Yahoo hosted online retailers and third-party developers at its second Merchant Summit in Chicago on Friday on the heels of the Internet Retailer Conference in Chicago. Attendees were treated to a special message from Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang through a recorded video in which he said he valued the relationship with the Yahoo Stores merchants, and said that as an entrepreneur himself, he could relate to their needs.

Speakers at the one-day summit included Yahoo managers, third-party developers and merchants who spoke on topics to designed to help retailers grow their businesses. Yahoo Merchant Solutions Lead Product Manager Paul Boisvert told attendees that Yahoo had more Internet Retailer Top 500 merchants than any other hosted ecommerce solution and conducted billions of dollars in transactions.

In a morning session, attendees heard from a panel of third-party developers representing Your Store Wizards, KingWebmaster, 4PSite, Practical Data and PayPal. The panelists discussed some of the latest features of their services and shared tips on how merchants could use the tools to help their Yahoo Stores.

Rob Snell, author "Starting a Yahoo Business for Dummies," shared advice on Search Engine Optimization strategies that worked for his family business Gun Dog Supply. Other sessions on the agenda were analytics, SEM and SEO, and Branding for the Web.

A large room held tabletop exhibits, allowing third-party services to speak directly with online merchants about their services.

Senior Marketing Manager for Yahoo Small Business Melissa Chaika Sobel said there were 200 total attendees, of which 135 were Yahoo Stores merchants. She said the company would be hosting another merchant summit on September 13-14 in Santa Clara, California. More information is available through the registration page.

Edited to include updated attendance numbers - 135 merchants.