November is an odd time of the year.  In much of the US it’s starting to get cold and dreary, there tends to be more rain at least in the New England area, and the real cold weather is right around the corner.  November brought us odd times in search as well, with Halloween costume decisions far behind and no need to search for the Turkey recipe since mom always cooks it the same way.  Search volumes overall declined by about 500 million queries in November.  November topped out at just shy of 12.5 billion queries.  Some interesting things happened among the top engine shares considering nearly everyone lost volume.

Continue reading “November Search Market Share Update: Not quite the usual story” »

What would you give for one day of Google eyeballs? What would it be worth to you to have one single ad running on Google’s oh so sparse and much hailed homepage? My guess, that for better or worse, many an online marketing department would be more than happy to open up the purse strings for a shot at this opportunity. Funny thing happened back in late October. The first Android phone launched in the form of the T-Mobile G1. In case you weren’t paying attention, this was a big deal for Google no matter how many questions still revolve around Google’s intent. This was such a big deal that Google actually went so far as to provide a link right on the home page for all the world to click.

The real question is whether or not this actually did anything for G1 and T-Mobile in terms of driving traffic. In other words, what was it worth to T-Mobile? The link ran on the Google front page for 7 days from October 22nd through October 29th. During this time the Google front page was visited by nearly 99 million people at an average daily rate of around 38 million per day. How many of these folks were interested enough to forgo their intended search activity and click through on the link?

So what happened?

• Overall the T-Mobile G1 Landing Page associated with the link was visited by over 800,000 people during the 7 day run.
• The peak of traffic came not surprisingly on day one maxing out at about 233,000 unique visitors.
• Google’s volume of clickthrough traffic from the home page peaked on opening day at around 80,000 UVs.
• However, Google’s share of the overall traffic to the site steadily increased from a low of 34% on day 1 to a high of 43% on the day before the shutoff.* Perhaps some repeat exposure impact?

What’s it worth? Well we know one thing for sure it’s worth a lot to Google, then again it is Android and maybe it was just to keep Mr. Ballmer up at night…

*It’s worth noting that on the last day the link disappeared part way through the day so the data for October 29th is a bit skewed

Please join us for our webinar on Smartphone Intelligence: Understanding the mobile consumer, Thursday Nov. 20 at 2pm.

Ah, September. When leaves begin to turn, school kids doff their backpacks, the economy tanks and Google sets a new record for search market share and hits the 2nd greatest month/month query volume growth in the past 13 months.

Interestingly, most of the other search engines also grew query volume, demonstrating the magnitude of students and concerned investors returning to their web browsers. MSN/Live was the only search engine that lost query volume in September, and with Club Live factored in, that loss actually became a dive.

Google continued to impress, hitting 40.3% year/year query growth, same as last month, while most competitors took big hits compared to last year. Yahoo! slipped 6.1% versus September, 2007. MSN/Live fell 12.8% or, if you count Club Live, only 5.8%. And AOL lost a whopping 18.2% of queries versus 13 months ago.

The only bright spot, other than the Google sun, was Ask, which inched 1.2% compared to September, 2007. Perhaps that “The Algorithm killed Jeeves.” advertising campaign actually did help retain Ask searchers.

The major takeaways for September, 2008 (excluding Club Live from the market)….

• Google sets new record of 70.4% share on 5.6% m-o-m query volume surge
• Yahoo! dips to 19.4% market share on essentially flat 0.2% m-o-m query volume change
• Windows Live Search falls to 6.0% market share (with Club Live, it lands at 8.8%, though m-o-m query volume still declines)
• Ask maintains 2.7% share on a slight increase of 2.2% m-o-m query volume
• AOL continues to hold on with 1.1% share and 3.3% m-o-m query growth
• Next up … the tricks and treats of Halloween and Election Season!

If you want to get your hands on the actual data in this post and a lot more don’t forget to check out Compete’s Data Hub.

*Search market share includes web search only for the Adult US Online Population and is calculated based on unique queries within each session during the given month.

From the Beijing Olympic Games to war on Russia’s doorstep to the DNC Convention and Hurricane Gustav, 2008 livened up the dog days of August and, not to be undone, Search followed suit. Google set a new record in August, gaining query volume and market share again as rival engines struggled.

All rivals ceded market share to Google, and Club Live deepened the dip at Windows Live.

