Ask has been re-launched following a makeover in the hope of boosting the numbers of people currently using the search engine.The re-launch follows the decision to drop its iconic butler at the beginning of 2006 and the introduction of new applications last year. With rivals increasingly looking at new ways to set themselves apart from Google, Ask will be refocusing on its ability to act as the search engine of choice for those asking questions.
Data from net measurement firm ComScore found that Ask is more often used by people searching for specific answers to questions, which accounts for about 5% of queries to Google, Yahoo! and Microsoft Live Search but accounts for 15% of Ask's searches.
Ask claims that the re-designed site will be faster, produce more relevant search results and utilise improved search technology, with the new site borrowing design ideas from rival Google.
Speaking to the BBC, Cesar Mascaraque, European managing director of Ask, believes it is inevitable that there will be similarities with Google.
"All cars have four wheels. No one wants a car with one wheel," he said.
Mr. Mascaraque is also convinced that Ask is chasing a very specific customer, namely 35 to 55 year olds.
"The 20 year old is never going to use us and, you know what, I don't care."
It was also acknowledged that last year's Ask TV campaign, in which the search engine was portrayed as an underground alternative to Google, was not as successful as the company hoped.
"The ad brought them in but the product let us down," a spokeswoman for Ask told the BBC. "This time we have done a lot of work on the back end."
Ask will be launching a scaled down TV ad campaign focusing on the tricky questions to which people want answers. The campaign will be confined initially to the Midlands area.
Despite a re-design of the site, Ask still have a marathon task in front of them if they want to cut into Google's market share, according Alex Burmaster, analyst with market research firm Nielsen NetRatings.
"For anyone coming into the net in the last few years Google is the lifeblood of their online behaviour," he told the BBC.
"Despite changes to the technology and marketing the figures suggest that Ask hasn't made a difference."
In the UK, Google dominates with an 80% market share compared to just 2% for Ask. In the US, Google's share is slightly less at 60% but Ask's share remains the same.
Despite these figures, searching on Ask remains relatively healthy. During August of this year, 46 million searches were conducted via Ask in the UK which accounts for one in five of all people using a search engine.
The re-designed Ask site will go live in the US from October 6th and in the UK from the 20th October.
