For the past few months, the Huffington Post has been on a bit of a tear–both in terms of traffic gains and in its hiring of some big talent for key positions.

Now, those execs are focusing on using that consumer momentum to achieve what has eluded the Huffington Post thus far: Making some serious bank from the privately held news and media site.

Here’s a chat I had with new President and Chief Revenue Officer Greg Coleman about how he is aiming to do just that.

Read More »

One word: Shameful.

So, no surprise that Yahoo, which is trying mightily to burnish its image worldwide, quickly apologized for the presence of lap dancers onstage at its Open Hack Day in Taiwan last weekend.

Top Yahoo execs were at the hack event, although it’s not clear if they attended the lap-dancing part of the program, which seems to have a history of this sort of Pussycat-Dolls-meets-geeks tone.

Read More »

In a shift that is sure to be much commented on by the advertising industry, Yahoo has tapped Goodby, Silverstein & Partners to take the lead for its creative, advertising, digital marketing and strategic planning efforts.

The San Francisco-based Goodby, which is owned by the Omnicom Group, is known for innovative ideas and has done such memorable campaigns as the terrific “Got Milk?” campaign.

Perhaps a “Got Yahoo?” campaign is in the future?

Until now, the top job of goosing Yahoo’s tarnished brand, as part of a recently launched $100 million marketing push, has been helmed by Ogilvy & Mather.

Read More »

Perhaps the sides in the ever-escalating war over the Skype deal will work out their differences and settle–which is what should and probably will eventually happen after everyone realizes how stupid all this noisy legal wrangling over the Internet telephony giant is.

But that day is decidedly not today, given a pair of recent big-gun PR hires by parties involved.

Read More »

In one week, Yahoo will report its third-quarter earnings, after the market closes.

And so far, its stock is showing signs that investors are hoping for better days ahead for the Internet giant.

Other good news: A pair of bullish analyst reports yesterday.

But, a spate of executive departures, with chances of more to come, are worrisome.

As is the excessive yodeling Yahoo is once again encouraging.

Read More »

According to the latest data from comScore, which are the most widely regarded by Wall Street, Bing has not lost market share in the U.S., as some recent reports had suggested.

The September report, which was released to clients today, shows small gains for the Microsoft search service and for Google, while Yahoo lost some share.

Read More »

Yesterday, BoomTown wrote about the status of the regulatory investigation for the Microsoft-Yahoo search and online advertising pact, which most expect to get approved.

One of the few vocal critics of the deal, though, is Jeffrey Chester, the executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, a public interest group, who lobbed MicroHoo some important questions.

Here are the answers.

Read More »

For a long time now, it has been Microsoft constantly raiding the Yahoo talent pool, as one top tech exec after another has left its Sunnyvale, Calif., HQ to join the Redmond, Wash.-based software giant.

Well, turnabout is fair play for Yahoo, as it nabs a top Microsoft ad exec.

Read More »

Is there gold in them thar tweets?

Maybe so, because–according to sources familiar with the situation–Twitter is in advanced talks with Microsoft and Google separately about striking data-mining deals, in which the companies would license a full feed from the microblogging service that could then be integrated into the results of their competing search engines.

Sources said a number of scenarios are being discussed to compensate Twitter for its huge and potentially valuable trove of real-time and content-sharing information, generated from the data stream of billions of tweets from its 54 million monthly users.

Read More »

Unlike the gripping back and forth of the fight over Yahoogle last year, the approval process for the search and online advertising partnership of Microsoft and Yahoo is chugging along slowly but surely as the Justice Department has deepened its investigation by reaching out to a broad range of publishers, advertisers, public interest groups and rivals for comment recently.

But, so far, there is still no significant external challenge to the MicroHoo deal, even from Google, the likeliest company to try to scuttle or, at the very least, slow down the deal.

In other words: Zzzzzzzzzzz…

Read More »

In a week, the entire advertising sales staff of MySpace will gather at a swanky new seaside resort about 20 miles south of Los Angeles to get a first glimpse of the fresh direction the company is preparing to take under its new management.

The beleaguered social networking site has been in the midst of an effort to reinvigorate its image, spur innovation in its product and–most of all–pull itself out of a too-long slump, even as longtime rival Facebook has seen explosive growth.

On the possible agenda: A new strategy aimed at music and entertainment; a new look; and, perhaps, a new boss for the ad sales team.

Read More »

Maggie Wilderotter, a Yahoo director who was once under consideration to be its CEO, has told the company she intends to resign from the board at the end of the year.

She has served on the Yahoo board since mid-2007, during its most tumultuous period ever.

Wilderotter is CEO of Frontier Communications, a large telecom services company. Her departure means Yahoo will only have one women on the board–CEO Carol Bartz.

Read More »

According to sources close to the situation, AOL has been busy selecting the board for the company, which is still set to spin itself off by year’s end–even as it slows down a decision on a new search deal with either current partner Google or a more emboldened Microsoft.

AOL is using Spencer Stuart in the search for directors, led by well-known headhunter Jim Citrin, sources said, and the company has already settled on several outside candidates.

Read More »

Here is a video interview I did today with AOL CEO Tim Armstrong in Germany–really!–where we both were appearing at a digital marketing conference.

In it, the former Google exec talks about a range of things, including the possibility of charging for content, innovating in the graphical advertising market, competition with Yahoo and the upcoming spinoff of the Time Warner unit.

But what he did not say is just as interesting.

Read More »

Yahoo introduced its new $100 million marketing and branding campaign in New York today with “It’s Y!ou” as the new motto, making use of the Internet giant’s famous exclamation point and aimed at its customers.

Sure, it’s clever and all, but All Things Digital has come up with a much better advertising idea focused on Yahoo CEO Carol Bartz, a sassy and ofttimes salty exec whose pugnacious utterances have become legend quickly.

Read More »