Bigmouthmedia search engine news: traffic-analysis

Where do searchers go after leaving Ask UK?

Mon, 28 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT

With the Microsoft-Yahoo-Google tangle dominating search headlines for the last two months, it's been a quiet time for Ask.

The exit of then CEO Jim Lanzone in January was followed by a change in direction from the search engine, which has aimed to concentrate on appealing to and retaining its most loyal followers.

However, recent research by comScore has revealed that Ask's new strategy might not be working as well as it hopes - at least in the UK. According to the figures, Google receives more traffic from users leaving Ask UK than eBay and Microsoft sites, its two closest rivals, combined. March's figures from comScore show that YouTube, Google Search, Blogger properties and Google Maps are highly ranked outgoing traffic sites.

ComScore's Media Metrix "outgoing traffic losses" report indicates the web properties that users browse after visiting Ask UK. The top outgoing traffic sites are dominated by search engines, social networks and portals.

1. Google Sites
2. eBay
3. Microsoft Sites
4. Ask Network
5. Yahoo! Sites
6. BBC Sites
7. Facebook
8. Bebo
9. Wikipedia Sites
10. Yellow Book Network

The combined top ten accounts for nearly 30% of Ask UK's outgoing traffic losses - and the outgoing top ten is a near mirror image of the incoming top ten.

1. Google Sites
2. Microsoft Sites
3. eBay
4. Ask Network
5. Yahoo! Sites
6. BBC Sites
7. AOL
8. Facebook
9. Virgin Media
10. Amazon Sites

ComScore's incoming and outgoing traffic rankings include traffic generated by click through activity, but also takes into account users entering new addresses in their browser bar or selecting bookmarks.

Ask's current CEO is Jim Safka, who also runs IAC's investment arm Primal Ventures. In March, bigmouthmedia reported on Ask's change of direction, through which it hopes to gain the patronage of women searching for information on entertainment and health.

At the time, Charlene Li - an analyst for Forrester Research - (perhaps prophetically) claimed: "It's a smart move. I still think Ask has great technology but it's just really hard to fight against Google."

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Ladies love Yahoo's Buzz more

Thu, 24 Apr 2008 12:00:00 GMT

Yahoo Buzz was launched late in February 2008 as a social news and meme tracking site. Through Buzz, Yahoo works with hand selected publishers to feed stories to the community and then allows the community to vote for the stories which should make the headlines.

The most popular stories may make it onto Yahoo's homepage - potentially a generator of formidable traffic - and, as a result, publishers are queuing up to be included by the site.

The fact that publishers need to have prior approval from Yahoo before their stories appear is the main differentiator between Yahoo Buzz and well-established social news sites like Digg and Reddit. To some, this aspect of Yahoo Buzz may lend it a strong degree of legitimacy, while others might see it as a site that takes away the variety and unpredictability that make social news sites like Digg so popular.

Nevertheless, comScore's Media Metrix has figures for Yahoo Buzz's performance in March, which reveal that the new site is already a strong competitor to Conde Nast's Reddit.com - an impressive achievement in its first two months of existence. According to the statistics, Digg clocked up 1, 617 000 visits in March, Reddit pulled in 54, 000 and Yahoo Buzz made 43, 000.

The demographic analysis of visitors reveals the true differences between Digg and Yahoo Buzz. Digg is largely a male dominated site with female visitors making up only a quarter of the audience. Yahoo Buzz, on the other hand, is roughly evenly split between male and female visitors.

Moreover, Yahoo Buzz does particularly well in engaging its visitors. The average amount of time spent on Yahoo Buzz per visit is much higher than that of either Reddit or Digg. Women spend the most time on Yahoo Buzz with an average visit length of 1.7 minutes. This is nearly six times longer than the 0.3 minutes men tend to spend on Reddit.

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Google hints at new ad formats at SES New York

Tue, 18 Mar 2008 12:00:00 GMT

During a heated Orion Panel at Search Engine Strategies New York Google hinted that the search engine is developing advertising options suited to Universal Search.

Google's Universal Search blends traditional text search results with videos, news, maps and other data. John Battelle noted that Universal Search seemed to break Google's traditional revenue model of driving traffic to websites and monetising the click. In some cases Universal Search result pages offered by Google are the only page a searcher looks at as the searcher has no need to look any further.

