Yahoo has appointed Hilary Schneider Senior Vice President of Marketplaces, a newly formed business unit of Yahoo. According to the press release, Schneider will develop an overarching classified and listings strategy that includes new ways of monetizing transaction listings across Yahoo, as well as have day-to-day oversight of Yahoo's Marketplaces properties in the U.S., including Autos, Classifieds, HotJobs, Personals, Real Estate, Shopping & Auctions, Travel and Yellow Pages.

"I believe Yahoo has the audience, products, technology and go-to-market assets necessary to win in the online classifieds and local listings segment," said Schneider. "I'm excited to capitalize on Yahoo's existing strengths of the properties and to develop and execute a strategy to take these businesses to the next level."

Rob Solomon, who had headed Yahoo Shopping, left Yahoo early this year. Solomon had been at Yahoo for six years.

Yahoo has an online auction marketplace in which sellers can place listings for no fees - there are no listing or commission fees. Yahoo monetizes Auctions through its placement of ads on both search results and in individual auction listings. However, it has not updated its announcement boards since April, and sellers have complained of broken links, programs that have not been updated for years or don't work at all, and lack of support. Some have wondered if Yahoo will continue supporting its Auctions marketplace given its relationship with eBay announced in May.

Despite such concerns, more sellers have been exploring Yahoo Auctions as a way to diversify beyond eBay in recent months since eBay increased Store fees. On September 3, an avid Yahoo Auctions seller posted, "Congratulations sellers. We finally broke 1,000,000 auctions listed. In fact it is 1, 011,633 +. We are finally growing." An AuctionBytes inquiry to Yahoo's public relations firm to confirm the number went unanswered.

While Yahoo's September 13th press release indicates Schneider will work on online classifieds and local listings, there's no indication what the new Marketplaces business unit will mean for Yahoo Auction sellers.

Yahoo's COO Dan Rosensweig is scheduled to give the keynote address at the next "PESA" summit (Professional eBay Sellers Alliance).

More on Hilary Schneider's background:
Prior to joining Yahoo, Schneider was senior vice president for Knight Ridder Inc., a $3 billion revenue company, where she co-managed the newspaper operations and led its digital division. Under her leadership, Knight Ridder's online revenue tripled and the division's profit margins grew significantly. Additionally, Schneider has also served on the boards of CareerBuilder, Classified Ventures, ShopLocal and NAA.

Prior to Knight Ridder, Schneider was president and CEO of Red Herring Communications, where she oversaw Red Herring Magazine, RedHerring.com and Red Herring's events unit. She was also president and CEO of Times Mirror Interactive, where she oversaw all of Time Mirror's Internet businesses, including more than 34 of its websites. Schneider also served seven years with The Baltimore Sun Company in a number of positions across new business development, sales & marketing, and culminating in the post of general manager in which she successfully led all of Sun's business operations, growing both revenue and operating profit. Additionally, Schneider worked for a number of years as vice president of corporate finance for Drexel Burnham Lambert, Inc. where she primarily focused on financing and acquisition transactions in the media and entertainment industry. Schneider holds a B.A. in economics from Brown University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.