Google received nearly 40% more queries from the US Adult population then it did in August 2007, continuing a trend of steady query growth over the past 12 months. Meanwhile, Yahoo! declined 5.5% and Windows Live (without Club Live) fell 6.1% compared to last month last year. The story is a bit different when we factor in Club Live – with it, Windows Live actually gained 2.3% share compared to a year ago.

The major takeaways for August 2008 (excluding Club Live from the market)….

• Google sets new record of 69.4% share on 1.5% m-o-m query volume gains
• Yahoo! dips to 20.1% market share on 2.2% m-o-m query volume decline
• Windows Live Search drops to 6.6% market share (with Club Live, this jumps up to 9.9%, though m-o-m query volume still declines)
• Ask share dips slightly to 2.7% on a nearly 12% m-o-m decline in volume
• AOL holds on with 1% search share on flat query growth
• Next up … the rush Back to School in September!

If you want to get your hands on the actual data in this post and a lot more don’t forget to check out Compete’s Data Hub.

*Search market share includes web search only for the Adult US Online Population and is calculated based on unique queries within each session during the given month.

Things move a little slower in the summer. Right? Well that’s what we’re telling ourselves anyway with our search share numbers being published a bit later in the month than we typically like to get them in your hands. Oh well better late than never.
July turned out to be a return to the norm with everyone losing share to Google. With the exception of the Club Live enhanced Windows Live search numbers everyone’s market share dipped lower while Google’s climbed to new heights.

Year-over-year, the volume of queries being perfomed on Google by the US Adult population was up 44%. In contrast, Yahoo! query volume was down more than 14% year-over-year, while Windows Live search (excluding Club Live) was essentially flat. If you fold in the Club Live numbers Windows Live Search volume was actually up about 27% from this time last year.

The overview (excluding Club Live from the market) …

• Google share climbed to over 70% on roughly 5% m-o-m query volume gains
• Yahoo! dipped to a new low of 18.1% market share on flat query volume
• Windows Live Search dropped slightly to around 7.5% marketshare (if you account for Club Live search this bumps up to around 13% and a slight gain m-o-m)
• Ask share dipped slightly to 2.5% on a 6% m-o-m decline in volume
• AOL seems to be slipping away with market share holding just above 1% after continued query losses
• Next up … Dog days of August

If you want to get your hands on the actual data in this post and a lot more don’t forget to check out Compete’s Data Hub.

*Search market share includes web search only for the Adult US Online Population and is calculated based on unique queries within each session during the given month.

No matter what the pundits say, the new Microsoft Cashback program along with some continued efforts on other marketing programs such as Club Live seem to have worked in June. MSN/Live search was the only major engine in June to post higher volumes of search queries. Everyone else, including the big dog Google, saw a decline. This seems even more impressive when you put this in the context of the overall search market. Overall search query volume in the market declined nearly 5% m-o-m, from 9.6 billion in May to 9.1 billion in June. Club Live search volume increased sharply, more than doubling the volume seen in May. In fact Club Live saw more search queries in June than Ask and AOL combined. Even if you exclude Club Live search queries Windows Live search volume ticked up nearly 3%, pushing MSN/Live market share back over the 8% mark. Rolling in Club Live MSN/Live market share jumped to a whopping 12.7% in June.

If you exclude Club Live search activity, Google actually pulled an interesting trick and managed to push market share still higher despite a sharp decline in volume. Google share increased to 69% despite a 4.2% decline in volume. The story for everyone else was pretty rough. Yahoo!, Ask and AOL market share all dipped to new lows on sharp volume declines.

The overview (excluding Club Live from the market) …

• Google share climbed to 69% despite a m-o-m decline in query volume
• Yahoo! dipped to a new low of 18.5% market share on continued query declines
• Windows Live Search was the only major engine to increase query volume moving market share up to 8.2%
• Ask share dipped slightly to 2.7% on a 10% m-o-m decline in volume
• AOL seems to be slipping away with market share holding just above 1% after continued query losses
• Maybe the Empire of the Northwest really doesn’t need Yahoo! search

If you want to get your hands on the actual data in this post and a lot more don’t forget to check out Compete’s Data Hub.

*Search market share includes web search only for the Adult US Online Population and is calculated based on unique queries within each session during the given month.