Apr 5, 2013 at 12:20pm ET by Amy Gesenhues

The data analytics firm Chitika has created an infographic showing search volume for the final four teams in this weekend's NCAA basketball championship tournament. If search interest has any influence on game results, we'll all be watching the University of Louisville men's basketball team beating Michigan next Monday night at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. Louisville also ranks No. 1 for most searched teams according to Bing's Search Blog. Leading the list of most searched players is Kevin Ware, the Louisville player who suffered a severe lower leg injury during the Louisville-Duke game on [...]

New Tool: BigWebStats Aggregates Website Statistics And SEO Data

Apr 2, 2013 at 3:54pm ET by Ginny Marvin

Marketers may want to add BigWebStats to their lists of research tools. The new site pulls a wide range of information on just about any website. Enter a URL and BigWebStats aggregates data from several sources across the Web and displays it in one page, including visitors insights, social engagement, domain and technology information and SEO stats. SEO related information includes H tag counter, a snapshot of indexed pages on Google, Yahoo and Bing, and backlink history, which is pulled from MajesticSEO. Other data sources include SimilarSites, Whois, and Social Buzz. The service reli [...]

Mobile Growth Highlights Importance Of Comprehensive Local Strategy

Apr 1, 2013 at 11:44am ET by Natalie Wuchenich

This week, the Local Search Association is releasing our “Local Mobile Search Study,” which overviews the evolving mobile environment in the U.S. and the growing role of smartphones, tablets and other connected devices in the local search experience. The 2013 study, which features 2012 data compiled from several comScore digital and mobile metrics databases, demonstrates a significant shift in how consumers are accessing the Internet and emphasizes the importance of local businesses embracing mobile platforms as yet another venue to reach consumers. Rise Of Connected Devices Provides [...]

Report: PPC Tablet Spending Up 112%, Smartphones Up 113%

Mar 28, 2013 at 3:48pm ET by Ginny Marvin

The new IgnitionOne Digital Marketing Report for Q1 finds that overall paid search spend in the U.S. was flat for the quarter, while mobile and tablet growth remained strong. Tablet spending rose 112% and smartphone spending jumped 113%. The study suggests that the growth in tablet and mobile is coming from a reallocation from existing budgets for Desktop/PC ads, rather than net new spend. While the gap is smaller than when the report last looked in Q3 2012, the report found a clear differentiat [...]

CPC Decline Ends: Rising 7% In Q1 Due To Mobile & PLAs [Covario]

Mar 28, 2013 at 2:07pm ET by Ginny Marvin

We may have seen the end of CPC stagnation. Covario's Global Paid Search Spend Analysis for Q1, released today, suggests that the cost-per-click trends of the last six quarters have reversed with CPC prices rising 7% from the previous quarter and 23% year-over-year. Overall paid search spend grew 9% quarter-over-quarter and 33% year-over-year. The following chart shows global paid search activity for Q1 ‘13: Google CPCs Rise 39% Year-Over-Year The study suggests that rising CPCs on Google a [...]

Search On Smartphones Up 26 Percent, On Tablets Up 19 Percent In 2012 [Study]

Mar 27, 2013 at 3:12pm ET by Matt McGee

Search continues to shift away from the desktop toward mobile devices. That's one of the conclusions of the just-released Neustar Localeze/15miles/comScore Local Search Study, which is now in its sixth year. This year's study involves a sample of more than 3,000 U.S. adults that say they use the Internet to search for local businesses. Results aren't available online yet, but we'll add a link here when they are. The total number of U.S. searchers using mobile phones grew 26 percent between March 2012 and December 2012, from 90.1 million to 113.1 million searchers. Search on tablets was u [...]

Microsoft “Research” Discovers The Obvious In Renewed Anti-Trust Attack On Google

Mar 26, 2013 at 11:55am ET by Danny Sullivan

Did you know that the higher a site is listed in search results, the more traffic that site is likely to receive? If you're a search marketer, or anyone with a dose of common sense, you do. But Microsoft had research conducted to yet again prove this point, in an attempt to influence the ongoing EU antitrust review against Google. Microsoft's Hired Gun Does Research In a Microsoft blog post today, Susan Athey, a Microsoft consultant and professor of economics at Stanford University's Graduate School of Business, writes about how she worked with those from Microsoft's Bing search engine to c [...]

