Bing just keeps on gaining market share, and is now growing faster than ever before. In December, Microsoft’s search engine gained another 0.4 percent to capture 10.7 percent of U.S. search queries, according to the latest comScore qSearch numbers. That makes five straight months of steady share gains for Bing since it launched—Bing’s share is up 2.7 percent in total since May, 2009. Google gained only 0.2 percent to end the month with 65.7 percent market share. Meanwhile, Yahoo lost as much as Google gained (0.2 percent) to end the year at 17.3 percent (see table above, courtesy of Barclays Capital, click to enlarge).
What is even more interesting is if you look at year-over-year query growth rates for each search engine. Bing’s growth is actually accelerating. Its growth rate in query volume was 49.4 percent in December, compared to 20.6 percent growth for Google (which was also above the average), and a 1.9 percent decline for Yahoo. Here are the year-over-year query growth rates for Bing for the past few months:
- December, 2009: 49.4%
- November, 2009: 46.0%
- October, 2009: 30.8%
- September, 2009: 30.7%
- August, 2009: 31.8%
- July, 2009: 15.6%
- June, 2009: 11.6%
Barclays Capital analyst Douglas Anmuth attributes Bing’s gains to “advertising, OEM partnerships and toolbars, & Bing cashback.” He also notes that Yahoo’s decline was due “almost entirely” to the loss of some toolbar deals, specifically HP to Bing and Acer to Google, which weren’t particularly profitable anyway. But Yahoo’s core search volume growth is decelerating, which is a concern for investors.
And while Yahoo lost 0.2 percent share, that is less than the 0.5 to 0.8 percent losses it incurred in each of the previous three months. He notes that since Bing’s launch, Yahoo has lost almost as much share (2.8 percent) as Bing has gained (2.7 percent), a trend we’ve seen from the very beginning.
Note: This data is based on comScore’s qSearch, which estimates the actual number of search queries for each search engine, including ones which go through toolbars and related sites beyond the main search site. Data from Nielsen and Hitwise show different trends, with Bing actually falling in December, but they measure market share differently. Most Wall Street analysts report the comScore numbers, and they are the metric we track most regularly.
Bing actually delivers good results for me. I’ve just been going to Google for so many years, my fingers just type it by default. The next iteration of functionality, and better integration of bing in mobile search, will be quite interesting.
The original post is very very incomplete and in some cases not matching basic standards.
Now that I have blasted the original post I must provide alternative approach…
(please read my post with care as the data is for last three months but the % are per month increase. it is easy to get confused).
1. The ComScore, compete etc make estimates on traffic etc. The numbers dont tell the whole story.
2. But there two data points which are important in search.
a. Unique visitors. This number is actually a hoodoo art. Very difficult to be correct.
b. Number of visits
3. If these two data points are available with appropriate accuracy, one can conclude user pattern.
In Bing and Google case these two data point are as follows-
1. In recent months, Bing unique users have increased and Google has not progressed or at least as much.
Bing is about 3% increase/month in last three months (this is at 53 mill visitors basis).
Google is about 0.5%/per month at 150 mill basis.
That is 1.6 mill new visitors in Bing as compared to 700k for Google in last three months.
So, Bing wins here…..by % and by absolute numbers.
(Refer to Compete.com)
The story is different in total visits-
Google had 80mill New visits in the same last 3 months at about 2% increase (of 2.6 bill visits).
As compared to that Bing only had 20 mill more visits in the same three months at the basis of 300mill visits per month.
That is about 6% increase. Now one may think that it is three times that of Google.
That is a false conclusion. The Google having 2.6 bill visits as compared to Bing 300mill makes an arithmetic difference.
So, the conclusion is that Google visits are NOT flocking to Bing.
Instead the users who were depending on the default settings are going to Bing.
It also tells me that Google is going EXACTLY as Netscape went…….
Slow bleed…..Microsoft is just blunting the competitive edge and making the competitors loose business model.
Watch out Google!
This is some intelligent analysis. These days, people who has a brain is really hard to find. Any way. Allow me to look the thing another way.
In physics, I did it well in school, when a small bubble attaches to a big one, the surface tension force the small one to shrink. In order for a small to stay, it must have very strong internal force, or made of stronger material. When you see the samll one grow, it means it has extra force. If the force sustains, it should continue to grow.
I know it’s different things, but they happen in same pattern. It is every bit to me like what happened with Netscape.
