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If Yahoo has its way, it’ll soon be the place to go for information about movies, TV shows, and the celebrities who star in them.  Yahoo announced several upgrades to its search engine this morning, and they’re all meant to make entertainment-related queries turn up much better results.

A Yahoo representative told WebProNews, "Today Yahoo! Search is unveiling new ways for people to explore information on their favorite celebs and TV shows by providing the most comprehensive and up to the moment entertainment news and content.  With Yahoo! Search’s celebrity shortcuts, people can see news, photos, movies and even the celebrity’s official tweets right on the search results page."

What’s more, "Yahoo! is also introducing a TV shortcut so people can search for their favorite TV shows and see videos, episode lists, schedules and ratings from Yahoo! TV."  And "we are launching new celebrity-related suggestions on the left-side of the Yahoo! Search results page for entertainment queries, with links to results for related people, movies, etc."

You can see an example of how this all comes together below.  The results page packs in a whole lot of information, but still manages to not look overly cluttered or messy. 

Yahoo appears to have leapfrogged well ahead of Google and Bing with these upgrades.

A Google exec recently said, "In three years’ time, desktops will be irrelevant." That’s debatable, but there’s no question that mobile use will have grown much more than it already has. Based on comments in a recent keynote, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer doesn’t seem to think PC use is going to drop too much, but he did say, "Mobile queries are just going to keep going up and up and up."

Do you think desktops will be irrelevant in 3 years? Share your thoughts here.

A study released last month found that the number of mobile phone subscribers is on track to increase from 4.6 billion to 5 billion globally by the end of 2010. Another study found that consumers are getting more comfortable with mobile shopping.

Mobile Search

Google has dominated the search market for a long time, and while this still continues to be the case, it’s important to note that search in general changes with mobile. People are searching in different ways than just using their favorite search engines. They’re using different apps. They’re using their voices. They’re scanning barcodes for instant access to product information. The number of ways people are finding information with their phones is only going to keep increasing. On mobile, it’s not just about Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

That’s not to say these three aren’t still incredibly important to mobile. In fact, the search share among these top search engines may even become more greatly divided as time goes on. We’re seeing different mobile carriers and manufacturers making deals with these companies, which affect the default search options for various devices. As we discussed before, mobile search engine use may be largely dictated by device popularity, which is (in my opinion) one of the biggest things Bing will have going in its favor in terms of market share – Microsoft’s new Windows Phone 7 phones will come with Bing hardware keys, meaning the most convenient way to search on these devices will likely be to hit a single button taking the user to Bing. If these devices become popular, it could be huge for Microsoft in search.

As far as Google indexing and mobile sites goes, Google’s Matt Cutts says, "If you can find a way where your existing site will work well in mobile browsers, we’re not worrying about supporting two completely different sites."

To learn about this subject in more detail, read the Google Webmaster Central Blog posts: Help Google Index Your Mobile Site, and Running Desktop and Mobile Versions of Your Site.

Mobile Search Advertising

When it comes to AdWords, Google says to create separate, mobile-focused campaigns so you can optimize keywords, ad text, and landing pages for people using mobile devices. Google shared an interesting case study this week looking at Razorfish’s mobile AdWords approach. They shared the following details:

- The Razorfish team started by duplicating the existing desktop campaigns and switching the settings to target mobile devices with full internet browsers.

- Since their client had a well-known brand name, they focused on branded keyword terms with enough traffic to help them learn quickly about what was working best for their campaigns.

- To measure performance, they tracked several conversion metrics including whether a mobile user looked up the brick and mortar store location or downloaded a coupon from the website. Right away, they saw a 7.5% lower cost per conversion on mobile devices, encouraging them to test ways to optimize their mobile campaigns.

- Razorfish tested whether variations in the campaign’s landing page would affect conversion rates. The team hypothesized that mobile users might be looking to take a specific action, and by starting the user’s experience closer to that action, the client would see better results. As it turned out, for this client, they saw much higher conversion rates when the user was directed to a landing page that showed nearby store locations.