Google, Bing Both Gain Market Share In February [comScore]

Mar 13, 2013 at 5:16pm ET by Matt McGee

Core search activity was down in February overall, but both Google's and Bing's share of search activity in the U.S. were up during the month. According to comScore's February U.S. search engine rankings, Google's market share rose from 67 percent in January to 67.5 percent in February. Bing's also rose month-over-month, from 16.5 percent to 16.7 percent. Bing's share represents an all-time high, but it was more than offset by a larger decline in Yahoo's overall market share. It fell from 12.1 percent to 11.6 percent in February. ComScore says there were fewer searches in February [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: comScore | Stats: Popularity | Top News

Study: 55 Percent Of Mobile-Search Driven Conversions Happen In One Hour Or Less

Mar 13, 2013 at 10:01am ET by Greg Sterling

Large numbers of people believe that the majority of mobile search activity happens “on the go.” However, according to an extensive new study from Google and Nielsen, the overwhelming majority (77 percent) of mobile search happens at home or work -- even when there’s a PC nearby and readily available. These people are choosing to search on their smartphones rather than PCs because of speed and convenience. And most of these users take some sort of near-immediate, follow-up action. In fact, the study found, 55 percent of mobile-search influenced conversions take place within one hour. [...]

“Better Than Google” Claims: Why Doesn’t Anyone Believe Them?

Mar 11, 2013 at 10:53am ET by Greg Sterling

Microsoft continues to run online its Pepsi-Challenge style ads "Bing It On," in which a majority of users prefer Bing in a "blind comparison test" with Google. Despite the commercials and despite Microsoft reporting that after extensive testing users preferred Bing 2:1, people generally express skepticism. People simply don't buy the campaign. Another recent study conducted by Butler University found that Q&A engine ChaCha bested Google in terms of the quality of answers provided (across nearly 4,000 queries). And last week, YP released the results of an extensive study of local sea [...]

These Five Websites Captured 20% Of All Search Result Clicks

Feb 22, 2013 at 8:31am ET by Matt McGee

Once in every five times that someone clicks a search result, it goes to one of five websites: Facebook, YouTube, Yahoo, Wikipedia or Amazon. That leaves about 80 percent of search clicks for the rest of us. Going further, the top 500 websites received almost 50 percent of all clicks from search results, and the top 10,000 websites got almost 75 percent of all search clicks. All of this is according to the 2013 Digital Marketer Report from Experian Marketing Services (Hitwise). The company says that those five sites I listed above combined to get 20.07 percent of all clicks from US [...]

Search Engines More Trusted Than Social Media For News & Information [Study]

Feb 18, 2013 at 4:01pm ET by Matt McGee

When it comes to getting general news and information, consumers worldwide put as much trust in search engines as they do in traditional media -- and more in both than they do in social media. But, the numbers don't portray any single source as highly trusted, which suggests that consumers are at least trying to vet the accuracy and trustworthiness of what they find in today's information-saturated world. The data comes from the recently released 2013 Edelman Trust Barometer, the 13th annual global survey that uses data from "informed publics" -- college-educated individuals in upper inc [...]

Google Hits 67 Percent Market Share Again, Bing Hits Another All-Time High [comScore]

Feb 13, 2013 at 4:50pm ET by Matt McGee

Core search activity was up pretty substantially in January, and Google's US market share returned to the 67 percent level that it was at in November -- all according to the latest comScore search engine rankings for January 2013. Google's market share rose from 66.7 percent in December to 67 percent in January. Bing's market share was also up, from 16.3 percent in December to 16.5 percent in January -- that's an all-time high for Bing. The Bing gains, as usually happens, were tempered by a similar decline in Yahoo's search market share, leaving the "Bing-powered search" combo still in [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: comScore | Stats: Popularity | Top News

Green Ribbon, Minimum Wage, Climate Changes: Google Searches For The State Of The Union

Feb 13, 2013 at 9:32am ET by Barry Schwartz

Last night, President Obama gave his State of the Union address. During his address, Google was plotting how his speech impacted the types of search queries done on Google last night. Google was sharing statistics and charts throughout the night on their Google Politics Google+ page. Here are some of the interesting trends we saw last night on Google due to the State of the Union address. During the first 15 minutes of the speech, the top rising terms on Google were Green Ribbon, Eliot Engel, Supreme Court Justices, and Steven Chu. There was a 950% spike in interest on search terms [...]