“These days, people who has a brain is really hard to find.” – TJ
QFT
The only thing that fascinates me about the bing is their Silverlight Maps.. I mean it works so smooth.. Unlike the Ajaxed Goog Maps. Details: http://bit.ly/bing-maps-beta-review
Just one question though…how many of these new users come from people who are upgrading to Windows 7 and unaware that they’re search engine is being changed to Bing and do not know how to change it back to Google?
Funny. These numbers are the exact opposite of some posted yesterday by another research organization that showed Bing losing market share in December. Our experience has been that Google gets new site information about 2 days before Bing.
Link please.
Hitwise report Bing down 4% from November
http://www.hitwise.com/us/press-center/press-releases/search-enginedec2009/
That’s what we keep finding in our own numbers (traffic through the Chitika network). I’m pretty sure it’s a matter of measuring different things – Barclay’s (and ComScore) measures queries, whereas we and Hitwise measure traffic generated. May suggest that it’s taking more searches to get someone from Bing to a website than when it first launched.
Bing’s UI on many types of searches discourages immediate clicks (traffic) on the first search. It has related search tabs (and runs a second search when you click them) and it has data such as phone numbers on the SERP. So fewer clicks per searcher does seem to be expected. I’m personally finding Google a bit clunky now and a bit basic compared to Bing. Certainly for certain types of searches.
Good to see that Bing is increasing market share.
Been on Bing since around June 2009 and rarely ever use no. 1 anymore. So far I’ve found that it meets my needs, the video search is great, there is Bing cashback, and it is good to have some competition in the search space.
I think its great to see Bing actually winning share. its about time we had both (1) choice (2) a nicer looking search UI! Google’s UI is so boring and outdated. People like good UI – iPhone and Mac are proof. Now whether or not its just do to lots of marketing…
Competition is a good thing…
The Google page is simple on purpose. I don’t want a shiny search engine… i want one that works, and Google’s results are superior.
If you want shiny and great results try igoogle.
I’m not quite sure what you mean. Google focuses on data, speed and utility. I think this is right particularly for search. If I’m waiting around for search, I’m off. All I care about is the data delivered fast. Its different than an iphone.
Yup, back in august, they were giving $.05 cent clicks vs. google $2.00!
When they say Yahoo/Google/Microsoft Sites are they including all of there sites with a search box or just Yahoo Search, Google Search & Bing Search home pages only?
I believe it is the former
yep former, including toolbars, mobile etc
I’ve tried Bing and so far it sucks, I have no idea whats gaining it market share, to find out I’ll have to check it myself.
http://www.dumblittleblogger.com/
I find it great easily as good as Google and I find I use it be dafault now…
same
same
wow learn to produce a complete english sentence… maybe you can bing bing for that. BTW bing sucks. Google is simple, straight forth, and produces more meaningful results than bing. I bet for those of you who like bing you also prefer to build embedded code in java eh?
Maybe you can Bing “straight forth” vs “straight forward”
*Open mouth; insert foot.
Maybe you can Bing “How to use a semi-colon properly?” and “When to use periods?”.
There was nothing wrong with Danno’s semi-colon use.
No, what sucks are your comments. Dumb Little Blogger should be called Dumb Little Spammer.
Only ONE thing’s for sure, Microsoft employees frequent this site
I agree, it’s way subpar to Google. It’s matches are often outdated and just doesnt find things as intelligently. Microsoft is still trying to shov it in your face, I rencenly upgraded to Windows7 and getting rid of Bing as default search engine is fair amount of work, that’s probably why the numbers are increasing. Somehow Bing just reminds me of Ballmer: a lot bling and noise but no substance.
Whether Bing is gaining or loosing share, Windows 7 installs may account for a fair number of queries attributed to Bing. Still, Google’s numbers didn’t dip correspondingly. Who knows the Windows 7 Bing default effect may be negligible or an outright myth or maybe its what’s killing AOL. Not that AOL needed the help of course. Will we ever know?!
But isn’t that the same game as Netscape? Replace Default “browser” with “search”… everything else is the same- bundling, deals, back-door arm twisting …
Bing can just make Google Business Model suck.
If Google can not make enough money in click ads, Microsoft will kill Google and then leave Bing in middle ages like IE….
Netscape was a paid product for a long while, IE was free. Very much not the same as 2 free products battling. Even if they are of the same quality (which, IMHO, they are not); there is no reason for Google to lose as Netscape did.
You must be one of the most dumbest person I have ever seen commenting
@dumbblogger
Shouldn’t you be working at a 7-11 somewhere
Please reconcile this stated growth rate with that of Windows 7.
