LBi Search: LBi Search Newsletter: April 2009

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Search News and Research

Google Toolbar PageRank update

Google updated the PageRank values which can be seen using the Google Toolbar (also known as "Toolbar PageRank") at the beginning of April. Google's last PageRank update was on 31^st December 2008.

Please note that, although PageRank is calculated on a regular basis within Google itself, the PageRank values which are seen in the Google Toolbar are only updated about every 3-4 months. With this update, new PageRank values should be visible.

Microsoft trademarks new mobile search brand

Microsoft has quietly filed the trademark for the name "Sift" for mobile devices. The application reads: "Operating system software for mobile phones; computer search engine software; computer programs for searching email, text messages, address and contact information." A Microsoft spokeswoman would not comment when asked about intentions for the brand, although Microsoft is believed to be planning to unveil new online services before the launch of Windows Mobile 7.

U.S. Internet advertising revenues up 10.6% in 2008 [IAB]

According to a new report by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP (PwC), U.S. online advertising revenues in 2008 reached at record high of $23.4 billion, up 10.6% from the year before. Fourth quarter revenues were particularly strong - at $6.1 billion it is the first time they have exceeded the $6 billion mark.

The report notes that various sources indicate weakness in overall advertising spending, citing a study by Nielsen which found that overall U.S. advertising revenues declined by 2.6% in 2008.

Yahoo! earnings down 13%

Yahoo!'s Q1 revenue report did not have good news for the company. In a press release Yahoo! said that its earnings were down 13% year-on-year. According to Carol Bartz, CEO of Yahoo!, query volume was up and search share was "stable", but revenue per search had dropped.

Microsoft to put more money into search

AdvertisingAge is reporting that Microsoft is to invest between $80 and $100 million with the aim of increasing its search market share and to be more competitive with Google and Yahoo!

Microsoft self-mockingly referred to its current offering as "MSN Windows Live Search on kumo@microsoft.com" and has previously stated that it is "still considering" its brand name.

Yahoo! update causes consternation

Yahoo! has released another update to its search engine's algorithms. Many commentators have been reporting seeing the number of links listed in Yahoo! SiteExplorer drop and pages dropping out of the search engine's index, and there are suggestions that Yahoo! may be having problems handling 301 redirects properly. The widespread nature of complaints suggest that Yahoo! may be having some teething difficulties with this update.

Google News UK searches dominated by celebrity and entertainment searches [Hitwise]

According to a recent study by Hitwise, Celebrity searches were the top type of searches sending traffic to Google News UK, with 24.1% of searches in this category. When Film, TV and Music searches are included, just over half of all searches were entertainment or celebrity related. The second biggest category was sport, which accounted for 17.5% of searches.

The study looked at the top 300 generic searches on Google News UK, which accounted for a quarter of all the site's search traffic.

New Product Launches

New Google features

Google has been busy in April making changes to its search results pages. Firstly, Google has started to include local search results for non-local search queries. Also at the beginning of the month was the inclusion of search suggestions in Google's image search.

Later in the month Google introduced one-line Sitelinks. These Sitelinks are displayed inline and unlike regular Sitelinks are not limited to the first result. Google has also been experimenting with advanced search options, such as organising results by time or viewing them on a timeline, and has also added a timeline feature to Google News called "Timeline of articles", which lists news articles about a story with a timeline showing the number of articles about the story over time.

Ask.com greatly expands Domain Nav

Ask.com has greatly expanded its Domain Navigation product (also known as "Domain Nav"). This feature, which resembles Google Sitelinks, has now been rolled out for many more queries.

Yahoo! extends analytics to its advertisers

Yahoo! has extended its free analytics service, Yahoo! Web Analytics, to its search and display advertisers. Yahoo! Web Analytics is based on its purchase of analytics service IndexTools in 2008, which was made free to some users shortly after the purchase. Last October Yahoo! Web Analytics was rolled out to users of the Yahoo! Small Business service, and is expected to eventually be free for all users.

Wolfram|Alpha debuted and Google's response?

The Wolfram|Alpha search engine, brainchild of Stephen Wolfram, made its debut at the end of April. CEO of Wolfram|Alpha gave a demonstration of what the "computational knowledge engine" can do. At this stage we would suggest that while it shows a lot of promise, it currently has a very limited set of data to work with, and for now is likely to be of limited use outside of the scientific community. However, Stephen Wolfram says it is a long term project, and we will be following its future development. See also our previous article "A British Google Killer?".

It is interesting that Google chose to announce the launch of a structured data search feature at almost exactly the same time, although later in the month well-known Google employee Matt Cutts wrote to say that this was just a coincidence.

Wikia Search to close

Jimmy Wales, one of the co-founders of Wikipedia, is to cease development of his Wiki-based search engine Wikia Search. The search engine was reportedly only receiving around 10,000 unique users a month, whereas the full set of Wikia properties is receiving several million unique visitors a month and is growing quickly.

Yahoo! GeoCities to close

Yahoo! has decided to close iconic free web hosting service GeoCities. It is no longer possible to create a new account on the service, and existing GeoCities accounts and web sites will be closed later in the year.

Yahoo! paid $3.6 billion in stock for GeoCities in 1999.

Search Industry Market Share Updates

Google increases U.S. market share, slightly [comScore]

comScore has released data covering the February to March period. Google's U.S. Market share of searches increased from 63.3% to 63.7% (up 0.4%). Yahoo! and Microsoft swapped a few visitors, with Yahoo! share dropping down by -0.1% and Microsoft up 0.1%.

Smaller engines Ask.com and AOL were both down more heavily (considering their already small market share figures), with losses of -0.3 and -0.2% overall search share respectively.