Report: Mobile To Drive A Third Of Paid-Search Clicks By Year End

Feb 12, 2013 at 9:52am ET by Greg Sterling

Marin Software has released a report on paid click, CPC and conversion trends across the globe, with a focus on mobile. Called "The State of Mobile Search Advertising in the World," the 2012 data are drawn from search campaigns conducted in 13 geographies including the US, UK, China, Europe and Australia. Some of the findings, however, will effectively be rendered moot by Google's new Enhanced Campaigns, which lump together PC and tablet targeting and create new default pricing intended, in part, to equalize CPC prices across platforms. Source: Marin Software Marin forecasts in th [...]

Google Still World’s Most Popular Search Engine By Far, But Share Of Unique Searchers Dips Slightly

Feb 11, 2013 at 9:00am ET by Danny Sullivan

No question. Google remains the most used search engine in the world, far outdistancing competitors. But, over the past three months, its share of unique searchers had dipped below 80%, suggesting it has lost some regular searchers. Still, the huge percentage remaining at Google are searching more than ever. Meanwhile, has Yandex really taken the number four spot from Bing? comScore's Worldwide Search Figures The figures come from comScore. They weren't released publicly, but after they emerged on GigaOm, comScore has been providing them to other publications upon request. Most attention has [...]

Has Google Overtaken Naver In South Korea?

Feb 6, 2013 at 9:43am ET by Greg Sterling

Since roughly 2006 Naver has been the leading search site in South Korea. Consistently Google has been unable to break through and -- according to various traffic estimates -- has less than 5 percent of the market there. That's as recently as Q4 of last year according to data I've seen. Mysteriously, however, StatCounter is now showing Google soundly defeating Naver, and having done so since February of last year. I'm not in the habit of checking the status of the Korean search market often so this is the first time I've seen the StatCounter chart. Everything I've seen and read shows [...]

Survey: Half Of Small Businesses Never Update Their Listings Online

Feb 5, 2013 at 9:43am ET by Greg Sterling

ConstantContact's SinglePlatform division has released the results of a new survey of small businesses (SMBs). The "headline" finding is that nearly half (49 percent) say they've never updated their listings online. The survey polled "more than 350" SMBs. Most small businesses are overwhelmed and confused by even basic online marketing. This is reflected in some of the seemingly contradictory findings of the survey: 50 percent of SMBs have seen listings for their business that are not accurate 70 percent of SMBs say they don’t have the time to manage listings on all of the sites t [...]

Bing On Super Bowl 47: San Francisco 49ers Twice As Many Searches Than Baltimore Ravens

Jan 30, 2013 at 3:09pm ET by Barry Schwartz

If search has any influence or say in who will win the Super Bowl this Sunday, Super Bowl XLVII, then the San Francisco 49ers are clear winners. A Bing representative told us that the San Francisco 49ers have twice as many searches than their competitor the Baltimore Ravens. Plus, the 49ers quarterback, Colin Kaepernick, has 50 percent more searches than Raven’s quarterback, Joe Flacco. The Ravens do win when it comes to searchers on the top player. The Raven's linebacker, Ray Lewis, is the most searched on player for Super Bowl XLVII amongst Bing searchers. While Alex Smith is the top [...]

Advertisers Increased PLA Budgets By 600% In Q4; Trend Likely To Continue

Jan 29, 2013 at 9:07am ET by Ginny Marvin

The Google Shopping gamble paid off – for both Google and e-commerce advertisers who ran product listing ad campaigns last quarter. A report from Adobe and a study by RKG each highlighted consumer interest and advertiser opportunity in Google product listing ads. Today, Marin Software released findings showing that, after the transition of Google Shopping to an entirely paid model in October, advertisers increased their share of search budgets directed toward product listing ads by nearly 600%. Those advertisers were rewarded with higher click through rates and lower cost per click than [...]

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