Yahoo Marketing's New System...flaws in transfer

I just "previewed" my new site and was disappointed as I expected I'd be. There are many flaws in the transfer of ads from the old to new system, in particular where they attempt to cluster more than one word into an ad group.

I'm wondering if anyone who may have ran into a similar problem found that Yahoo was willing to fix the problems prior to your activating the new system. I just wrote them but sometimes they take a day or so to get back so I thought I'd scout out how others have found their level of helpfulness to correct problems before activation of the new system. Thanks.

I suspect they give you seven days to preview it in order to do that. The only account I've had migrated so far had little in it and I edited some ad titles that didn't transition properly. I'll know more when other accounts transition.

Did you volunteer to get on the new system early or are they already migrating accounts for those who didn't? Did you review the Yahoo Account Migration Process Information?

Thank you for the information, including the link to the YAMPI

I signed up for early migration and Dec. 8th was the first day to do so. Apparently I can preview it til Jan 5th, 2007 which is the date listed in my account upon which I will switch over automatically to the new system if I don't activate the new account prior to then.

One question that occurs to me is whether or not once you're in the new system, do the changes you make appear instantly?

If I could fix things immediately, I'd be more likely to switch over. I'm used to submissions taking up to 3 days under the old system...but if it's instantaneous implementation as I believe they've promoted, that'd be great.

Can you not make changes now in the preview version so they're already done when you switch over?

Thanks for your reply. Unfortunately the PREVIEW option is "Read Only".

Therefore, I'm wondering if it's possible to make immediate changes (changes that appear online immediately) instead of requiring editorial review which may take a day or two...or three.

Any idea if the new system, once active, allows for immediate changes? Thanks.

There is a function within the new interface to convert third part campaigns to Yahoo ones.

Does this work for Google?

I have tried creating a report from Google to the format that is recommended by Yahoo, but when I try and import it I just keep getting errors.

Does anyone know the layout of the report that will work with Yahoo as all the ones I have tried don't seem to work.

Cheers.

I spoke with Yahoo and it seems that the preview is read only and no changes can be made until you actually go live on the new system.

It appears to me that keywords and ads don't actually run immediately if they are high traffic and show as pending. It looks like they run after they get approved but not before while the low traffic keywords will run right away.

You can import Google ads to use at Yahoo; however, as you've found out it can be challenging to get that to work. Ideally you may be able to put the Google ad text into the short ad version when you import them and then later write longer ads, add longer titles, and add Google Analytics tracking if desired.

Some Google ads may be slightly too long to fit in the short ad and that might generate errors.

I have sussed out how to do this now.

It's best doing it from Adwords Editor as the output file is formatted correctly for Yahoo.

It isn't straight forward by any stretch of the imagination, it's taken me all day to do the first campaign but the rest should be quite straight forward in comparison.

When I do the next batch it'll write a little read me file to help any others out.

Regards

I used Adwords Editor to generate the output file. Because this particular account qualifies for Gold status Yahoo put the ads into their system for me. Here are some details others may want to know.

The conversion process had some difficulty figuring out what to do with the data. I ended up with some Ad Groups with no keywords, others with no ads, and sometimes an Ad Group with nothing in it (neither keywords or ads). I'll have to check to see if it imported multiple ads from any Google Ad Group or only one.

Something else to be aware of is that Yahoo's system will automatically delete any keyword phrases that had no searches for some period of time. The Rep I asked wasn't sure if that was the last 30 days or the last 90. So you may want to add some keyword phrases that show traffic and conversions from Google in manually.

If you write a help file please do post the information or you can send it to me if you prefer. That way your file can help other advertisers figure out how to import ads.