- Finally, they tested variations in the ad text. Four versions of ad text were tested, including the original copy used in desktop campaigns. Each of the three new versions provided over 9.3% lift in conversion rate over the strongest performing copy in their desktop campaigns.

When it comes to Yahoo and Microsoft search advertising, things are about to get more appealing here in general, and presumably, that includes mobile. Microsoft and Yahoo advertisers will have the audiences of both search engines to view ads once Yahoo and Bing get their integration done.

Wrapping Up

One of the most important things any search marketer can do with regards to a mobile strategy, is to simply keep up with the latest mobile trends and innovations. This space is rapidly evolving, and new apps are released frequently. Pay attention to hot apps, and how your target audience is engaging with them. What devices, operating systems, and browsers are hot? Monitor studies and surveys that delve into demographics. Try to stay ahead of the curve.

Do you have a mobile search strategy? What suggestions do you have for improving in this area? Comment.

Motorola has announced a "global" alliance with Microsoft, which will see Bing used as the default search engine on Motorola Android-based devices. The move begins in China, where obviously there is some turmoil between Google and that country, but again, this is being called a "global" alliance that is "launching" in China.

Motorola says that users will get a pre-loaded Bing bookmark on their mobile browser, and an enhanced search widget with Bing integration, though users will be able to customize their devices and select their own search provider.

"We believe that consumer choice is one of the most critical components to ensuring a rich and seamless client experience," said Christy Wyatt, corporate vice president of software and services, Motorola Mobile Devices. "Motorola and Microsoft have enjoyed a longstanding collaboration and the addition of Bing services to our Android-based smartphones in China is another important step in empowering our end-users."

"Mobile devices continue to be a critical place for customers to access location-based services such as local search and mapping," said Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of the Online Services Division at Microsoft. "We are pleased to expand our long-standing relationship with Motorola to bring powerful Bing location-based services to Motorola’s innovative new mobile devices, providing consumers with more choice and flexibility in mobile search."

This is the second time in about a week Motorola has made news by offering non-Google search options on its Android-based devices. The recently launched Motorola Backflip comes with Yahoo.

Bing search and maps will be available on Motorola Android-based devices in Q1 2010 in China. No other expansion of this has been announced, but the phrase "global alliance" certainly leaves room for speculation.

With the 2010 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament starting next week (March 16), it’s no surprise the majority (83%) of fans will watch coverage on television, while 44 percent will go online and 10 percent will use a mobile device, according to a new survey by Unicast.

Among those planning to follow the tournament online or on a mobile device, a majority will visit ESPN.com (69%). Other branded popular sports sites fans plan to visit include Yahoo Sports (42%), Fox (24%), CBS (29%), and AOL (17%).

More than a quarter of fans following the tournament (26%) will visit NCAA.com, while 17 percent will type in the URL for their favorite team.

Fans will also gather information on the tournament via search engines (22%), social networks (18%), or newspaper/magazine sites (20%).

"On the heels of the extensive online coverage of the Winter Olympics in Vancouver, the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament offers online publishers another premium sporting event that will generate high traffic from consumers looking to follow the tournament outside their living rooms," said Bryan Hjelm, VP of Marketing for Unicast.

"Digital innovations like iPhone apps, online bracket tools and streaming video are bringing basketball fever to a growing online audience of fans.

"Sites like ESPN.com and Yahoo! Sports will dominate traffic due to their inherent sports fan user base, which make them prime real estate this month for marketers targeting the typical visitor – men aged 18 to 35."

The most popular online activities for those following March Madness include:

        *58%    Monitor scores
        *54%    Watch games live
        *53%    Check the status of brackets
        *49%    Watch game highlights
        *42%    Fill out brackets/participate in a pool

Yahoo’s line of thinking with regards to the big Microsoft/Yahoo search and advertising deal is that it will benefit both Microsoft and Yahoo’s advertisers, as well as consumers and publishers.

