Live Searches Drop Below 1 Billion
link: original article - section: microsoft
August U.S. search share data shows ugly declines for Microsoft in 2008.
The month's data, released today by ComScore, is but a snapshot of a longer trend. I went back to the historical data, which shows how big Google gains are compared to Microsoft losses.
Microsoft's share of U.S. searches dropped 4 points, to 8.3 percent, between July 2007 and August 2008. During the same time period, Google gained 7 points, to 63 percent search share. For Microsoft, the heavier blow will be psychological. In August, its number of searches dropped below 1 billion, approaching the dregs occupied by Ask and AOL.
U.S. Internet users conducted 11.7 billion searches in August, 7.4 billion through Google. But, when including YouTube, Google searches top 10 billion.
The numbers should greatly disappoint Microsoft product managers, particularly considering how much improved Windows Live Search is. I now tend to use Live Search alongside—and sometimes instead of—Google. Live Search typically delivers different results and often better ones. But better often doesn't win the market, otherwise DVDs would have replaced Betamax not VHS, and Netscape Communicator would have bested Internet Explorer 4 a decade ago.
Microsoft can still regain share, but it will have to be done through marketing, not lofty acquisitions such as the failed Yahoo takeover. Microsoft's recent Powerset acquisition is a good example of nowhere gains. A Wednesday post on the Powerset blog identifies some of the early integration into Windows Live Search. But I agree with eWEEK colleague Clint Boulton that, at least in the short term, Microsoft won't gain search share because of Powerset.
Live Search is one of the few products or services that Microsoft consistently advertises. But there needs to be more marketing, and it has got to be loads better. Right now, Microsoft's Google problem isn't complex:
* Google has better branding success.
* Google search is available in more places, through deals with AOL, Dell, Mozilla and others.
Google's ad platform may attract advertisers, but not consumers. Most people don't use Google so they can see contextual ads. They want to find stuff. Google's ad platform is only as good as its ability to make money for third parties; search queries are the major agreement. Google should be no problem at all if Microsoft put its priorities in place; people can easily switch search providers. Google Chrome is a problem, but I've blogged about that.
Google: Questions of Monopoly
The search data comes during troubling times for Google. The U.S. Justice Department and European Competition Commission have increased scrutiny of Google's ad deal with Yahoo, which some analyses indicate would lead to 90 percent search share. Google is defending the deal, while Microsoft works behind the scenes to quash the deal.
Under terms of the agreement, Google paid search displays alongside Yahoo's only in Canada and the United States. The agreement is nonexclusive, and Yahoo chooses the search term queries and the pages on which they appear.
