Is Yahoo's brand reputation on the rise or in decline?

Yahoo stock price has increased, unique visits to the website in the US have surpassed Google for the first time this year, but brand perception has decreased. So should Yahoo be celebrating or asking questions why perception has fallen in spite of positive news elsewhere?

http://news.sky.com/story/1131958/yahoo-overtakes-google-in-us-web-traffic

Unique visits don’t tell the whole story as they exclude search engine figures, which would clearly benefit Google over Yahoo. Stock price as increased following strategic acquisitions of popular sites such as Tumblr. Perception has… well.. perception is perception so it is worth digging a little deeper to understand why consumers feel differently.

http://www.brandindex.com/article/yahoo-stock-consumer-perception-down-past-year

Brand perception was clearly impacted by the decision to eliminate the employee work from home policy and since this point Yahoo have continued to hover closely to two of its main competitors in Bing and MSN. It would be unrealistic to assume that brand perception of the public would be impacted so massively by a Yahoo employee policy change. Yahoo have struggled to adapt to the uptake of Smartphone technology which in turn has led to a clunky, slow and inefficient feel to many of its products on the smaller screen. Whereas Yahoo have made great strides in investing in up and coming companies it has so far done little to address issues with smartphone applications and how easily its offerings are displayed on the small screen and even less to understand mobile technology. The Brand Avenger suggests that Yahoo brand perception will continue to suffer until they essentially catch up with the rest of the market and make a real effort to understand the consumer and their relationship with mobile technology.

Yahoo are of course facing an uphill battle when it comes to reaching the summit, maintaining growth and offering a sustainable brand. The decline has played out in the public eye and the reasons behind it are nicely summed up in the attached infographic.

http://www.scores.org/graphics/yahoo/

As already covered Yahoo stock price is on the up, visits to the website has increased but perception is down. When you combine this with the fact that Yahoo sales in the last quarter aren’t as healthy as the top brass at the company would like then you begin to understand why Yahoo should take the good news with a pinch of salt.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/17/technology/companies/yahoos-profit-rises-but-revenue-slips.html?_r=0

Yahoo can’t afford to ignore the sales figures or the brand perception. They have a massive task on their hands and they certainly won’t do themselves any favour’s until they understand how consumers interact with Yahoo in their own hands via smartphone technology