It will benefit advertisers because it will increase search volume, with results from both Bing and Yahoo being taken into consideration. It will benefit consumers because by combining advertisers from both properties, there will be a greater pool to deliver sponsored results from, which Yahoo says will mean increased relevance. It will benefit Yahoo, Bing, and their publisher partners with increased liquidity, participation, and relevance. That is basically the sum of it, according to Yahoo Vice President of Search Advertising David Pann.

WebProNews recently sat down with Pann and discussed these things and how the deal will affect advertisers.

According to Pann, the migration across all international markets will occur over the next 24 months or so, but they will not rush it at the expense of quality, they say. "Our focus is really about developing a plan that is smooth, seamless, and with quality. So we anticipate doing the U.S. migration sometime before the holiday season in 2010," says Pann.

In the above interview, Pann goes on to talk about how things will be split between Yahoo and Microsoft. He also addresses some privacy concerns, related to data sharing between the two companies.

WebProNews also interviewed Yahoo Sr. VP of Search Products Shashi Seth and Director of Search Marketing David Roth, both of whom talked about the deal in more detail. You can catch both of those interviews, as well as a recent keynote from SMX West where the deal was also discussed, here.

Although this turned out to be a pretty "meh" day for the stock market as a whole – the Dow and S&P 500 slipped a little bit, while the Nasdaq didn’t gain much – Yahoo investors should be feeling pleased.  Yahoo’s stock rose by a significant amount as an analyst rated it "market outperform," up from "market perform."

Sameet Sinha of JMP Securities is the man who’s responsible for making that change, and he attributed the move to Yahoo’s relationship with Microsoft.  Sinha indicated that other experts will come to think better of the company, too, as additional financial models incorporate the deal.

Then here’s another, more concrete, detail: Sinha set a price target of $21.  Since Yahoo’s stock hasn’t been that high since July of 2008, that would be a significant level.

As for the current price of Yahoo’s stock, it’s been very much on the move.  It rose 2.86 percent during the trading day, taking it from $16.06 to $16.52.

Again, then, this was a good day for Yahoo’s shareholders.  Google’s shareholders lost a small amount of money, meanwhile (its stock decreased 0.31 percent), and Microsoft’s shareholders made an even smaller amount (its stock rose 0.15 percent).

Yahoo’s approach to the mobile market is about to change in a very noticeable way.  Indeed, Yahoo’s mobile division will more or less cease to exist as a separate entity, with mobile becoming something of a company-wide concern.

One important note: no layoffs have been announced.  "We are infusing mobile throughout the organization, rather than having a specific team for mobile," Cory Pforzheimer, Yahoo’s senior manager of corporate communications, explained to Tricia Duryee.  "Mobile is top of mind for everyone, and it’s part of regional teams, business teams, product teams."

Obviously, this is a significant change, and it’s one of several that have occurred in recent weeks.  Yahoo’s introduced a dedicated mobile blog, released a new Social Pulse feature, and seen a mobile exec depart all in the last month or so.

It’s possible the dissolution of Yahoo’s mobile division isn’t the last step in this process, either.  Pforzheimer told Duryee, "The importance of mobile in Yahoo has increased and we are re-aligning the organization to do just that."

Meanwhile, a completely unrelated thing that’s also gotten the mobile world all excited is the first iPad commercial, which aired during the Oscars.

UPDATE: Pforzheimer provided an extra bit of information in an email to WebPronews, adding, "Yahoo! seeks to be the center of people’s online lives. We have more tightly integrated our mobile business into the company’s DNA as we create the best possible user experiences for our consumers and partners regardless of device or access point. As the adoption of Yahoo!’s mobile services continues to grow globally, mobile continues to be a key priority for the company."

As you know, Microsoft and Yahoo were recently granted regulatory approval on their search and advertising deal, and we’ve discussed what this might mean for search engine optimization. WebProNews stopped by the Yahoo Headquarters in Sunnyvale before heading to SMX West in Santa Clara this week, and talked with Shashi Seth, Sr. VP of Yahoo Search Products about the deal, how it will be integrated, and timing, among other things.