For the time being I am still 90% google, however that does not mean I won’t change when I feel bing is giving me better results.
Actually I am support the existence of another strong search engine because this will put aside any monopoly or dominance and enflame competition
You need a microscope to find the competition. For now Microsoft fails to be the 2nd player, the ~30% market share after the 800 pounds Gorilla.
Without the good old Windows vehicle they spend $$$ to get merely ~10%.
Other companies seem to do well with less than 10% of their chosen markets *cough*Apple*cough*.
Don’t be a h8r!
Gosh golly…a whole 8% of the market…lookout google! Bing looks cool and obviously has a good PR firm. But common, the results still suck.
People are resistant to change. Even if Bing was literally 100x better than Google, it would probably still have 20% share, max. Google has been the only good search engine for a very long time and people are comfortable with it. 8% in 6-7 months is really impressive.
I tried Bing for a few weeks last summer. I liked it for the most part, they have some neat UI stuff. I think it’s a good service. But there nothing compelling enough for me to stay there. The results didn’t seem any better than Google’s, so why switch? One thing I also noticed is Google is MUCH better about “real time” results. I’m not talking about this twitter crap that they’re doing now, but I mean when something new is posted on a web site, it tends to be in Google’s index within 15-30 minutes. I noticed Bing didn’t do that at all (I was testing it) so to me that made it a lot less valuable. So I went back to Google.
Well.. try it again. Bing has improved a lot since last summer. Contrary to your observation, Bing beats Google in realtime search.
Look at what Tech Crunch says if you don’t believe me
http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/12/30/realtime-search-off-bing-beats-google/
People are fickle online and will change at the drop of a hat if they are getting better service.
Actually the results are really good. But you wouldn’t know since you don’t use it.
no surprise there? Windows 7 came out, Christmas hit. Everyone got new Windows 7 notebooks, and most of that ‘everyone’ are people whom use IE and don’t care/know what a search engine is. Bing is there by default.
This will level off, it’s not rocket science. It’s also not that far of a stretch to say at least half, if not more, of Bing usage is simply due to the default status it has on Windows/IE.
Good point. It’s not a bad search engine though, should at the very least, provide a good alternative to google if you are ever unhappy with its’ search results for a key phrase. (if that’s possible, hehe)
not true.. search providers have to pay for that default and if you’ve seen IE share lately you’ll know IE can’t be the reason for a Bing uplift.
Google and Yahoo all still compete for the search default from hardware providers..
It’s not that simple.
Live Search (Microsoft’s predecessor to Bing) had the same preferred status in IE & Windows, but was losing share over time.
Bing has turned things around in terms of market share, and I don’t think we can attribute all that just to Windows/IE.
i actually use to use win live search a lot and compare it to yahoo search because i wanted to find out which of the two gave me the most irrelevant results. i have to chalk up this whole post to windows 7.
Bing is pretty. The results are okay, but the UI is pretty. I’m sure the ad campaign is helping too…
http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/nielsen-reports-december-u-s-search-rankings/
i don’t think so is that right??
Bing is growing because Microsoft is spending large amounts of money on growth (toolbar deals, advertising, …). That’s the real story. People aren’t migrating to Bing because they want to, they are using Bing accidentally (because Microsoft bought the traffic).
One day, this might result in these people sticking with Bing because they’re happy with it, but I don’t think that’s the story right now.
google spent money partnering with yahoo when it came out
Microsoft does what is has in the past. Strong arming people into using their products. When they realize that it is crap as usual, they are usually too stuck to move (IE is a good example of this)
How can you be too stuck to move from a free Web browser, or a search engine? If people are using IE, it’s because they are happy enough with it that they don’t bother moving – Firefox or Chrome takes seconds to download and can import all of IE’s settings. In the day of open source products and broadband, bundling != strong-arming.
Couple things. Default browser on all Windows OS. Some people really don’t see a choice so they just use what is already installed on the machine (IE). If there was no browser, they would have to do some research and likely pick Firefox.
Also companies relied a little too much on technologies built into IE (active X anyone), and now with the web changing, they are unable to change because of those technologies. True it was the companies fault… but at the time, they really didn’t have a choice because MS forced out all the competition until Firefox came along.
Google does the same – toolbars, default search provider in Firefox, and so on.
How is it different from MS, and why the double-standards applied to MS when everybody does the same?
I agree to a certain extent… particularly on the part of MS pulling strong-arm tactics in the past. I don’t, however, think that it applies today.
