One of the most anticipated session at this years TechCrunch Disrupt New York was Michael Arrington’s Fireside Chat with Marissa Mayer. Mayer, as you undoubtedly know, is the CEO and President of Yahoo!, and it did not disappoint. The chat covered a large amount of topics, ranging from Yahoo’s mobile offerings, to development, to Tumblr. Overall, this was one of the best sessions of TC Disrupt NY.
Yahoo: Media or Tech Company?
Yahoo’s scope is so massive that it is hard to tell what it is that they actually do, or what they call their service. The company operates in so many different verticals that it is hard to fit them into any one category. Yahoo’s CrunchBase profile speaks to this:
The Company’s offerings to users fall into five categories: Front Doors; Search; Communications and Communities; Media, and Connected Life.
Though ultimately, Mayer argued, it doesn’t matter what you call Yahoo!. The company is user driven. The goal is to build beautiful products that people love and interact with. Yahoo, Mayer argued, is about facilitating the Worlds’ digital daily habits, be it news, email, weather, sports, or whatever.
Yahoo! Now Vs. The Yahoo! Mayer Took Over
The Yahoo! that Mayer took over was a struggling, outdated giant looking for its place in the world. The question above – Yahoo: Media or Tech Company? – seemed to be eating the company. The was a very real lack of mission, and only a vague focus on where Yahoo was going. This is displayed by a lot of the anecdotal stores Mayer went into.
Mayer described a conversation she had with a Yahoo! team member in one of her first days as CEO. In talking with the employee, Mayer learned he was a mobile developer. She was excited to learn that Yahoo! had a mobile team, only to find out that mobile dev team was only around 60 members strong. Further, of these 60 developers, the great majority were embedded in other teams. In her first days, Mayer noted, mobile was more of a hobby for Yahoo developers. Everyone did a little bit of mobile, but it was no ones job.
Now, however, Yahoo! has made mobile a major focus. Now, Mayer noted, Yahoo! has some 500+ mobile developer on staff. Further, Mayer pointed out that Yahoo! is doubling in just about every single mobile metric. A lot of this growth, Mayer continued, has to do with the nature of mobile use. If you look at the major use cases for mobile – news, photo-sharing, email, and weather among others – Yahoo! does, all of these things, and has been doing them for a long time.
Mayer’s tenure as CEO were not without mistakes. Of these mistakes, Mayer was asked by Arrington about the most recent and most public. In January of this year, then Yahoo! COO Henrique De Castro was removed from that position – and received a severance package totaling around $58M. Though Mayer would not get into much detail about the firing, she did note that De Castro was not a fit. “There were a lot of issues when I got here,” Mayer noted, “I created a couple of them.”
Tumblr
Arrington asked whether Yahoo’s $1.1 billion acquisition of Tumblr seems like an over-pay in hindsight. Mayer replied that she is incredibly happy with the deal and it was not an overpay at all. Tumblr is making incredible strides in both usage and monetization. There are some fundamental characteristics in Tumblr that give the platform a huge advantage over similar offerings. As far as monetization and sponsored content, there are some incredible statistics for Tumblr .According to Mayer, “More than 58% of Tumblr users engage with sponsored content, and 48% actually share it.” Arrington went on to ask about Tumblr’s app, which segued into a whole new topic.
Mobile and The Future of Yahoo!
Arrington asked how it was possible that the Tumblr app is not in the top 100 on any app store, and how Yahoo doesn’t have a single app in the top 100. This prompt led to an insightful exchange about Yahoo’s future. Mayer acknowledged that Tumblr, and Yahoo as a whole, was late to the mobile market. That said, Mayer noted that mobile is now the top priority of Yahoo.
Over the past year, Mayer noted, Yahoo has begun investing heavily into mobile. This focus is already paying off. Yahoo now has somewhere in the ball park of 400 million + monthly mobile users. Further, Mayer noted that in the next year or so, Yahoo will have more mobile users than desktop users.
Though it is clear that Yahoo still has a lot of work to do, the company now has a clear vision for itself. Although Yahoo was late getting to mobile, a renewed focus and commitment has the company poised to make a huge impact in the next several years.
