Topic: MSN

Bing Passes 10% Market Share, Nielsen Says

The latest search engine stats from Nielsen bring good news for Bing, which now has more than 10% market share for the first time in … well, longer than I can remember. Nielsen says Bing captured 10.7% of all searches in August, up from 9.0% in July. Based on that jump, Nielsen says Bing is […]

Bing 2.0 “Visual Search” Launches, Allows Search By Pictures

Microsoft has unveiled Bing 2.0 at TechCrunch50 today, also known as Bing Visual Search, which allows people to “search by picture.” After much speculation following Microsoft’s annual meeting last week in Seattle, many had expected to see an update to Bing Maps,  integrating  Silverlight technology to display images of local businesses and locations within map […]

SearchCap: The Day In Search, August 31, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Still No. 1 Search Engine On Earth; Search Activity Way Up, comScore Says Search activity around the world jumped 41 percent between July 2008 and July 2009, and Google remains […]

Best Search Engine In Canada? Hitwise Says It’s Bing

In a detailed report about the Canadian search landscape, Hitwise says Bing is the best search engine at producing “successful searches,” beating out both Google and Yahoo, as well as their Canada-specific search engines. The chart above, provided specifically to Search Engine Land, shows that Bing is the 6th most popular search engine in Canada, […]

Google Tops In Search Satisfaction According To Pre-Bing Survey

On an annual basis the University of Michigan puts out the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) E-Business report, sponsored and administered by Foresee Results. Among the things the index examines is consumer satisfaction with search engines. The survey asks a representative sample of consumers to rate their experiences with portals and search engines according to […]

What Micro-Hoo Might Mean For Local Search

As the dust begins to settle on the Microsoft-Yahoo search deal, we’re finding that this week’s announcement raised as many questions as it answered. The companies told Danny and Greg that the agreement covers “web, image, and video search.” But what about the many search verticals that Yahoo and Microsoft are involved in? These are […]

The Microsoft-Yahoo Search Deal, In Simple Terms

What a day! Still trying to digest all the news about the Yahoo Microsoft search deal? So are we. While answers are still coming in, here’s what we know so far. NOTE: The deal has now been approved. See Yahoo & Microsoft Receive Go Ahead To Implement Search Deal. In a nutshell, what just happened? […]

Twitter’s Delicate Dance With Google, Microsoft, & Others

A series of private documents reveals Twitter to be a company that’s very careful and detailed about the course it’s plotting, while simultaneously being very nervous and very ambitious about what the future holds. It also reveals previously unknown details of discussions with Google and Microsoft (and possibly Yahoo) that show Twitter considering formal relationships […]

SearchCap: The Day In Search, June 19, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Goes Rainbow For Gay-Related Searches Google Operating System notes that Google is once again flying rainbow colors to support gay pride celebrations happening this month throughout the world. Certain searches […]

Bing: comScore sees Gains; Compete Sees Same Old, Same Old

More early stats are coming in on how searchers are reacting to the Bing launch. comScore shows Microsoft’s Bing search engine continuing to make gains, but Compete shows things remain largely the same. From comScore, the latest stats show that “searcher penetration” has climbed from 13.7% in the week before it launched, to 15.8% during […]

Schmidt: Bing Can’t Buy Search Love With Ads; Gotta Earn It

CEO Eric Schmidt has weighed in on the Bing launch — and he’s not sounding panicked, not that I would expect him to be. But he certainly puts out a conflicted message that Bing isn’t a serious competitor and yet argues that it’s serious enough that talk of a Google monopoly seems “unwarranted.” Plus, a […]

SEO

Satya Nadella Keynote At Bing Search Summit

Satya Nadella, SVP of Microsoft’s Online Services Division, gave the morning keynote at the Microsoft Search Summit. It was an introduction to and tour of Bing and adCenter upgrades and improvements. Nadella began with a review of the search market and its growth. He was initially apologetic to the audience about Microsoft’s market share. He […]

Live Blogging SMX Keynote With Microsoft’s Qi Lu

I’m live blogging Danny’s interview with Qi Lu, head of search for Microsoft. Before the interview begins we first see one of the new Bing TV commercials, which is funny. Under the heat of the lights Danny and Qi Lu take off their outer shirts: Lu wears a Bing shirt, Danny has one one that […]

SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 11, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: MSN Overhauls City Guides, Integrates With Live Search MSN and Live Search probably don’t get enough attention in the local search field, but the reality is that there’s a solid core […]

MSN Overhauls City Guides, Integrates With Live Search

MSN and Live Search probably don’t get enough attention in the local search field, but the reality is that there’s a solid core of usage thanks to the default experience offered on many PCs — Windows OS and Internet Explorer. (On a purely anecdotal level, an old blog post I wrote about adding a business […]

SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 7, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Microsoft Adds Photosynth To Virtual Earth Microsoft’s innovative Photosynth technology has been integrated into Virtual Earth, marking the first time Photosynth has been available for commercial use. Photosynth is a tool […]

Microsoft Announces 3,000 New Layoffs

Today, Microsoft announced that it had delivered layoff notices to 3,000 employees across several divisions (1,200 in Washington state). This comes just months after an initial round of 1,400 who were let go when Microsft announced second quarter earnings. At that time, Microsoft said it planned to eliminate 5,000 jobs this year, and Microsoft’s CEO […]

SearchCap: The Day In Search, May 4, 2009

Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web. From Search Engine Land: Google Starts To Leverage Latitude Location Through New Apps Google is now expanding its map-based, location-aware service Latitude beyond the the Latitude destination in new ways with a public location sharing […]

Search Queries Are Getting Longer: Hitwise Report

More than half of all search queries are at least three words long, and more than a third are four words or longer. That’s according to Hitwise data (PDF) released today: As the chart shows, 1- and 2-word queries are becoming less common, while 4-, 5-, and all the way up to 8+ word queries […]

Report: Microsoft To Lay Off 15,000 Workers

There are reports that Microsoft is getting ready to lay off 17% of their workforce on this new year. The layoffs are expected to happen on or around January 15th. So it looks like the rumors are right and this recession is going to hit one of the most successful technology companies of all time. […]

Tough Love For Microsoft Search

Back in June, I spoke at Microsoft as part of a regular series for those involved with its webmaster tools group and anyone generally interested in search. My talk was called “Tough Love For Microsoft Search,” and I covered various reasons why I felt the company has generally failed to make headway in the space. […]

SEO

SearchBiz: Microsoft Search General Manager Brad Goldberg Leaving, Twitter Gets Serious About Revenue & Google Gives Good License

Microsoft’s GM of search product management (on the marketing side), Brad Goldberg, is leaving the company to become CEO of online business at investment firm Peak6. This doesn’t impact the technical side of search at Microsoft, which just hired former Yahoo search exec Qi Lu to head up its overall online business unit. There’s also […]

Live Search Testing New Crawler; MSNBot/2.0b

The Live Search Blog announced they are letting a new robot loose. The new search engine crawler is named msnbot/2.0b and will be added to the army of current MSN spiders, currently named msnbot/1.1. The new spider is currently being tested but will ultimately replace the old spider. The new spider will respect the current […]

Live Search Adds Malware Warnings To Search Results

MSN’s Live Search has announced the addition of malware warnings to their search results pages. In doing so, Live Search joins Google and Yahoo in taking a proactive stance against potentially dangerous sites; Google began adding malware warnings in early 2007. Yahoo added SearchScan alerts in May of this year. The Live Search implementation is […]

SEO

SearchBiz: MSFT’s Online Struggles; More on Yahoo-AOL; Cuts At Technorati

Fortune magazine asks why Microsoft can’t make money online, and shares some striking numbers: The company’s Online Services unit, which includes Live Search, aQuantive, and the MSN portal, lost $480 million in the quarter that ended September 30th — 80% more than the same quarter a year ago. Ouch! Why the struggles? The article suggests […]

SEO

SearchBiz: MSN Staff Shuffles; GOOG Gains; eMarketer On 2009 Ad Spending

AllThingsD and paidContent.org are both reporting on staffing changes at MSN. AllThingsD calls it a case of “musical chairs,” and that seems pretty accurate based on a memo sent out by Greg Nelson of the Global Media Group. Nelson himself is now under Satya Nadella, Senior VP of Search, and Erik Jorgensen, Corporate VP of […]