In response to direct questioning from Federated Media's Battelle, Google conceded that the search engine had explored advertising options suited to Universal Search. The comments came from Jack Menzel, Google's Product Manager from Universal Search.

Menzel later admitted that he was surprised by statistical analysis provided by comScore. James Lamberti, Senior Vice President of Search and Media at comScore, took the Search Engine Strategies' audience through analysis of over 1.2 billion search queries at Google. ComScore's figures showed that 17% of Google results ended in some aspect of Universal Search being shown. Of the original set of 1.2 billion searches over 220 million search results included one or more video, news, map, weather, stock or image results.

ComScore's data mining revealed that the number of clicks on Google's AdWords reduced whenever an Universal Search element was present on the results page. The panel, moderated by Search Engine Watch's Kevin Ryan, discussed whether this reduction of clicks represented a threat to Google's earnings.

Lyndsay Menzies, from the digital marketing agency bigmouthmedia, explained how Universal Search increased both branding considerations and tracking challenges in search marketing. Menzies noted that a shift in thinking was required from brands previously used to ROI and ROAS only analytic models from their search campaigns. Universal Search is both an opportunity and a threat to brands.

Mike Grehan, co-moderator of the panel, and bigmouthmedia's Menzies noted that the expectations of searchers are changing. Searchers are increasingly familiar with rich interfaces offered by web 2.0 sites and the vanilla "ten blue links" format traditionally offered by Google would begin to disappoint. Universal Search represented Google's efforts in offering the most relevant search results to this generation of searchers.

Taking the audience through a typical e-commerce scenario, Menzies described how a search for a laptop may begin with the user examining pictures of different laptops on Google Universal, then researching via organic results before completing a purchase through an AdWords link.

The debate concluded with comScore revealing that although paid search clicks reduced on Universal Search, conversation rates increased. Google also reminded the audience that the search engine intends to continue to experiment with search results formats.

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Upcoming holidays 'drive US web activity'

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Retail sites in the US experienced growth during October as consumers began to prepare for the upcoming Christmas holiday season, new research indicates.

According to figures produced by comScore, e-cards, flowers, gifts and greetings sites all saw a surge in demand over the month.

E-card sites saw an increase in demand over the month of 23 per cent - experiencing a total of 33.8 million visitors - and making it the top-gaining category for October.

Most popular within this category were the American Greetings properties, followed by Evite.com and Hallmark.com.

Meanwhile, the flowers/gifts/greetings category experienced a jump in popularity of 22 per cent during the month, reaching a total of 35.6 million visitors.

Within this category, PartyCity.com saw the most significant rise in visitor numbers, increasing by 151 per cent and experiencing 3.5 million hits.

Commenting on the figures, Jack Flanagan, executive vice president of comScore Media Metrix, stated: "Holidays were the primary driver of Americans' web activity during the month.

"With retailers moving their holiday season promotions earlier and earlier, October now represents the unofficial beginning of the holiday retail season."

The increase in traffic to a number of online retail categories indicates that US consumers were already initiating their hunt for "holiday bargains", he added.

Figures released earlier this month by comScore revealed that e-commerce spending in the US during October was 19 per cent higher than it was a year ago, totalling almost $10 billion.

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OpenSocial riding high with surge in Plaxo's traffic

Wed, 21 Nov 2007 12:00:00 GMT

What a great start for Google's OpenSocial application. Here at bigmouthmedia, we've been keen to find out how successful their new foray into social networking would be. Now it seems that our questions have been answered with reports that Plaxo Pulse has seen a massive increase in traffic, directly linked to the announcement of their involvement with OpenSocial.

Plaxo's traffic leapt from 200,000 around the OpenSocial launch date to more than one million on November 14th - a staggering figure. It looks like Google may be onto a winner.

Plaxo Pulse, the photo and news sharing application of Plaxo, went live with OpenSocial on the first of November and it seems that their enthusiasm to embrace Google's new technology is paying off. John McCrea, VP of Plaxo marketing, said on the Palxo blog that, since announcing their role in Google's OpenSocial initiative:

"We have experienced a surge so strong that we had to expedite a hardware order, and shift focus temporarily from new features to scalability."

