Jan 2010 data for Top 10 US Search Providers

Latest data about who is searching what and who is searching where is out.... Checkout the table below for the Top search providers ( Jan 2010) and its the US  geography considered. Google has lost one percentage in search compared to the last while Bing is  gaining. With this data now innovative search marketers and online marketing companies can now target the top searched internet properties and design a killer marketing strategy accordingly. Top 10 Search Providers for January 2010, Ranked by Searches (U.S.)
Rank	Provider	Searches (000)	Share of Searches
	All Search	10,272,099	100.0%
1	Google Search	6,805,424	66.3%
2	Yahoo! Search	1,488,476	14.5%
3	MSN/Windows Live/Bing Search	1,116,546	10.9%
4	AOL Search	251,762	2.5%
5	Ask.com Search	194,161	1.9%
6	My Web Search	112,356	1.1%
7	Comcast Search	59,608	0.6%
8	Yellow Pages Search	35,101	0.3%
9	NexTag Search	34,736	0.3%
10	BizRate Search	20,123	0.2%
Source: The Nielsen Company

2008 : Comparison of Top Social Media Sites Performance

Year 2008 saw the emerging domination of social media on the internet like never before.
Sites like facebook and blogger retained the top lead while msn live shows a down trend.

The Top 5 as as expected, Blogger is not much ahead of facebook while myspace is catching up in the visitor counts.

Top Social Media Sites (ranked by unique worldwide visitors November, 2008; comScore)

1. Blogger (222 million)
2. Facebook (200 million)
3. MySpace (126 million)
4. Wordpress (114 million)
5. Windows Live Spaces (87 million)
6. Yahoo Geocities (69 million)
7. Flickr (64 million)
8. hi5 (58 million)
9. Orkut (46 million)
10. Six Apart (46 million)
11. Baidu Space (40 million)
12. Friendster (31 million)
13. 56.com (29 million)
14. Webs.com (24 million)
15. Bebo (24 million)
16. Scribd (23 million)
17. Lycos Tripod (23 million)
18. Tagged (22 million)
19. imeem (22 million)
20. Netlog (21 million)

Source ( TechCrunch)

Here is a graphic representation of the fierce competition between the web2.0 and more doing websites on the internet.



The essential tool for todays media advertising and brand building is Social Media Communities and sites without any doubt. The SEO's (Search Engine Optimizers) and SEM's (Search Marketers) who ignore this major and "less cost" promotion opportunity, are not using the internet to the fullest.

Microsoft Sun Partnership for Search!

Microsoft has tied up with Sun Microsystems for search toolbar.

Here is the complete news from Reuters:

SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp said on Monday that it reached a Web search deal with Sun Microsystems Inc, the latest partnership struck by Microsoft aimed at chipping away at the dominance of Google Inc.

As part of this agreement, users of Microsoft's Internet Explorer browser who download Sun's Java technology platform will be given the option to also download the MSN Toolbar from where users can directly access the company's search engine.

Earlier this year, Microsoft also reached an agreement with Hewlett-Packard Co, the world's largest personal computer maker, to place a toolbar on new PCs in the United States and Canada starting in January.

"This deal will expose Live Search to millions more Internet users and drive increased volume for our search advertisers," said Yusuf Mehdi, senior vice president of the Online Audience Business at Microsoft, in a statement.

Striking distribution deals are one part of Microsoft's strategy to close the gap on market leader Google. Microsoft said competition for these types of deals is intense and that the company had to outbid several rivals for the Sun deal.

Sun said the Java platform sits on more than 800 million personal computers around the world, or on 91 percent of Internet-connected PCs worldwide. The Java Runtime Environment is downloaded tens of millions times every month, Sun said.

Google's U.S. Web search market share reached 63 percent in August versus a 19.6 percent for Yahoo Inc and 8.3 percent for Microsoft, according to comScore.

Source : Reuters

Search Engine : All Year Trends : Analysed : Indian Perspective

Whats going on in the search industry recently?
Well a lot, but to get a bird's eye view here are some of the graphs and illustrations via Google Trends ( strange thing is that it does not include Google.com itself, but lets move forward)

Graph showing Top Data fetching search engines and properties:


Regions ruling the search world are United States, India and China respectively for the highest numbers of internet population and IT revolutions.

One time high competing rivals Yahoo! and MSN are keeping a distant parallel lines when it comes to unique visitors, Yahoo! holding the upper limit.

Interesting thing is Facebook ( top social media / networking site) shows better performance than ask.com, a major search engine.
Confirming the fact that more and more users are being attracted on social networking sites, due to the web2.0 concepts, more inter-activeness and contact / concept sharing

Top keywords searched include ever green directory Craigslist, emails solution providers, a latest buzz word in US Politics "Sarah Palin" and financial terms like Bank america.



Indian Search Scene :

Now taking the Indian Context (having second largest population on the planet) of all the google trends goin on for the year.

The graph above shows Yahoo! ( including the search properties i.e. sub sites and partner sites) dominate the Indian Online Market. MSN shows its presence while Ask is nowhere ...

Facebook is having some upward movements in terms of growing users online via social media networking.
Checking regionwise :
Maharashtra, Delhi and Karnataka tops the list of states while the next surprise here in andaman and Nicobar islands ... is it a wrong data ? nothing can be proved but lets take it for the sake of information.

Other visited sites mostly include email service providers ( rediff, yahoo) job sites ( monsterindia, naukri, timesjobs) and railway ( irctc). Ibibo makes a surprise entry here along with hdfc bank, while orkut or youtube seem missing in the top 10.

Top keywords searched within India this year:


BSNL tops the list along with the pay commission ( mostly by central government employees). Indian railways also being searched a lot considering the forthcoming festive season online railway booking.

