The portal's newly-appointed agency Euro RSCG created the campaign, which breaks in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines this month. Vishnu Mohan, Euro's managing director in Singapore, said the network's handling of Yahoo's US account provided the local office with an introduction.
Winning Yahoo has led Euro to resign the AsiaOne account, a rival internet portal owned by Singapore Press Holdings. Mohan pointed out AsiaOne had stopped spending money on mainstream advertising, and that most of Euro's recent work for AsiaOne only appeared on the internet.
AsiaOne has been on a cost-cutting drive. Last November, it cut staff numbers from 111 to 79 and the portal was subsequently folded back into SPH.
Markus Barnikel, Yahoo Southeast Asia head of marketing, said the portal previously used a small agency - Ad People - for two years.
"We felt we needed to work with top tier agencies and we are looking for a stronger footprint in the Southeast Asian markets outside Singapore," he said. "I think the campaign will set a new milestone for the advertising of Yahoo in Southeast Asia."
Euro's first work for the World Cup encourages users to log onto asia.world cup.yahoo.com each day to predict the outcome of each day's matches.
Yahoo is also trying to move its internet users to the wireless space to ensure it is number one in both mediums. Mobile phone users with WAP-enabled or GPRS handsets will be able to access Yahoo's real time news, scores and in-depth analysis on the World Cup, said Niren Hiro, Yahoo Southeast Asia general manager.
He said it was fortunate that Korea and Japan were hosting the World Cup because both markets were setting benchmarks in wireless internet.
Hiro claimed Yahoo had become the leading web portal for wireless users in Japan through the growth of wide-band CDMA and i-mode mobile phones.
This technology will enable users to watch animated World Cup matches on their handsets.