He acknowledges that the truly Open Social Web Plaxo he would like to see will require a lot of hard work - but appears quietly confident that the initiative will result in a secure web-wide platform from OpenSocial.

With forerunning social networking sites such as Engage.com, Bebo, Friendster and MySpace also implementing OpenSocial, and the ultimate goal being for any social website to be able to use OpenSocial's API and host third party social applications, it's clear that Google is aiming high. The search engine says that OpenSocial is the way to a happier Open Social Web, where developers cut costs by being able to write and maintain applications that work on multiple sites.

However some voices of dissent can be heard in the online jungle. An article in the The New York Times alleged that OpenSocial is a strategy designed with the one-upmanship of Facebook in mind.

It's true that the announcement of OpenSocial came just a week after Microsoft successfully won an advertising bid with Facebook, but whether Google have a vendetta against any particular social networking site is something we can only speculate on. What is undeniable is that a success story for OpenSocial may result in an unprecedented position of control for the internet giants - right at the centre of social networking.

OpenSocial certainly has the potential to explode the social networking domain and increase traffic for sites such as Plaxo Pulse. And, with Google pushing competition as well as cooperation, surely the average user can only benefit from the fierce battle for their attention - that is, if they don't become lost in a blizzard of applications every time they sign into a social networking site.

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Ask launches new search site

Tue, 05 Jun 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Ask.com are getting ready to launch their new search site. And while analysts are said to be impressed by their range of fresh features, many are asking: will the site 'wow' consumers enough to take it above its competitors?

Many believe it will. Greg Sterling, founder of consultancy Sterling Market Intelligence, said he was impressed with the organization and design of the new Ask site, while Charlene Li of Forrester Research said it beats Google's new interface "hands down" and is thus certain to grab notice.

And notice is what they're after - even if it's not exactly new notice. While Doug Leeds, vice president of product management at Ask, doesn't expect the site to attract a huge number of new users, the goal is to have the current 25 million unique U.S. visitors and 50 million worldwide visitors become more frequent, loyal Ask users instead of using the site only occasionally, as is the current case.

Ask will now feature a new interface design and re-engineering, with a simple homepage default, customizable backgrounds, new video search powered by Blinkx and the option to view video previews, play music clips and enlarge images quickly and more easily than many other search sites. Moreover, search results will be based on the user's location, and information on local businesses and events can even be saved into a folder to enable easy sharing with others.

However, the most prominent change is the incorporation of all types of search onto one page: the results page will be divided into three sections, granting its new name, 'Ask 3D'. The left side of the page will include the general search box, which can expand and narrow down results, while the right side will offer a customized search option. For example, a search for a particular movie will return video trailers, targeted film news and local show times based on the location of the user. And lastly, the centre section of the search page will contain Smart Answers, which display the most likely results that preview the page.

However, some are doubtful about the potential success of the project. After all, Ask's main competitor is - you guessed it - Google. And when Google, who hold 50 per cent of the search market, have a say in the matter, the odds are usually in their favour. According to research firm comScore, Ask currently rank fourth behind Yahoo! and Microsoft, but just ahead of AOL, with 5 per cent of the total market share.

Still, others are holding hopeful scepticism on the matter. Barry Parr, a Jupiter analyst, said:

"I don't think this change alone is going to bolt [Ask] into being a top tier player. On the other hand, I think a lot of people are going to find that this is a good experience for them and that it is something they enjoy using."

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Newspaper websites booming

Wed, 09 May 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Newspaper website audiences are growing at almost twice the rate of the overall online audience level, according to a recent study by Nielsen//NetRatings.

The Newspaper Association of America (NAA) revealed that 37.6 per cent of all active internet users visited newspaper websites each month in the opening quarter of 2007.

This represents an average of over 59 million people and is a 5.3 per cent increase over the same period a year ago.

In comparison, over the same period the overall internet browsing audience increased by just 2.7 per cent.

The NAA's president and chief executive John F Sturm suggested that the figures validated the industry's investment in digital innovation and the "ongoing attraction consumers have to newspapers online".

He added that newspaper publishers had "aggressively transformed" business models and continued to provide "ground-breaking content to consumers".

According to the data, visitors to newspaper websites have higher household incomes, shop online more frequently and are more likely to hold managerial or professional posts than other internet users.

