Marissa Mayer received an early boost to her bid to turn around Yahoo as she outlined her priorities for the struggling internet company, with third-quarter earnings coming in ahead of expectations. Ms Mayer set out her strategic vision as Yahoo chief in a call with analysts, saying that she would focus on quality and improving the user experience and noting that her role was "tailor made" for her, after her experience at Google. "The core components of Yahoo's business - search, mail, ads, news and homepage - are also the core products that I've built my career on," she said. I came to Yahoo to grow and help redefine one of the internet's most beloved companies. She said that she had spent many of her first 100 days in the post improving the "efficiency, wellbeing and accountability" of Yahoo's 12,000 staff, by aligning employee priorities with the company's wider goals and providing perks such as free food and smartphones. "The vast majority of what we have done has cost nothing," Ms Mayer said, perhaps a reference to some analysts" concerns about the potential impact of her turnround plan on profitability. Operating margins in the third quarter fell from 17 per cent a year ago to 14 per cent. Revenues, net of payments to publishers and other third parties, were also just ahead of forecasts at $1.09bn, up 2 per cent, sending Yahoo's shares up by 3.8 per cent in after-hours trading in New York on Monday. Both search and display advertising showed modest increases in revenue, despite an 18 per cent drop in revenues from Europe, the Middle East and Africa. While the results were stronger than Wall Street's modest expectations, Yahoo is still underperforming the broader display advertising market, which eMarketer expects to grow by 21.5 per cent this year in the US and where it is being outpaced by Google and Facebook. Analysts expect Ms Mayer to use acquisitions to improve Yahoo's offerings in fast-growing areas such as mobile and to bring in new talent. Yahoo netted $7.6bn in pre-tax proceeds from selling half of its stake in Alibaba, the Chinese ecommerce group, and it plans to return $3.65bn to shareholders, through buybacks or dividends. Cash and cash equivalents stood at $7.56bn at the end of September, up from $1.5bn at the end of last year. The earnings statement also revealed that Yahoo has agreed a new, undrawn $750m credit facility, which it said would be used for "general corporate purposes." However, Ken Goldman, Yahoo's new finance chief, said that the company would spend its resources "prudently" and "with discipline" and remain "very mindful of shareholder value creation."