id search engine — based on keywords submitted by users during their Internet search. The system can also submit keywords in direct response to keywords submitted by Internet users. Yet compared with advertising practices in other media, the advertiser only pays Yahoo when the ad has been clicked on.
“Since 2005, sponsored searches in the United States and Korea have been steadily increasing,” said Hung Hsiao-ling, general manager of Yahoo Taiwan. “In 2007, sponsored searches constituted 43 percent of all searches in the U.S., and 62 percent in Korea.”
On the Taiwan market, however, paid searches amounted to 36 percent in 2007 from 27 percent in 2006, according to Yahoo Taiwan.
“More than 1.2 million small- and medium-size enterprises will have room to develop in the future,” said Hung.
Yahoo North America, England, Japan and Korea upgraded to the new system in recent years. Today, Yahoo Taiwan is also upgrading its sponsored search engine, just before Yahoo Singapore, Hong Kong and China.
In the upgraded version of the search system, Yahoo proposes three main characteristics. First, in just a few steps, companies can establish a search account online that targets certain consumers, chooses keywords related to the business, sets a budget limit and creates and reviews ads.
Meanwhile, Yahoo has set up an online management system for keywords, which allows clients to check in real-time the advertisement’s results. The system can also suggest improvements.
Finally, Yahoo lets the companies decide how much money they are willing to spend, as the search engine only bills a client once a consumer has clicked on the Internet ad. Yahoo said the system is click-fraud protected.
“The new system allows us to know the keywords Internet users search for,” said Lin Kun-cheng, general manager of Pay Easy. “We can then evaluate what users want and proactively suggest our products to them.”
