Search Engine Satisfaction Dips Slightly; Google & Bing Effectively Tied

Look out, Google. In the annual American Customer Satisfaction Index for search engines, Bing has practically matched the search leader’s consumer satisfaction score for the second year in a row, with Ask.com not that far behind. Bing Barely Behind Google The scores look like this: Google: 82 points Bing: 81 points Ask.com: 80 points Yahoo: 78 points […]

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Look out, Google. In the annual American Customer Satisfaction Index for search engines, Bing has practically matched the search leader’s consumer satisfaction score for the second year in a row, with Ask.com not that far behind.

Bing Barely Behind Google

The scores look like this:

  • Google: 82 points
  • Bing: 81 points
  • Ask.com: 80 points
  • Yahoo: 78 points

On the ASCI scale, 100 would be a perfect score. Google earned 82, or what I’d call a B letter grade. But Bing was just behind by one point, and that makes it effectively tied with Google. Writes ACSI:

Once trailing Google by three points, Bing is now just one point behind Google in terms of customer satisfaction, which is within the margin of error and means that they are neck-and-neck in terms of providing their users with an excellent customer experience.

One aspect users liked about Bing was its design. ACSI noted:

When asked: “What do you like best about this search engine site?,” a full 55% of those surveyed about Bing liked Bing’s ease of use more than any other search engine.

Before assuming that Bing’s recent redesign deserves credit here, keep in mind that Bing is down a point from last year (as is Google). The redesign (which I like) didn’t seem to improve Bing’s score, nor did the increasing complexity of Google’s search page seem to have hurt Gogle, given that Bing had the same drop.

This Year Like Last Year

All in all, it was really a year of nothing largely changing. Yahoo also dropped a single point from the previous year. Ask.com stayed steady. The overall trend:

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Yahoo’s challenging, because the ACSI category measures “Portals & Search Engines.” Are customers considering Yahoo as a search engine or portal? It’s not clear. Also measured are MSN (78 points this year) and AOL (74 points). I’ve not listed them, as they seem much more firmly in the portal camp.

Search Satisfaction Drops Slightly

Overall, search satisfaction also stayed about the same, dropping only a point from 80 last year to 79 this year:

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The overall rate still hasn’t matched the high of 83 points in 2009. However, ACSI said that the Portals & Search Engines category is the highest rated one in its E-Business Index, which includes internet news and information sites, portals and search engines and social media sites.

ACSI also released new social media satisfaction scores today. See our story on that: Google+ Debuts With ACSI Consumer Satisfaction Score Well Above Facebook’s.


Opinions expressed in this article are those of the guest author and not necessarily Search Engine Land. Staff authors are listed here.


About the author

Danny Sullivan
Contributor
Danny Sullivan was a journalist and analyst who covered the digital and search marketing space from 1996 through 2017. He was also a cofounder of Third Door Media, which publishes Search Engine Land and MarTech, and produces the SMX: Search Marketing Expo and MarTech events. He retired from journalism and Third Door Media in June 2017. You can learn more about him on his personal site & blog He can also be found on Facebook and Twitter.

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