Yahoo Search Marketing revs engine, jumps shark

Jumping the Shark is a term used to describe television shows that are:

typically deemed to have passed their peak, since they have undergone too many changes to retain their original appeal, and after this point critical fans often sense a noticeable decline in the show’s quality.

More specifically,

Jump-the-shark moments may be scenes like the one described above (Happy Days character Arthur “Fonzie” Fonzarelli jumps over a shark) that finally convince viewers that the show has fundamentally and permanently strayed from its original premise. In those cases they are viewed as a desperate and futile attempt to keep a series fresh in the face of declining ratings

The term can apply to anything that has changed to the point of being, in a sense, of rapidly declining value and utility. As of today, I think that Yahoo Search Marketing’s editorial processes may have ‘jumped the shark’.

This afternoon, I was quite suprised to learn that a Paid Search campaign on YSM had been deactivated, so I immediately logged in to find out why. The campaign-in-question is for our Trademark Monitoring and Protection service. Interestingly, Yahoo Search Marketing seems to believe such a product or service is “unacceptable”.

Now, there are a lot of very smart people working at Yahoo, so, I considered that, perhaps, what they were saying was that a trademark monitoring and protection service was not “unacceptable”, but was just invalid or unnecessary. So, I did a little investigating to see if that was actually the case.

It would seem that might be the case. Yahoo is certainly doing a bang-up job monitoring and enforcing infringement of their own trademarks. Not a single Paid Search ad to be found under the keyword “yahoo”.

Then there is Tiffany, the company which just lost a trademark infringement lawsuit against eBay. Mmmm… lots of ads under the keyword “tiffany”…

And there’s Apple, a company very protective of their trademarks. Lots of ads under keyword “apple” as well. Something does not seem right…

Not just Apple, but Apple’s flagship iPhone product. Again, lots of ads under keyword ‘iphone’.

So, clearly, a trademark monitoring and protection service is not invalid or unnecessary. Perhaps Yahoo was being clear in their message and a trademark monitoring and protection service is unacceptable to them. I must admit that I find this a little odd, especially considering how well they protect their own trademarks. With that in mind, I decided to dig and find out just what kind of services and products are acceptable to Yahoo Search Marketing.

Porn is an acceptable product or service. And, it is available by the ton, and free too!

So is making explosives. Beauty products and the making of explosives, together at least. Apparently, you can get all your personal care and explosive needs taken care of at shopping.yahoo.com. One-stop-shopping, indeed. Blow things up and look good doing it.

The Terrorist Handbook is a solid product or service, fully acceptable to YSM. Finally, the answers to the question of what to do with all of your left over explosives! Now, if we could only find something to do with those beauty products…

Holy smoke, even slaves are an acceptable product or service at Yahoo Search Marketing! I don’t know about the Target stores near you, but I haven’t seen human beings for sale at the one close to me.

The major search engines do little to be an ally in combating trademark infringement and abuse occurring across their properties. Yahoo Search Marketing has taken that to the next-level… they’ve jumped-the-shark.