« SEOs Want The NOINDEX Tag To Not Show A Page In The Index | Main | SEMPO Announces New 2008 Board of Directors »
Feb. 25, 2008 at 1:28pm Eastern by Barry Schwartz
Ask.com Adds More Sponsored Ads, Pushing Organic Results Below Fold
I was messing around with the Ask.com interface on my Mac and decided to compare some results between my Mac browser and Internet Explorer for PC. I noticed that Ask.com is now displaying five sponsored results for many keyword searches. The organic results are now below the fold, like they once were before dropping Jeeves.
One of many searches where you can find five sponsored results at the top of the Ask.com results is for mp3 players.
Here is the result in IE for PCs:
But when you search in Safari or Firefox, you only get three ads at the top:
This is a huge shame. It was one of my biggest complaints back in 2004 with my article named The Little Engine That Could. I blasted Ask.com's representative, where I said back then that by placing so many ads above your organic results, it says that you feel the ads are more relevant than their own search results. It is a shame to see Ask.com moving back in this direction.
|
Like The Story? Vote For It On Yahoo Buzz!
Send me the monthly search newsletter too! (Learn more about our newsletters and feeds) |
Subscribe To Our Search Feed!         
|
| Share & Bookmark This Story! |
By Barry Schwartz
Permalink
Jump To Comments
See Related Stories In: Ask: Sponsored Listings, Ask: Web Search
