Google Tops, But Yahoo Switch Success So Far
New WebSideStory stats say Google's most popular, but they also reveal that Yahoo's recent replacement ofGoogle results with its own technology doesn't appear to have cost it visitors.
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A longer version of this article for Search Engine Watch members examines how Yahoo’s drop may not be due to Google and how MSN is performing better than you might think. |
New stats from web analytics firm WebSideStory highlight the news often heard before: Google’s most popular, when it comes to search. But they also reveal that Yahoo’s recent replacement of Google results with those from its own crawler-based technology doesn’t appear to have cost it visitors.
WebSideStory’s StatMarket service measures search referral traffic to web sites. This means it can estimate how many people are driven to sites based on searches they perform.
In general, much-used generate more referrals than less-used ones. Thus, having a high-share of search referral traffic can give a search engine bragging search engines about being most popular.
Google Has Biggest Slice Of Referral Pie
On Tuesday, March 23, 2004, WebSideStory examined a sample of over 25 million visits and found that Google had the top share of search referrals, 40.9 percent. It was followed by Yahoo at 27.4 percent, then MSN at 19.6 percent:
WebSideStory also released trend data showing how all three search sites performed for the corresponding Tuesday over four years. Not surprisingly, Google appears as a giant success:
Dropping Google Didn’t Hurt Yahoo
A key question many are wondering is whether Yahoo’s switch from Google to its own search technology has had an impact. The fear for Yahoo is that if its quality isn’t as good as the results previously provided by Google, searchers might start abandoning it.
Personally, I’ve felt Yahoo’s own search technology has often been close to Google’s and doubted many typical Yahoo searchers would even notice the change. Stats from WebSideStory for the beginning of this year that seem to support this:
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The lines show the average of search referral traffic share estimated for Google and Yahoo for each month. As you can see, Google’s showing a rise. However, this hasn’t come at Yahoo’s expense. Yahoo, which dropped Google in mid-February, has so far come through the changeover apparently without any major loss of searchers.
Google Big Outside US
While search remains very competitive inside the US — even “dominant” Google doesn’t have more than half the search referrals — WebSideStory stats paint a different picture for some selected counties:
| Country | Yahoo | |
| Germany | 80.5% | 5.6% |
| UK | 65.6% | 10.8% |
| China | 72.6% | 12.7% |
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A longer version of this article for Search Engine Watch members examines how Yahoo’s drop may not be due to Google and how MSN is performing better than you might think. |
Search Headlines
NOTE: Article links often change. In case of a bad link, use the publication’s search facility, which most have, and search for the headline.
| Hold all bets: Search engines end casino ads… IHT Apr 4 2004 10:41PM GMT |
| Google’s ‘Gmail’ raises concerns… SiliconValley.com Apr 4 2004 7:38AM GMT |
| Google is watching you… Observer Apr 3 2004 11:17PM GMT |
| Google mail is evil – privacy advocates… The Register Apr 3 2004 9:52PM GMT |
| Cyberstalking law should be used as anti-spam weapon… Seattle Times Apr 3 2004 9:30AM GMT |
| Google Users Feeling Yucky… New York Post Apr 3 2004 7:49AM GMT |
| Yahoo promotion upgrades email for some… CNET Apr 3 2004 0:39AM GMT |
| Closing the Last Mile Gap: Local Search… Internet News Apr 2 2004 11:27PM GMT |
| Yes, Yahoo Can Search for Growth… Business Week Apr 2 2004 4:28AM GMT |
| Briefly: Google to align ad prices, conversions… CNET Apr 2 2004 4:24AM GMT |
| Hacking the Google Numrange Operator… WebProNews Apr 2 2004 1:41AM GMT |
| ICANN Reports On WHOIS Inaccuracies… asia.internet.com Apr 1 2004 12:44PM GMT |
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