November 21, 2007
End of the Search Wars?
It’s beginning to look like the Search Wars are over, at least for now: Google has won.
Despite everything Microsoft and Yahoo! have been able to throw at it, Google’s share of the search business has just kept going up, to the point where it finally seems time to declare this contest done (though with two caveats - see below.) Whatever the next front in the battle for online dominance, it looks like it won’t be in search.
The latest figures from ComScore today make the point. Already dominant in Europe, Google’s share of US searches reached 58.5 per cent in October. That is up from only around 35 per cent in November 2004 - the month when Microsoft formally took the gloves off with the launch of its own search engine. In almost every month since, Google has bitten off a little more of the business. (Nielsen NetRatings figures show a slightly less dramatic rise, but the story is essentially the same.) Who would have predicted that three years ago?
A growing awareness that Google’s lead now looks impregnable has underpinned its latest stock price rise, and led one analyst this week to suggest that $900 a share is now in sight.
So what could go wrong? One caveat is that, despite Google’s massive brand and technological advantages, there is still nothing to stop its users defecting en masse for a better experience elsewhere. It has become fashionable to compare the maturing Google to Microsoft, but the lack of customer lock-in is formidable. The search wars are over for now, but this is a fight that can easily resume - after all, who would have expected a return to the Browser Wars?
The other caveat is China. Fair or not, Google has not been able to make much of a dent against Baidu in what is set to become the world’s biggest internet search market.
Still, it will be years before China boasts an online advertising business to match the scale of its internet audience. For the next few years at least, the lion’s share of the booming profits from internet search now look destined to flow into Google’s coffers.
Google has 80% market share in the UK. Once the Americans get round to finding out how to change their default search engine the US will go the same way.
Posted by: Simply Clicks | November 22nd, 2007 at 10:08 am | Report this commentIn my mind, the search war is over for a long, long time…
Posted by: Check | November 23rd, 2007 at 9:09 am | Report this commentDidn’t Google “win” by *not* locking people in to search? Originally (and still, probably), the allure of Google was it gave you a) a box and a button, and b) results, quickly. I don’t want lock-in, as lock-in usually implies something to be locked in - extra features, more data, etc. If I want to find something, I want to go to it, and in that sense search services have to be like an OS: do what I need, and otherwise get out of the way.
The lock-in comes elsewhere - blogs, maps, user-based data, etc.
Posted by: Graham | November 23rd, 2007 at 10:54 am | Report this commentWasn’t it Google who started to track individuals’ preferences to target them with advertisements? What’s really going to be interesting to observe in the next few years is the Gphone makes all media more ubiquitous, and how that ubiquity will impact company profits. That can benefit both consumers and investors. The NewsVisual article on Google’s Open Handset Alliance http://www.newsvisual.com/newsvisual/2007/11/google-and-moto.html implies that it’s really personal connections among business leaders that determine future success in the competitive marketplace. But consumers can also benefit from the new products those alliances spawn.
Posted by: Jim | November 23rd, 2007 at 3:36 pm | Report this comment