Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL are joining forces in an online advertising attack on Google and Facebook.
The alliance, announced Tuesday, is designed to sell some of the less-prized ad space that Microsoft Corp., Yahoo Inc. and AOL Inc. have had trouble filling on their own.
Even as they share some resources, the three companies vowed to retain their independence and compete against each other with separate sales teams. For that reason, they said they don’t expect U.S. antitrust regulators to object to the nonexclusive partnership before they begin selling ads together in January.
Ross Levinsohn, a Yahoo executive vice president, hailed the alliance as a “fundamental rethinking” of the Internet ad market.
That statement also could be interpreted as a bit of wishful thinking. Microsoft, Yahoo and AOL all need to change the direction of an online ad market that has been increasingly tilting in the direction of Google and Facebook.
Having already built a moneymaking machine in its dominant search engine, Google has become even more powerful in Internet marketing since it bought DoubleClick’s ad service for $3.2 billion in 2008. That deal provided Google with a springboard to leap from text ads that appear next to search results into the graphical messages known as display advertising.
Facebook attracts more advertising as it becomes established as the Internet’s most popular hangout. The company accumulates valuable insights into people’s interests as its 800 million users share their passions.
