Google Recaptures Lost Search Share Dominance (GOOG, YHOO, MSFT, IACI)

If new data out of Experian Hitwise is accurate, then Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is again taking market share in the US search market against competitors Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT).  For the four-week period ended November 28, 2009, Hitwise is showing an increase for Google  to 71.57% of all searches in the United States.

Google took back 1% mathematically 71.57% in November, up from 70.6% in October.  This was listed directly as a loss at Yahoo! and at Bing:

• Yahoo! search was down 5% mathematically to 15.39% of US search, versus 16.14% in October.  Bing needs to be watched by Microsoft here very closely with a drop in its search results.  Bing posted a 2% mathematical drop to 9.34% in November versus 9.57% in October.

The one surprise is a continued gain in the IAC/Interactive (NASDAQ: IACI) search engine Ask.com, formerly AskJeeves.  The Ask was listed as 2.65%, up 1% mathematically from 2.62% in October.

As far as ‘the others,’ the remaining 52 search engines accounted for a whopping 1.07% of search.  That isn’t even on the map.  Bing enjoyed some gains from its launch earlier this year. It seems that the searchers are willing to try new search tools, but trying isn’t a commitment to drop old habits.

Jon C. Ogg