With 2008 behind us, I wanted to look back and plot how search engine market share changed over the year in the United States. No surprises here. Pick your numbers, Google grew and grew. Yahoo and Microsoft dropped by lately have leveled off. Before we do the pretty pictures, I'll repeat my standing philosophy about search market share figures: Avoid drawing conclusions based on month-to-month comparisons. Lots of things can cause one month’s figures to be incomparable to another month. It’s better to see the trend across multiple months in a row. Avoid drawing conclusions b [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Features: Analysis | Stats: Compete | Stats: comScore | Stats: Hitwise | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity | Top News

For the several years Nielsen and local SEM platform provider WebVisible have done research tracking online consumer behavior related to local search. Here is our write up of the previous round of findings from the last survey (October, 2007). Over the weekend I got a preview of some of the data from the most recent survey findings. This latest Nielsen-WebVisible survey captured responses from just under 4,000 U.S. internet users. The questions sought to determine which tools and media they were using to find local business and related information. In the sample were also 261 small business [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Search Engines: Maps & Local Search Engines | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Search Behavior

Nielsen released some UK mobile usage data yesterday that are very interesting on a number of fronts. The highest-level findings reflect that in the UK the mobile internet is growing much faster than the PC internet (8x) and that the average age of mobile users is younger than online. There are now more than 7 million mobile internet users in the UK according to Nielsen. That compares with more than 40 million in the US. The mobile internet audience is about 20 percent the size of the UK online audience. In the US, where the raw numbers are much larger in both categories, the proportion [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Mobile | Features: Analysis | Search Engines: Mobile Search Engines | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity | Stats: Search Behavior | Stats: Size

With the latest search popularity stats now in from Hitwise, Nielsen, comScore, and Compete, it's time to pit them against each other and see what they agree -- and don't agree -- about in terms of search engine popularity. Why not show a full year's worth of data? Ratings methodology changes mean I can only go back to June 2007 for comScore and October 2007 for Nielsen. Normally I would also show raw number of searches in addition to search share. See the caveats section below which explains why this is important. However, I don't have Compete figures this month. Without them, I didn't wa [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: Compete | Stats: comScore | Stats: Hitwise | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

Another ratings service shows Google hitting an all-time high for search share in the United States. This is according to April 2008 search share stats from Nielsen Online that were released (PDF) today. Last week, Hitwise also reported Google hitting a new record. Microsoft also dips below the 10 percent mark for the first time. Here are the percentage shares for the top five search engines shown in the pie chart above: Google: 62.0% Yahoo: 17.5% Microsoft: 9.7% AOL: 4.3% Ask: 2.1% Note that in the chart above, traffic from Ask.com-owned My Web Search is not combined by Nielsen with the [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

I've now compiled the latest search popularity stats from Hitwise, Compete, comScore, and Nielsen Online. That means it's time to put them all together once again, to see what a "panel" of ratings services agree on -- and don't agree on -- in terms of search engine popularity. Why not show a full year's worth of data? Ratings methodology changes mean I can only go back to June 2007 for comScore and October 2007 for Nielsen. Also, in terms of raw number of searches, Hitwise doesn't report these, so they aren't on the number of searches charts below. Services shown in the charts blow [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: Compete | Stats: comScore | Stats: Hitwise | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

Continuing from previous search stats from Hitwise, Compete, and comScore, Nielsen Online is now out (PDF file) with search engine share figures in the United States for March 2008. Similar to Hitwise and comScore, Google remains at a high but unlike some of the others, Microsoft and Yahoo come off lows. Searches that happened on the five top search engines in the pie chart above: Google: 58.7% Yahoo: 18.1% Microsoft: 12.0% AOL: 4.1% Ask: 2.4% Note that in the chart above, traffic from Ask.com-owned My Web Search is not combined by Nielsen with the Ask figure. If it were, the Ask figure [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

I've now compiled the latest search popularity stats from Nielsen, comScore, Hitwise, and Compete. That means it's time to put them all together, to see what a "panel" of ratings services agree on -- and don't agree on -- in terms of search engine popularity. Ordinarily, I'd love to cover an entire year's worth of data from each service. Unfortunately, I've previously written how changes in rating methodology mean I can only go back six months for comScore and two months for Nielsen, at the moment. I can go back a full year for Compete and Hitwise, but when doing comparisons, I l [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: Compete | Stats: comScore | Stats: Hitwise | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

It's search popularity stats time, now that the figures are in from all the major ratings services. I'm starting off with those from Nielsen Online, the former Nielsen NetRatings. For November 2007, they show the usual picture -- Google leading the pack, followed by Yahoo and Microsoft. You'll find the press release here (PDF format), showing the top ten most popular services. Here are the top five: Google: 57.7% Yahoo: 17.9% Microsoft: 12.0% AOL: 4.5% Ask: 2.7% The figures above are the percentage of all US searches handled by the leading search engines. Here are the numbers in pie chart [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

Continuing on with this month's search popularity stats review, I'm turning now to those from Nielsen NetRatings, after having looked at Hitwise stats yesterday. Like yesterday's stats, those from NetRatings are from August 2007. They show Google on top, Yahoo fairly steady and Microsoft largely holding on to gains made in June. You'll find the press release here (PDF format), showing the top ten most popular services. Here's the top five: Google: 53.6% Yahoo: 19.9% Microsoft: 12.9% AOL: 5.6% Ask: 1.7% The figures above are the percentage of all US searches handled by leading search [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity

Nielsen//NetRatings found that in June and July of this year the major search engines enjoyed high user retention but also high audience overlap, suggesting that audiences are actively using two and three engines. Search engines saw the highest user retention of the three categories that Nielsen compared and examined (search, travel, jobs). According to the release: Among the categories, search providers had the highest visitor retention rates, with an average of 71 percent of June visitors at home returning in July among the three leading search players. Google Search led with a retention [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity | Stats: Search Behavior

According to the Nielsen-measured, Online Publishers Association-sponsored Internet Activity Index, Internet users are spending more time with content sites, less time with "communications" and marginally more time with search. According to OPA president Pam Horan's prepared statement, "The index indicates that, over the last four years, the primary role of the Internet has shifted from communications to content." During the period studied, search increased from 3 percent of time spent (2003) to 5 percent (2007). Social networking sites were also found to gain in the survey. [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Search Behavior

Earlier I wrote of the latest search popularity stats out from Hitwise and said those from other companies would be coming. Next up, Nielsen//NetRatings. The most recent figures out (PDF format) for February 2007 from NetRatings show a significant Google gain at Yahoo's expense. Live.com also shows a notable gain. But the figures also show the "search pie" itself grew massively. Here are the figures for February 2007, showing the estimated percentage of all home and work searches done in the United States that were handled by each search network: Google: 55.8% Yahoo: 20.7% Micros [...]

Related Topics: Channel: Strategy | Stats: NetRatings | Stats: Popularity