How Yahoo turned a dormant brand into one people actually talk about (again)
Creative Lab head Kemma Kefalas on the strategy behind it
We’ve been away for a bit. But we’re back, and properly making up for it. Consider this our welcome home gift, the exact playbook on how to wake up a dormant social feed.
We spoke to Kemma Kefalas, who heads up Yahoo’s Creative Lab, about what actually had to change to bring Yahoo back to life, why Cardi B ended up fronting a campaign about email anxiety, and where she thinks brand partnerships are heading next.
Here’s the story in her voice …
Two years ago, the comments said “Yahoo still exists??”
The Creative Lab was built from the ground up, most of us joining the company just about two years ago. We had our work cut out for us, taking over nearly dormant feeds, removing all content, and rebuilding a social strategy that would bring Yahoo into the cultural conversation. The approach has completely shifted from broadcasting at people to genuinely connecting with them and finding a place in their everyday lives, usually with a laugh.
In the beginning, our comments were flooded with “Yahoo still exists??” and slowly but surely that tide has shifted to “I can’t believe this is from Yahoo!”
We’re really focused on making sure the story always leads back to how people use tech every day. We’ve been with our audience through nearly every era of the internet, and after 30 years of that shared history, leaning into humour feels like the most genuine version of who we are together.
Cardi B, and the problem she was hired to solve
We love playing with real tech insights, especially the tension points we all know and feel, and the inbox is a major catalyst for that type of stress. We’ve all been buried in emails, convinced something important is slipping through the cracks. We put a name to that feeling, FOMSI, the Fear of Missing Something Important, and built an entire campaign around it.
Cardi B was the perfect fit because she’s one of the most in-demand people on the planet, so naturally, she’s busy, and just as importantly, she brings that relatable humour and warmth that makes a campaign like this fun. All the while, she’s highlighting how Planner in Yahoo Mail solves the FOMSI problem by automatically surfacing events and tasks from your email, bringing everything together in one view.
Ultimately, we wanted to give audiences a reason to take another look at Yahoo and spend some time in our corner of the internet.
90% of the US sees Yahoo every month
Social media changed the game here. It’s where most people stumble across us before anything else, and that moment deserves care. We put real thought into every post because of it. You can’t do that if you’re only speaking to one version of your audience.
Tech is such an integral part of our daily lives; 90% of the US internet population visits Yahoo each month, and we’d be remiss not to consider our audience a beautiful amalgamation of backgrounds, lifestyles, and needs. The brands winning right now are the ones leaning into that complexity rather than flattening it.
A lot of people have grown up with Yahoo, and that’s something we’re proud of, but we also want to show them why we still deserve a spot in their future too. Honouring who’s always been there while reintroducing yourself to a whole new set of people is something we think about a lot. Social media accelerated all of it. Audiences can now tell you loudly and publicly what they need from brands, and it’s our responsibility to respond to that in earnest.
Finding the right person, fast
I think we’re in a really exciting moment for creator partnerships, and the brands getting it right are the ones throwing out the old playbook. It’s no longer about reach alone; it’s about resonance.
The partnerships that really land are the ones where the creator’s world and the brand’s world truly overlap. Never in my career did I expect to be the first brand to sponsor a leaf crunch, but IYKYK. The creator @leafeveryday appeared out of nowhere, rating the crunch factor of leaves, and we hopped into the comments immediately to make it happen. That speed and specificity are only going to become more important.
We tapped @chickenjawsh at record speed because he was talking about the weather in a deeply relatable, joyful way, and we saw an opening for Yahoo Weather. We were his first brand partnership, and the video amassed over 600K views. The future is less about follower counts and more about finding people who’ve built genuine trust with a specific community and are moving fast enough to meet them where they are.
What’s next for Yahoo?
Expect more storytelling-led social work and more partnerships that feel like they could only come from Yahoo. Some of the best examples start in unexpected places. We recently partnered with voices on the ground at Cannes to deliver need-to-know insights from the festival, in a series we called “What I Scouted at Cannes.”
We don’t sell a product you can hold, unless it’s April Fool’s Day, but we do offer experiences, whether that’s a concert at SXSW, a diner breakfast with Frankie Muniz for the launch of our new daily game Crushable, or our upcoming Yahoo Explorers Society activation in Cannes.
We plan to keep creating one-of-one experiences for people who want to feel the magic of Yahoo IRL, because at the end of the day, the through line of everything we do is finding the human truth inside the tech and building something real around it. 30 years in, and we’re only just getting started.
Yahoo found its biggest wins in the comments section, not a media plan dreamed up by boring stakeholders sitting in suits around a boardroom.
That’s what changed how one of the internet’s oldest brands actually operates. Where’s the smallest, weirdest opportunity sitting in your replies right now?
Got a brand or client campaign as weird and wonderful as a leaf crunch sponsorship? We want to hear about it. Drop it in the comments or the subscriber chat, and catch us on Instagram @thebrandingblackbook between issues.
Great piece on Yahoo's revival! The shift from broadcasting to building genuine community connection is spot on. I explore the evolution of marketing on my blog—specifically how data collection will eventually fade for established businesses as they lean into this exact kind of authentic trust and resonance. I just subscribed to your newsletter! Would you be open to a sub swap so we can support each other's growth? Keep up the great work!