Google remains atop search heap

Small inroads are still being made by other search engines but according to the latest data from Nielsen//Netratings, Google remains atop the list. In October the search giant led the pack by nearly 3 billion searches.

by Kristina Knight

Nielsen//Netratings found that Google captured about 4.4 billion search queries in October. That is more than 55% of the total searches queried in the month. By comparison Yahoo, Google's closest competitor, captured 1.49 billion searches or 18% of all searches.

MSN/Windows Live Search accounted for 1 billion searches (13%), AOL Search accounted for 292 million searches and rounding out the top five search engines was Ask.com with 229 million searches (under 3%).

What is most interesting, however, is the number of times users are returning to search engines. Google searchers returned to the search hub more than 40 times throughout the month to conduct new searches. Yahoo users returned 26 times and AOL users returned 31 times throughout the month.

This indicates that though users may be more familiar than ever with how the Internet works, they still rely on search engines to find specific items or websites. Which means that search engine marketing is far from dead. By utilizing the different search engine marketing platforms, marketers may gain more attention from consumers especially during peak online shopping seasons.