Chitika, an advertising network, has pegged Bing as the second-biggest search engine, ahead of Yahoo. It may or may not have the support of other stats, but it might not matter – Bing could have a leg up on Yahoo regardless of what the numbers say.
According to Chitika, Google claimed 81.0 percent of the search traffic flowing through the Chitika network in July, followed by Bing with 10.6 percent and Yahoo with 6.1 percent.
If these numbers are correct, Bing is ahead of Yahoo by a whopping 4.5 percentage points.
This wasn't an overnight success story for Bing – it has had a leg up on Yahoo since the beginning of the year.
The important fact to note is, of course, that Chitika's numbers aren't based on how many searches occur on each search engine, but instead on the number of visitors leaving a search site and coming to websites in Chitika's network.
“It could be that Yahoo remains having more searches at its site, as the major ratings services find, but that less of that traffic is 'escaping' out of Yahoo and to third-party web sites such as those in Chitika’s network,” according to Danny Sullivan at Search Engine Land.
He goes on to discuss how many webmasters have reported that they get far more traffic from Google than the commonly used rankings indicate, and far less traffic from Yahoo. “My own suspicion has been that Yahoo is very good at recycling people who search at Yahoo back into Yahoo’s own properties,” Sullivan writes.
StatCounter's rankings, which, like Chitika, cover North America, seem to dovetail fairly well with Chitika's findings. For August, StatCounter has Google with 84.5 percent of the market, followed by Bing with 7.09 percent and Yahoo with 6.82 percent.
Bing overtook Yahoo in December 2009, but gave up its spot behind Google from March through June.
NetMarketShare and Hitwise, on the other hand, have Yahoo ahead of Bing in their latest rankings, as do comScore and Nielsen.
“What does it mean to have more searches but not have that traffic escape your own network?” asks Mike Melanson at ReadWriteWeb. “Even if all these other ratings services find Bing as taking a smaller piece of the search engine pie, is their piece more valuable because it gets around more?”
While Chitika's findings are interesting and have made for eye-grabbing headlines, it appears wise to hold back any conclusions until we see the other big analytics firm reveal numbers that follow suit.
Besides, one thing remains uncontested: Google is far and away the king of search, despite its apparent attraction to the social media game.
Sources:
http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/chitika_bing_overtakes_yahoo_search.php
http://chitika.com/research/2010/july-search-stats-bing-2-search-engine/
http://searchengineland.com/chitika-bing-passes-yahoo-in-search-market-share-48678
http://gs.statcounter.com/#search_engine-na-monthly-200907-201008
http://www.hitwise.com/us/datacenter/main/dashboard-10133.html
http://www.netmarketshare.com/search-engine-market-share.aspx?qprid=4
http://thenextweb.com/microsoft/2010/08/16/bing-takes-second-place-in-search-from-yahoo/
Jason Hahn
e: jhahn221@gmail.com
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