"This data underscores the value newspaper websites offer advertisers with their ability to attract a discriminating, high-income audience," Mr Sturm commented.

"The educated, highly engaged consumers who visit these sites for news and research on the latest products are also more likely to make purchases online than other internet users."

Shawn Riegsecker, chief executive of Chicago-based company Centro, said the findings were no surprise to him because consumers are becoming more sophisticated at navigating the web.

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Changing trends in the retail sector for Valentine's gifts

Tue, 20 Feb 2007 12:00:00 GMT

It only took two days for the people at Hitwise UK to release the industry stats showcasing the big winners in the crucial week leading up to Valentines Day 2007. Following on from the peaks in November and December with the Christmas ecommerce spend, Valentine's Day is the first major event in the 2007 calendar to which marketers build up, with businesses in the flowers and gifts sector spending heavily to gain crucial market share.

The data this year in the run up to Valentine's Day is especially insightful, as it reveals three key trends in the retail market that all search engine optimisation specialists will be considering as they plan future ecommerce strategies.

1. Big brands still have the advantage

Firstly, the results show that it's still the big brands who are leading the way. Tesco Flowers were at the top of the Hitwise table for market share of UK internet visits in the week prior to Valentines Day for the second year in a row, with 4.45% of the overall visits to the Flowers and Gifts sector. In second place were Tesco's major rivals in this space, Interflora UK, with 3.94% of the market share.

Both Tesco and Interflora rank very well for the generic term 'flowers' on Google UK. Tesco have the slight edge on this keyword but Interflora rank ahead on the other popular term 'Valentines Flowers', so both brands are evenly matched on the organic SEO front. The other brand which performs very well in the organic search space on Google UK is Serenata Flowers but, crucially, this site does not appear in the Hitwise table. The difference here is that Interflora and Tesco both possess the brand trust factor and the mass appeal that attracts consumers, giving them a big advantage over pure play competitors who don't have the same offline presence.

Nielsen NetRatings recently released figures which highlighted that as many as 45% of online shoppers still have concerns about the handling of credit card and personal details when buying from ecommerce sites. This backs up the fact that shoppers are more likely to trust the brands they shop from regularly as opposed to the ones who might have the best deal. Evidently, the brand and brand reputation is still a crucial component to winning the battle for online spending.

2. The Top 10 are having their market share squeezed

By analysing Hitwise statistics from 2005 and 2006, it can be seen that this year's results indicate the changing market share of the top ten sites in comparison to previous years. If we analyse the chart below we can see how the landscape has changed in just two years.

The chart indicates that a greater number of competitors are taking a piece of the pie at the expense of the top ten (who remain largely similar), squeezing the amount of traffic by nearly 15% in two years. The big players will be glad to see their names remain at the top of the list, but at the same time they will want to reverse this trend and grab a greater share of the market.

3. Key Influence Forums can have a significant impact

Hitwise analyst Heather Hopkins picked out Moonpig in her recent blog post as the real winners this Valentines Day. Moonpig, a company behind personalised cards certainly had a bumper year, rising from 31st place in the chart in 2006 to 3rd this time around. Hopkins' picks out huge traffic increases to Moonpig from two community sites, Hot UK Deals and Martin Lewis's MoneySavingExpert.com, as a key reason behind the surge in traffic prior to February 14th, and also suggests that the site went viral as referrals from MSN hotmail had increased significantly.

It is no doubt that these two Key Influence Forums can be a major factor in whether a site experiences a huge traffic spike. However it's likely that Moonpig were not major benefactors, since a leaked promotional code allowed thousands of users to obtain free (or close to free) Valentine's Day cards.

A post in a forum of Hot UK Deals (viewed over 17,000 times) explaining how to get free cards again and again looks to be the real reason Moonpig jumped up in the Hitwise table, and although we can't be certain, it is likely Moonpig found out too late to change the offer before thousands of web users had taken advantage of it.

So the lesson here is that these forums can make an offer go viral (and drive significant uplifts in sales), but it's still important that retailers are aware that promotional and discount codes are likely to be shared on a mass scale if the offer is exceptional.

In summary, as the numbers of online shoppers continues to rise, so do the challenges facing the major ecommerce players fighting for the spend around big events like Valentine's Day. Big brands look set to continue to lead the market on the back of their brand trust and reputation, but the growing competition from all angles will be a concern.