If someone gets a new Windows computer, they’ll either immediately change browsers, or they don’t care enough to bother. Hardly a strong-arm tactic, and given that people need a browser to download a browser, the alternative is MS pre-installing (or pre-loading the installer for) half a dozen or so browsers with every batch of Windows, and giving people a step-by-step “choose your browser” selection process like IE8 does with its default search engine.
Seems counterproductive, annoying to the end-user, and a huge PITA for MS. And really, what % of people who use IE now would choose a browser they don’t know?
Techie types (anyone who reads TC, for example) will research and go out and find the browser that works best for them. The vast majority of the Internet only cares that their porn comes through unscrambled.
Dan Ruby does not get it or he does not want to.
When there is significant efforts (like download, install or specifically choose and click on some App) rather than just type somewhere and get OK results, users will stick with easy and NOT the greatest.
Go Google in this way will result into loosing say 30-40% users.
That is 30-40% down revenue. So, the brand name suffers, investors run away, deals are not made.
Partners move away and business collapses.
That is what the future is if Google does not overcome Bing….
IE8 already prompts you to manually select your default search engine when you first run it. Where’s the “significant effort” in that, or in typing google.com (or bing.com, or yahoo.com, or whatever) into a browser?
I’m very curious as to where you’re getting the idea that Google has any threat of losing “30-40%” of its revenue and collapsing because Bing is cannibalizing Yahoo!’s traffic.
you sir Must be an idiot!!! a pure idiot!!! not that there is such a thing, just that you redefined it.
They need to get their act together and start indexing the web faster, that’s where Google just kills them.
These facts seem to be the exact opposite of atleast one blog post I have read elsewhere.
On the basis of such strong and overwhelming evidence I guess well just have to believe that then.
pr0n FTW?
lol good point. VERY good point.
Hey TC, good job not mentioning that Google went UP in marketshare as well. All the numbers from Yahoo and AOL are just transferring over to Bing. Not exactly a hallmark event. Looks like your fanboyism continues.
do you actually read before you comment?
“Google gained only 0.2 percent to end the month with 65.7 percent market share ”
“compared to 20.6 percent growth for Google (which was also above the average”
Good point, I must have missed that in the sight over overwhelming fanboyism that TC’s posts usually are.
gosh just read the entire post first and reserve your hatred for after you finish each post.
The more search indexes we have the better for us. World has more to offer for a topic than a 20-30 links.
Perhaps Google should concentrate on its core business rather than getting side tracked in hardware and trying to take over the world??
This is funny, to show you what a name change can do.
As least Bing plays fair.
Unlike Google:
http://atheists.org/blog/2010/01/05/why-is-google-blocking-islam-is-search-recommendations
HAHAHAHHA. You do realize this is Microsoft right?
Perhaps that should have called it ping instead of bing, imagine how many hits they would get from techies testing IP’s only to look up and realise they typed into the wrong window
I made over $250 from Bing CashBack in December. Google paid me nothing. Which search engine will I use… let me think
alta vista?
no surprise there. they are now on the #1 and #2 PCs. that is whats moving the share here
Im from Holland and have used Bing since the start…its still in beta though, but am very pleased with it and (rarely) go to google anymore.
@Denny Sugar: “gosh a whole 8% of the market? Watch out Google”
You must be either ignorant or a blind google fanboy, because if you’d know how much 8% of the searchmarket is in pure $$$. I’ll help you: Its more than you will make in a 100 lifetimes.
Replace the word Bing with Linux, keep the same “Tiny fractional of people use it, so it’s a run away success!” tone, and everyone would reject this post out of hand.
Why is it when Bing shows rounding error level traction it’s “news”?
Because linux took 10 years to take 1% market share even with Vista’s era
Wait until all the Windows 7 migrators have set their search engine back to something sane and Bing will drop like a stone.
It’s still the old Microsoft search in a new dress.
After Ballmer’s announcement from today to stay in China and do what they get told by the KP I’m more than ever staying the hell away from Microsoft whenever I can.
I tried googling my name on both search engines. Google results were more relevant since it actually shows my company’s website in the top 10 results whereas Bing just misses it out (at least in the first 2 pages…) But beyond the accuracy of the result, it is all about habits. People have no way (or will) to compare results (do people actually care?!) and they will stick to whatever they were using till today, unless their brand new laptop suggests them a new search engine… In the end, people will use the search engine (or any other application) they’re told to use (did someone say IE?…)
Just reading that first sentence, you know Bing has a looooong way to go. I can’t imagine ever binging my name.