Yahoo and Microsoft announced their alliance. How does that work? Or does it not work? We do not know yet. It remains to be seen. They needed to first obtain approval, due to monopoly concerns. I am not stating there should be a concern, just that there was. As they stated:

“Microsoft® and Yahoo! have now received regulatory clearance to form the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance in the United States and European Union.”

How the Alliance Effects You
In a nutshell, get used to the logo at the right. While there is an “alliance” you will be using the Microsoft ad platform. There is Yahoo transition information and Microsoft transition information. You can find it all here on a neutral Search Alliance site. It may not be a fast transition however they state to have it completed by the 2010 holiday season but are not promising anything.

Who Will You Interact With?
What they decided to do was split up the responsibilities between both organizations. Yahoo will support what they call the high volume advertisers. Those that spend quite a bit, the agencies and resellers. Microsoft will support the self service advertisers and they will use the Microsoft adCenter.

Benefits
By merging these two ad platforms they will have a greater reach. They state that there will be a reach of up to 150 million searchers. Through the combination of both ad platforms there will be approximately 62% more search volume than on Yahoo! alone. Now for those that are currently advertising on both platforms you will only need to now log into one.