SUNNYVALE, Calif. and WILTON, Conn., Dec. 16 /PRNewswire/ -- Yahoo! Inc., , a leading global Internet company, and Marketing Management Analytics, Inc. (MMA), the marketing analytics pioneer, today announced a new service that will help marketers improve their return on overall marketing investments by evaluating the offline sales impact of their online marketing programs. This move builds on Yahoo!'s commitment to enhancing the accountability of online marketing ROI, and will help marketers deploy a best practice solution for budget allocations across all media.

Yahoo! and MMA's marketing ROI assessment model builds on an existing MMA model to include data from Yahoo! showing users' exposure to online graphical and search advertising. This new model provides a focused assessment of online programs on Yahoo!, measured next to programs on other media, and gives insights and recommendations to marketers on both online and offline marketing spend. Marketers can choose to provide MMA with data from other online sites, including direct marketing campaigns and Web site data, to get a broader view of their total marketing programs.

"Marketers need to be able to measure and make decisions about online and offline marketing campaigns with a holistic view," said Wenda Harris Millard, chief sales officer, Yahoo!. "Providing this new service with MMA is a key step in Yahoo!'s continued commitment to providing marketers with leading tools to enhance and optimize their marketing spend."

"In many ways, online marketing can be more accountable than many offline marketing tactics, but there is still a real need to understand the total sales impact of online and offline programs on a common ROI basis so that optimal budget allocations can be made," said John Nardone, MMA Chief Client Officer. "Clients are shifting more and more of their total spend online, and need to move beyond measurement of clicks and page views to understand what is really working to drive sales."

About Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is a leading global Internet brand and one of the most trafficked Internet destinations worldwide. Yahoo! seeks to provide online products and services essential to users' lives, and offers a full range of tools and marketing solutions for businesses to connect with Internet users around the world. Yahoo! is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California.

About Marketing Management Analytics, Inc. (MMA)

MMA pioneered the use of marketing mix modeling to help companies plan, measure, validate, and optimize their marketing performance. Since that time, MMA has conducted more than 1000 studies on hundreds of brands and businesses in more than 20 countries. MMA's clients include many of the most recognized marketers in the world. MMA has been a unit of Aegis Group, PLC, London (AGS.L) since 1997. For more information, visit http://www.mma.com/ .

Media Contacts: Nissa Anklesaria, Yahoo!, 310-907-2851, nissa@yahoo-inc.com Louise Callagy, Fleishman-Hillard (for Yahoo!), 415-318-4109, callagyl@fleishman.com Wendy Marx, Marx Communications (for MMA), 203-445-2850, wendy@marxcommunications.com Tom Mariam, Marx Communications (for MMA), 914-939-4294, tom@marxcommunications.com

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CONTACT: Nissa Anklesaria of Yahoo!, +1-310-907-2851, or
nissa@yahoo-inc.com ; or Louise Callagy of Fleishman-Hillard, +1-415-318-4109,
or callagyl@fleishman.com , for Yahoo!; or Wendy Marx, +1-203-445-2850, or
wendy@marxcommunications.com , or Tom Mariam, +1-914-939-4294, or
tom@marxcommunications.com , both of Marx Communications, for Marketing
Management Analytics, Inc.

Web site: http://www.mma.com/