An upgrade to Yahoo's systems this past weekend has been causing problems for its advertisers throughout the week, Yahoo and search marketers told DM News.
The problems have not affected the display of ads, said Kristen Wareham, Yahoo spokeswoman.
“Yahoo Search Marketing initiated a systems upgrade … to lay the groundwork for performance and availability improvements that our advertisers will see over the coming months,” the Wareham said. “During this process, we encountered some unexpected issues that affected advertisers' ability to access their accounts.”
On Wednesday, many advertisers were not able to access the Yahoo interface, where they make updates and changes to campaigns and keywords.
On Thursday, the problems seemed to be less severe, with some advertisers seeing only delays in their keyword bid updates.
“I think the impact was quite minimal,” said Danielle Leitch, vice president of marketing and analytics for search marketing and optimization firm MoreVisibility, Boca Raton, FL.
While smaller advertisers were likely frustrated with not being able to access their accounts, Yahoo provides good support for advertisers, Leitch added.
Yahoo is “working round-the-clock” to solve the problem, according to the Yahoo spokesperson. “Our number one priority right now is to restore service for our advertisers.”
Christine Blank covers online marketing and advertising, including e-mail marketing and paid search, for DM News and DMNews.com. To keep up with the latest developments in these areas, subscribe to our daily and weekly e-mail newsletters by visiting www.dmnews.com/newsletters
