Ask’s New App Search To Be Powered By Quixey

Quixey and Ask have entered into a deal in which apps from Quixey’s database, whether for mobile or the PC, will be integrated into search results. It’s going live today and should be rolling out now, although it’s not yet live for me.

Apps in Ask search results will be from Android, iOS, Windows Phone and Blackberry.

Tomer Kagan, co-founder and CEO of Quixey, says that apps can equally be “answers” to search queries. Apps thus become one more content category for end users. While app search has existed for some time in specialized sites and app stores, the further mainstreaming of app search in this way will be helpful for everyone.

In the near term the Quixey data in search results will be conservatively triggered. They’ll be threaded into results (with some A/B testing going on). There will also be a new “apps” tab at the top of the page. When platforms (“Windows Phone,” “iOS,” “Android”) are named or the word “app” is used explicitly as part of the query, Quixey results will appear.

Over time, however, the presentation of apps will expand to queries that aren’t specifically requesting them. For example, according to Quixey, “When users search ‘watch Toy Story,’ they’ll no longer get sent arbitrary Rotten Tomato links and fragmented YouTube clips, rather, they’ll get a way to watch the movie online through apps such as Hulu, Netflix and HBOGO.”

Immediately below is what an “app search” result looks like currently on Ask. The second screenshot reflects what a search result will soon look like when Quixey data are triggered.

Users will be able to interact directly with apps through search results and co-branded landing pages. Revenue from paid apps sales will be shared between Ask and Quixey. App-related ads are contemplated for the future. For now, however, the integration will be entirely focused on the organic section of the page.

Kagan sees the Quixey-Ask partnership as a broad one that will grow over time. Regarding the inevitable question about whether this will help Ask vis-a-vis Google and its other search competitors, the answer is uncertain. Ask has lots of traffic and usage and so this deal will be meaningful for Quixey and potentially for developers.

However it’s not clear whether it will win Ask any new users or merely reinforce the loyalty of existing users today. To varying degrees the other engines present apps and app-links in search results. Among them, Yahoo offers the most useful and visually interesting presentation of app content today.

Below are example screens showing results for the query “cooking apps.”

Yahoo also has a dedicated apps tab and advanced filters for apps.

Based the screenshots I’ve seen thus far the Quixey-Ask integration will look similar to what Yahoo is doing today.