'Net Features : ASK

Search Rankings Remain Steady – Explicit and Core

Pete Prestipino — Mon, 13 Jun 2011 21:26:00 GMT

comScore released its monthly analysis of the U.S. search marketplace last week.

Google Sites led the “explicit core search" market (searches occuring directly/explicitly at those destinations) in May with a 65.9 percent share, followed by Yahoo! (15.9 percent), and Microsoft Sites (14.1 percent). Ask and AOL rounded out the list with 3 percent and 1.5 percent shares respectively.

According to comScore, more than 17.0 billion explicit core searches were conducted in May (up 5 percent versus April). Google Sites ranked first with 11.2 billion searches (up 5 percent), followed by Yahoo! Sites with 2.7 billion (up 5 percent), Microsoft Sites with 2.4 billion (up 4 percent), Ask Network with 502 million (up 2 percent) and AOL, Inc. with 254 million (up 2 percent).

When it comes to “core search” – which includes partner searches, cross-channel searches and contextual searches – Google once again let the way. Google Sites accounted for 63.3 percent of total core search queries conducted, followed by Yahoo! Sites with 19.6 percent (up 1.7 percentage points) and Microsoft Sites with 13.1 percent.

The Ask Network comprised 2.6 percent of total search queries, followed by AOL, Inc. with 1.3 percent.

SEO for Questions and Answers

Pete Prestipino — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 16:30:00 GMT

While you may struggle optimizing your site and its content for competitive rankings on search engines for popular keywords there remains a very good opportunity in optimizing for search query phrases that come in the "question" format.

Yesterday Ask.com released its list of the top question of 2009. According to the announcement, "More than 50 million people visit Ask each month, where they are three times more likely to enter their queries in the form of a question than on other search engines." As you might imagine (if you've got your thinking caps on), this presents a great starting point for an SEO project related to answering questions.

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Look at a few of the questions on this list and you'll see what I mean. It's the "how," "what," "when," and "who" that consumers apparently use to find answers to their questions. Since you (hopefully) know the answers to questions related to the content of your site, therein lies the SEO opportunity. Just answer questions related to your product, service or niche - no matter how seemingly mindate - and you might be surprised at how well you'll rank.

I've listed a few sample questions below along with the start of each question.

Hopefully this will get your creative SEO mind working:

How much should....?
How much should you pay for SEO services?

How do I get...?
How do I get top rankings on Bing?

How many...?
How many blog posts should I write every day?

What is...?
What is asynchronous tracking?

What are...?
What are the best Internet tradeshows?

What can...?
What can I deduct on my business taxes?

What does...?
What does URL stand for?

When will...?
When will Google officially release its social search product?

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Ask Makes a Run For It (In a good way)

Pete Prestipino — Wed, 27 May 2009 17:15:00 GMT

LookSmart advertisers will want to pay attention here.

According to an SEC filing, Ask.com is not renewing its contract with LookSmart wherein ASK/IAC displayed LookSmart advertiser listings. The partnership between the two companies began in May 2005 but will expire on December 31, 2009.

It is safe to assume that Ask.com is making a run for it (in a good way) by starting to look at other advertising partnership. The company might even explore ways to monetize its relatively popular search platform much the same way they did with the recent total skinning of the site to promote the upcoming Night at the Museum movie.

We're not talking about chump change in terms of search market share (Compete had Ask at 2.4% in December 2008) so expect everyone to be pitching the company in the coming weeks and months.

Revenue from Ask Sponsored Listings revenue generated 89% of LookSmart's Company Publisher Solutions revenue in Q1 2009 alone. That a big problem for Looksmart who will be actively looking for replacement partnerships. It is unlikely that LookSmart can sustain itself as a consumer property with a little over 500K unique visitors (according to Compete).

If you were Looksmart how would you bounce back?

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Comscore August Search Rankings

Pete Prestipino — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 13:38:00 GMT

Is Search at a Tipping Point?

Comscore released its monthly comScore qSearch analysis of the U.S. search marketplace today. Americans conducted 11.7 billion core searches and Google extended its lead by 1.1 percentage points, to 63 percent of the searches conducted (up from 61.9 percent in July). However, the total number of searches was virtually unchanged from July.

AOL (4.3%) and ASK (4.5%) made modest gains (+0.1 and 0.3 respectively) while both Yahoo (19.6%) and Microsoft (8.3%) slipped slightly. In the comScore August 2008 extended search analysis of the top properties where search activity is observed (which includes partner searches and cross-channel searches), Google sites led with 10.2 billion searches, a 2-percent increase versus July. Yahoo! sites ranked second with 2.4 billion searches, followed by Microsoft sites with 1 billion and AOL LLC with 839 million.