Elsewhere it's important all retailers are aware of the influence of community sites and how promotional codes can go viral so quickly that retailers have to react fast to make sure an offer isn't running at a significant loss. It seems the majority of UK online shoppers love a free bargain - and will be keen to share a freebie to all their friends, family and work colleagues if an offer is too good to turn down.

Thanks to all at Hitwise for providing the data used in this article.

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Google tests CPC site targeting

Mon, 19 Feb 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Google has announced a change in the way people can advertise on its network of partner sites. The Content Network gives advertisers an easy way to display their adverts on a huge range of sites across the internet, including big names such as Ask.com and HowStuffWorks.

The change applies to a method of advertising on the content network called site targeting; sites are usually analysed by Google to find the themes and content of the site, and adverts are targeted and displayed accordingly. The site targeting method allows users to pick the sites on which their adverts are displayed by hand.

In the past, advertisers using this method have been charged on a CPM (cost per thousand) basis - meaning they were charged per 1000 displays of their adverts. Google is now testing a new method for charging advertisers, using a CPC (cost per click) method. This means advertisers pay a fee each time their advert is clicked on, similar to the way that people are charged for their adverts on the Google search results pages.

The problem with the CPM model is that advertisers are just paying for people to see their adverts, not for the click which shows that users are interested in their product or service. For instance, if the site you're advertising on has a lot of returning visitors, you'd be paying for each time the same user sees your advert. However, that user may not click on your ad multiple times.

On the other hand, this may not necessarily be a bad thing. If an advertiser is interested in increasing brand awareness rather than generating direct business, a site targeted CPM campaign can be a very cost effective way to achieve this.

The main benefit of Google using CPC is increased flexibility for advertisers. Choosing to use a CPC campaign means that advertisers can ensure they're only paying for business generated by their adverts, which may give them more peace of mind when using a site targeted campaign.

As this project is still being tested, it remains to be seen whether a CPC site targeted campaign can produce better results than a well targeted CPM campaign - but the results from the test will certainly be something to look out for.

If you're a US-based Adwords advertiser, you simply need to fill in a form to register your interest to be part of the beta testing.

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Google uncovers missing links with new webmaster tool

Mon, 12 Feb 2007 12:00:00 GMT

Webmasters have welcomed Google's new addition to its Webmaster Central panel: a link tool that allows website owners to view a much larger sample of backlinks than ever before.

In the past, anyone wishing to view the incoming links to their website could type "Link: www.example.com" into the Google search box. The result, however, would only produce a small proportion of links that Google actually knew about and used when ranking sites for its search engine result positions. This is thought to be because Google feared that site owners would use the data to try and manipulate rankings.

So why are Google all of a sudden allowing us to see a little more behind the scenes? Well, it seems that webmasters wanted it, so Google gave it. Google Webmaster Central product manager Vanessa Fox explains:

"We take [webmasters] feedback very seriously. We have been looking at ways to provide this data and are ecstatic to make it available."

Google adds that it is happy to release the data knowing that it is only available to the owners of the site, rather than people who might try to misuse the data.

In the world of search engine optimisation, the number and quality of external sites linking back to your site is known to be an important part of the Google algorithm - so having a better idea of who is linking to you is valuable knowledge for webmasters seeking to optimise their websites.

The new tool asks webmasters to first verify their identity by either of two simple methods: uploading a HTML verification file to their domain or adding a META tag to their site's index file. Once Google has verified the genuine owner of the site, it allows access to the number and identity of internal and external links and provides the option to download this data.

Webmasters are already praising the tool, with the general consensus being that it's better than any other free or paid link back tool currently available.

With the traditional Link: operator tool, Google.co.uk reveals around 388 links pointing back to the bigmouthmedia.com site.

But with the new Webmaster Links tool you would be able to see a far more complete number of backlinks once you have verified that you are associated with the website they link to in the webmaster console.

However, it's important to remember that even this is not 100% of the links the Google knows about. As ever, Google keeps some cards close to its chest, stating that it knows of "more links than the total we show". However, the new link reporting tool gives considerably more data than previously available and is a welcome step to webmasters who have been vying to know more about Google's inner workings.

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