Yahoo! Search Marketing (formally Overture PPC)
History
Yahoo! Search Marketing started out as a spin off company from Idealab and under the name of Goto, it established itself as the first ever company to provide a Pay Per Placement search engine. In February 1998, Goto offered advertisers the opportunity to appear at the top of a specific search query based on how much they were willing to pay for the listing. This is still the fundamental principal behind all PPC search engines.
The business model for Goto was simple, a company that was willing to pay more money for a listing would be able to better provide the end user with information regarding the search query. As the web developed over the next two years, this kind of advertising flourished as the web became more than just a place of academic research. The more sites enabling people to purchase products and services online established themselves, the more lucrative it became for these online businesses to have there business appearing at the top for specific search queries.
In October 2001 Goto.com re-branded itself and was renamed to Overture Services Inc. Overture was able to acquire lucrative deals with Yahoo and MSN Search to have there PPC listings appear on there search engines along with the organic search listings. The substantial profit made from these deals allowed overture to purchase two other competing search engines AlltheWeb and Altavista.
In 2003 Yahoo, Overtures biggest customer for its ppc listings, instigated a take over of the company and has since re-branded all overture products with Yahoo! Search Marketing.
Case
studies 
web promotion