The problem with Yahoo is they lost forward momentum and that means they lost growth. Everyone seemed to be asking the same question … what’s the future for Yahoo? That, in fact, is the same question that was asked several years ago before Marissa Mayer came in as CEO to reinvent the company. The truth is this is the same question we’ve been asking of Yahoo over the last decade or longer.
So let’s pull the camera back and take a longer-term historicial look at Yahoo. When we do, the answer seems clear. Yahoo’s growth is still stalled, just as it has been for quite a long time. Where will growth come from going forward?
There are many ways to grow this company. Wireless is a great place to start. So what does this mean? Yahoo executives must think of the company in new and different terms. They must think about reinventing the company, not just repairing it. That they simply have not done to date. Instead, they have been trying to get better and stronger in the same old space.
Yahoo lost their mojo
Yahoo is a good company, however, they lost their way when Google entered the scene and changed the industry. First with a faster search engine, then with the rapidly expanding company and all the positive stories and PR they get on a daily basis. Suddenly Yahoo was yesterday’s news. That has not changed over the last decade or two. And that is what must be changed.
Yahoo was a successful company in the 1990s. Then they crested and have been falling ever since. It seems every few years we think they are doing something to restart their growth engines. However, it always turns out to be a dud.
Winning is impossible without forward momentum
It’s tough to succeed when you’ve lost forward momentum. Just ask other past leaders like BlackBerry, Nokia and Motorola to name a few. It’s not a matter of a particular product succeeding. Rather, it’s a matter of creating forward momentum. All good things spring from forward momentum.
Another term for forward momentum is an ongoing growth wave. If a company stops growing, it crests then falls. The longer it is cresting or falling the harder, it is to start the growth engines up again. And Yahoo has been falling for quite a long time.
Growth wave comes from forward momentum
My phone and email have been ringing off the hook with questions from reporters, investors, competitors and other interested parties about Yahoo. They keep asking me what Yahoo should do next. Can they recover?
I’ll tell you what I have been telling them: Yahoo needs a new identity. They need to refresh the company and what it means in the marketplace. They need to share who and what they now are with the world. They need to get the world to buy in to their new vision for who they are going forward. They need to create something big and new and different.
Reinventing Yahoo
Yahoo must start with one simple question: Who are they? Once they know that, then they have to share that with the rest of us. Then they need to start their next growth wave. Then they need to turn that growth wave into a giant forest fire of growth.
That means much more than just releasing a new product. They need to reinvent what Yahoo means to the marketplace. To the customer. To the investor. To the worker. They need to make Yahoo important again. Alive again. They need to punch their way back onto the screen big time. That is something they simply have not done.
Yahoo should learn from AT&T
I think Yahoo could take a lesson from AT&T. That’s right. AT&T faced the same fork in the road a decade ago. They made the right choices and have been growing strong ever since.
If you recall, 10 years ago AT&T was dying along with MCI and Sprint as long distance giants. Then SBC, the smallest “baby Bell,” acquired AT&T, BellSouth and Cingular. They changed the new company name to AT&T and refreshed and rebranded it. Growth exploded after they re-engineered the company.
This is what Yahoo needs next
That’s what Yahoo needs to do today. Hell, that’s what Yahoo has needed to do for the last decade or two. If they can do this, then they stand the chance to be born once again. If not, well then, we won’t see any changes with them going forward. Is that a straight enough answer for you!?
The longer they wait, the harder it will be. And it’s been a long time already. That makes it harder to restart the stalled growth engines.
One thing I have to say, however, is Yahoo executives and the board of directors never seem to say die. They keep trying time after time. You have to admire and give them credit for that kind of effort.
