Yahoo! hires Google’s Mayer to provide “focus” and “stability”
Earlier today Marissa Mayer was announced as the new CEO and president of Yahoo!, bringing the 37-year-old’s 13 years of service with Google to an end.
Yahoo!, which has had five chief executives in as many years, has struggled to attract advertisers in recent times despite boasting 700 million users.
Planning to work through maternity leave, Mayer will be looking to attract revenue away from Facebook and Google.
Both have firmly established their dominance over Yahoo, comprising 16.8% and 16.5% respectively of the display ad market, compared to Yahoo!’s 9.1%.
In a statement to the media, Mayer said: “I am honored and delighted to lead Yahoo, one of the internet’s premier destinations for more than 700 million users.
“I look forward to working with the company’s dedicated employees to bring innovative products, content, and personalised experiences to users and advertisers all around the world.
“Yahoo!’s products will continue to enhance our partnerships with advertisers, technology and media companies, while inspiring and delighting our users. There is a lot to do and I can’t wait to get started.”
Having achieved significant success with Google as the company’s first female engineer – Mayer was heavily involved in developing the aesthetics of the company’s ubiquitous search engine and formed part of a three-person team behind Google AdWords – the biggest challenge will be to forge a vision for Yahoo!.
Chris Sacca, a former Google employee said: “She had a very instrumental role in creating the most powerful monetisation engine in the history of the internet.
“I remember her ship as being the tightest run as well as the most rewarding for the members of her team.”
Sacca added that Yahoo! employees “need a vision to rally around”, stating that Mayer could be the one to provide this.
The company’s Q2 financial figures are due at 5pm this afternoon (17 July), and it is expected that the appointment will be a welcome boost when the statistics are released.
Future challenges
With rivals Facebook and Google having thoroughly wrestled the initiative from Yahoo!, embracing social networking and providing a search engine framework, neither of which Yahoo has done, Meyer faces several challenges in regaining the company’s former prominence.
One of these is the user experience, which Mayer acknowledged as a key priority: “My focus at Google has been to deliver great end user experiences, to delight and inspire our end users.
“That is what I plan to do at Yahoo!, give the end user something valuable and delightful that makes them want to come to Yahoo every day.”
However, the recent turmoil experienced by the company could, and has, proved to be an impediment. Former chief executive Scott Thompson was forced to resign for allegedly exaggerating academic achievements on his CV.
Yahoo!’s interface, compared to that which Mayer helped forge at Google, for instance, has been branded “cluttered and chaotic” by the New York Times – the newspaper also described Yahoo! as suffering an “identity crisis” and struggling to “stay relevant”.
The BBC added that Yahoo!, unlike Facebook and Google, had taken a “scattergun approach to development” and that it has been “eclipsed by its rivals”.
It remains to be seen what the latest financial figures will reveal; however, for a company that has seen its share price decline by 41% over the past half decade and year-on-year revenue fall by 15%, the time for focus is most certainly now.