Seth says that the integration of Bing results into Yahoo Search will take somewhere in the range of 18 to 24 months for it to happen worldwide, and they’ll start with the U.S. first. He says the core thing users will find is a compelling set of experiences that go on top of just the algorithmic and paid results that come from Microsoft. In other words, Yahoo users will still find the Yahoo experience.

Shashi says he feels like Yahoo can surface a lot of things better on its own, simply because of the content its properties provides (local, sports, finance, etc.). That stuff won’t be going away, and it will be weaved into the experience.

One thing that Shashi stressed was that the integration of Bing frees up a lot of Yahoo’s own resources, so they can improve on other aspects of the user experience. Comments from Yahoo’s Director of Search Marketing David Roth at the State of the Search Union keynote suggested that some amount of those resources will be moved over to work with Microsoft as well, with others staying at Yahoo:

WebProNews actually spoke with Roth himself after the event as well. He thinks he has something of a unique viewpoint about the integration, as he comes from search marketing himself. He will also likely be one of the first to be able to use the integration, given his position within the company. You can hear more of what he has to say in this interview:

Reactions from marketers are still mixed about how this integration is going to play out. This point was made clear in the keynote. Misty Locke of iProspect said a lot of her clients are excited about it, while former Googler Vanessa Fox is reserving judgment, hoping Yahoo doesn’t lose "all the Yahooness." From the way Yahoo has described the coming integration, particularly Shahi Seth, it doesn’t sound like it will be losing much Yahooness at all, but the extent of integration of things like Yahoo’s BOSS and SearchMonkey features is still largely unknown.

Believe it or not, Yahoo has a market cap of about $22 billion, and the company intends to put some of that money to good use in the near future.  Carol Bartz stated at the Transformation 2010 conference that she intends to acquire more stuff this year.

In response to what could have been a "yes" or "no" question concerning acquisitions in 2010, Bartz answered "absolutely," pretty much guaranteeing that at least one purchase will take place.  Bartz then explained to Abbey Klaassen, "This year it’s about what technologies: Do we need to fill in the blanks, what analytics, what tools?"

Bartz also said, "Well just imagine whether it’s acquiring an audience – a group of female bloggers, or whether it’s acquiring some better analytics tools that help us guide campaigns with our partners, or whether it’s technology.  Last year we bought at company called Zoobut, which is better photo technology, so it let us do very modern photos in our mail.  It’s that sort of thing – audience, technology and tools."

The next few months should be interesting time for Yahoo, given that Microsoft will soon begin to exert a huge influence over the search side of its operations.  Whatever purchases Bartz is considering could provide a good clue about what area(s) Yahoo will focus on moving forward.

One last note: For the record, Yahoo’s stock is moving up in early morning trading, perhaps giving the company a bigger shopping budget.

Yahoo Mail users should find it considerably more convenient to get in touch with their friends and acquaintances from now on.  Today, Yahoo and Facebook made it possible for those users to add their Facebook friends’ email addresses to their Yahoo Contacts lists.

The benefits should be obvious.  A post on the Yahoo Mail Blog pointed out, "So when you are on Yahoo! Sports and you want to email your old high school buddy that great article on the Winter Olympics, his email address is just a click away.  Or maybe you want to forward your cousin your airplane reservations on Yahoo! Mail . . . . [n]ow you can type the first few letters of his name in Yahoo! Mail and – presto! – his email address from his Facebook profile will appear in your email."

The import process is extremely simple, too.  Users just need to head to the "Import Contacts" page, click on Facebook’s logo, enter their Facebook login info, and wait a few moments for all of the data to transfer.

Whether this development will be enough to make Gmail or Hotmail users give Yahoo Mail a chance is hard to say, but this at least represents a significant step forward in terms of user-friendliness for existing Yahoo Mail fans.

More tie-ups between Yahoo and Facebook are on the way, too, according to Andrew Molyneux, a program manager over Yahoo Mail.