Google search share down 0.5%!
It seems that people can’t help but go after the successful. Moreover, I’m sick and tired of all the sensationalist title lines that stock market prognosticators can’t help themselves with. For example, this one – “Did Google Just Gag?”
ComScore, a notoriously poor predictor of overall performance, released January 2009 U.S. search share data.
Yes, Google lost a bit of market share but remains 3 times as popular as Yahoo for search in the United States. In the article mentioned above, the author notes that Yahoo has gained share from 19.7% in August to the current 21.0%. Of course, the “Fool” fails to note that Google’s share in August was 63.0%, the very same as it is today. So, long term, Yahoo seems to be taking share not from Google, but from the rest of the industry.
This data also doesn’t even begin to elucidate on world wide market share where Yahoo and Baidu are duking it out for second place in search advertising and where Google continues to hold #1 or #2 position in most major markets. In fact, despite trailing Baidu in China and Yahoo in Japan, Google’s retains top status with 33% of all Asia-pacific search. To put things in perspective, Google derives 50% of its revenue from international sources while Yahoo gains just 24% of its revenues outside the United States. Don’t forget, 50% of Google’s business is greater than the 75% of Yahoo’s business inside the United States. What do you think that means world wide?
Google is a search power house that has become an advertising monster as well. It’s reach across sites and partner networks is derived not just from search success but from success serving advertisements with better relevance and higher conversion rates. Looking at a 0.5% decline in the proportion of queries in a market that was up 7% quarter over quarter overall is no cause for alarm and shouldn’t make for headline grabbing news.
Full Disclosure: Author is long shares of Google at the time of writing.
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Comments
[...] cases for Google, which I’ve written about several times (Google’s earnings power and Google’s search share), remain intact in the long. Does that mean the shares necessarily imply a great risk-reward [...]
yahoo really needs to get with the program, i’ve tried their search and their back end really sucks compared to google.