword Tool

Larry’s Little Keyword Tool - With Cost Estimates

Dependency-based Word Similarity

MSN - Not great but getting better

Keyword Combinations 1.06- Got your root terms and modifiers? Now mix and match

Quintara - For those who like to ’see’ things.

And my absolute all time favorite keyword site, still free after all these years

5minutesite.com

***EDIT

And props to keyworddiscovery.com for not falling asleep at the wheel. Check out their new PPC ad:

Inventory Tool Gone
Get The Top Rated Keyword Inventory
Tool Now. Best Overture Replacement
www.KeywordDiscovery.com

This blog is new to me, but I’m a big fan of ‘minnesoda’, so I’m glad that Marty from Minnesota took a hard look at Yahoo Panama and called out their geo-targeting quirks.

According to Yahoo “Duluth Hotel” can show up anywhere in the country when someone searches for it regardless of any campaign geo-targeting. It also would display for searches for “hotel + zip code.” The only true IP targeting being offered in Panama is for keywords which do not actually include a geographic prefix or suffix. “Hotel,” geo-restricted to Florida would only be displayed in Florida. “Florida Hotel” (if it displays at all) is be shown anywhere the phrase is queried on Panama regardless of any geo-targeting of the search.

I’ve been very hard on the folks at Yahoo, and deservedly so, most of the time. I do have to admit, however, that after finally digging into the Panama platform and using it extensively for the past few weeks, I’m finding that it’s actually easier to use, in some cases, than Adwords.

The funny thing is that I’ve been avoiding using Yahoo like the plague since late 2005, when I had just had enough of it. But recently some of my clients were demanding some Yahoo love, so I was forced into action. To my suprise, once you get used to the new interface it’s in some ways faster for me to build ads and manage campaigns (not counting adwords editor).

Here’s what I like:

It’s fast, from page to page, compared to Adwords.

The ability to see performance over time with the graph view, without having to run a report. (I’ve said it before, I’m a graph person, pictures don’t lie)

The find keywords tool is really easy to use

The campaign settings are organized in a simple manner (tactic setting, geo targeting, etc)

The dashboard that tells you all the important information. Right there in front of me I know when I ran out of budget, when my credit card was charged, my CPA over the last 7 days, etc etc. That’s it, really simple and useful information right in front of me when I log in.

So, in short, Yahoo Panama is worth another look. Give it a few days to get used to the system, and I’m sure you’ll feel the same way I do.

So be nice to your little brother. He may just help you out.