When measuring the search engine market, it’s important to take into consideration the different types of engine. Specifically, it’s important to look at the difference between pure search products and web portals built around search. In both cases, search plays an integral role in the business, but it’s where the searchers end up that differentiates the business models.
Both Google and Microsoft’s Bing can be considered pure search engines. This may be why, particularly with Google, their comScore market share number (released yesterday) differs from our own market share numbers (which we released at the same time). Our numbers measure the amount of traffic that comes from a search engine into our network of third-party websites, outside of the reach and control of the engine itself. comScore, on the other hand, measures how many searches were executed on the engines themselves. This may explain why, although Google’s market share for searches entered according to comScore is 66.2%, their actual traffic generated to the non-Google web was 80.97% in July. As a pure search site, Google’s goal is to get users off of the search engine and out into the web.
On the opposite end of the spectrum lies Yahoo! The Sunnyvale-based web portal has doubled down on its commitment to the content of the Internet, building up a network of Yahoo!-branded portals – sports, politics, business, etc. Looking again at the difference between market share in searches entered (17.1%, from comScore) and market share in traffic generated (6.14%, from Chitika), you begin to see the different business model that holds for web portals. You can see from the numbers that Yahoo! manages to keep most of its search traffic in-network, allowing less of it to reach the third-party Internet than competitors Google and Bing. By providing users with a unified portal, Yahoo! appears to be striving towards a centralized web destination rather than a search-and-go solution.
From a business standpoint, both methods make sense: Google wants to push people out into the world of sites running AdSense, whereas Yahoo! wants to give searchers their search results without having to leave Yahoo! properties. It’s somewhat similar to the Android vs. iPhone debate, whether allowing unfettered access to an open device is better in the long run – for both the parent company and its users – than an environment more crafted for user experience by one company.
Going forward, users themselves will determine whether they want a search engine or a web portal. Between June and July, Yahoo! is the only one of the big three search properties to see growth – both Google and Bing declined in market share, according to our stats. comScore’s stats support this trend as well, showing Yahoo! up on the month, Google down, and Bing remaining exactly the same.
Thanks Daniel for the rationale on this matter….I have always believed, like your own stats show, that Google sends us far more traffic than what other reporting firms show, based on our own traffic stats — as it appears Chitika shows too!
But the “portal” model, I was unaware of as a still viable model in the contemporary biz world….so thanks for that!
🙂
Jim
Nice states about bing ,google and yahoo .Thanks for usefull information. Chitika not doing well earning very poor.
oohh my God!!! how come AOL is just taking the last spot comfortably. AOL i think it is the time to do more than you guys have been doing. its time to grow.
@Jim, thanks for the kind words. Honestly, I think the portal model is still a viable business model, if done right – build it around a solid search engine and try to create a unified feel for all traffic that stays in-network. It makes sense for the engine, too – Google is open and can afford to send all their traffic out into the wild because chances are they’re sending traffic to a site running AdSense. Yahoo or Bing can monetize better by sending traffic to Yahoo or Microsoft sites with their own ads running.
The trick, as always, will be for them to make the user experience in-network worth coming back for. If the portal has solid, well-done content, it’ll work out great. If not…
Thanks for the stats about google. I was wondering how big the gorilla really is. I have heard so many conflicting guesstimates.