Google Chrome : New Browser for those who want more out of the web!

Its been a little while when the top search giants havent pulled out their swords at each other.
Now check this out..

This is where it started... (from main www.google.com page)


A new browser from Google, nomenclatured as "Google Chrome", a 474.73 Kb exe file to start with, is a super take on IE and may be (?) on Mozilla Firefox ...well only time will tell.


By defination:
Google Chrome is a browser that combines a minimal design with
sophisticated technology to make the web faster, safer, and easier.
Read More : http://www.google.com/chrome/intl/en/why.html?hl=en

Now how to get the new software ( its free !!)?
Its easy, follow these steps

1.Download the software exe
2.Click Run or Open in the window that appears.
3.Click Run when you are asked "Do you want to run this software?"
4.Your software will now install automatically. If you need help,
just visit http://www.google.com/chrome/intl/en/why.html?hl=en
5.The Google Chrome installer should complete in seconds and start your new browser automatically.

Congratulations you have the new browser now.


Currently showing a beta version,and limited to only Windows Vista /Xp, this Browser will import data from exisiting browsers.

The opening screen says:
The "Most visited" area shows the websites that you use most often. After using Google Chrome for a while, you will see your most visited sites whenever you open a new tab.

Will take some time to get familier with, but the Chrome interface looks clean and beautiful.

Keep your fingers crossed for the next possibility ( A Google OS , well lets face it Others !!)

Top 4 Traps by Fake SEO's and Search Marketers

Checkout the Fake SEO case studies, its very common to lose money when you dont know where to put your faith and trust in...

1. Guaranteed inclusion in Google
The most killer line you can observe in most of the so-called Great SEO's in any part of the world.
Some say we will make your site listed in Google's Search engine ( some go beyond and say we will do it for Yahoo! and MSN too.+ 100000000 other search engines)

Remember the term inclusion ( means your site is there in the search engine's index) and ranking ( get top positions for targetted keywords) are totally different and used to confuse the potential client.

The fact is if you have a site , Google will be crawling it as per DNS (Domain Name Server) Updates. Most of the webmasters or net surfers dont know the fact that Google is also an Authorized Domain Registrar, meaning that it has the power to search and crawl the WHOIS database as per wish.
There is a concept of "Sandbox" with search engine (can assure for Google), which may delay the indexing of the site for some time, a new site therefore does not show the instant it is registered.
If your site is still not indexed you can submit a Google Sitemap via Google Webmaster tools.

2. Top 10 Ranking in 24 Hours
Is it a magic trick? well read the complete story first before following these SEO gurus. They have some "special" terminology for that and also have some "conditions", which you will come to know only after you pay.
I have checked with some sites:
One says, the top ranking you will get is for the keyword " Pravin Shivarkar is the best SEO in India". When asked about 24 hours ... well they say, they will submit the site and then "influence" the search engines to rank me for the keyword ; well is it a keyword anyway ;)
One site goes beyond the logical ( Sorry....) imagination limit to say that, they are not talking about the organic ranking, they mean the top ranking is for the Sponsored results ( generally we get on the right hand bar in google) and they will rank your site ( here the really mean a paid advertisement)

3. Do you want guaranteed search engine ranking on Google, Yahoo , MSN?
Who will say no, unless and until he dont know why it is all about ...
The advertisement copy DO NOT Say which ranking, what rank to be exact.
We might have seen for years that if you link a particular site via n number of backlinks ( one way linking) then it is considered that the site is important by Trust vote, which some Black Hat SEO's do try to experiment or spam.

4. Guaranteed 100000000 visitors !!!
If you dont want to know who is coming from which site, or you want to show your client the sudden "Growth" that has incurred because of your "Magical" SEO techniques yesterday , this can be an ideal situation to be in with your money running out of your pocket...........
There are many "businessmen" who buy 1000+ domains and put some "engine" to show some data on each of those "websites". So do employ people (Data entry operators) to add ( copy and paste) content on these sites. Now most of them are directories with whatever subject in this world you can imagine of. So if you are selling for a washing soap and are getting visits from college library sites ( well can be good no doubt) are you expecting any sales after that?

Its all about asking exact questions in life and while dealing with Online Search Optimizers and Marketers!

How to earn from a blog or website?

Want to earn online via your website or blog?

Beside many link advertising and banner advertising options , one reliable solution is Google Adsense.
No doubt other online marketing solutions from Search Engines like Yahoo Search Marketing, MSN Adcenter and Ask Sponsored search are effective, the market share of these companies is one issue where most of the online brand building and marketing money is flowing for a deep and volummetic market reach with effective ROI ( Return on Investment)
Yes the same one which I'm using on my blog here.
Whats the funda?

Its just allowing some space to display ads on your site or blog to Google by placing some script/code.
Once approved, your site starts showing ads "relevant" to the page content, relevance will get more accurate as page gets older and the content gets reliable via more text, links and headers. The ads can be text, images and/or videos too.
You can earn via :
1. Page impressions ( number of times your page gets downloaded or viewed) : You get per thousand earnings via PPM score.
2. PPC ( Pay-Per-Click) : You earn if any of the visitor clicks on any ad
3. Referals ( Now they are being / been taken out)

But first you need to have an adsense account. Get it now, its FREE

Whats new with Google Adsense ?

Google has recently rolled out its "New Ad Management" feature in adsense console.
Those who already have their adsense logins, must have observed some new additions in terms of "code storing" details such as ad size, colors and channel settings etc. The code details are being saved on Google's servers and not elsewhere, so the appeared advantage is the webmaster can make changes to the adsense units from within the account itself.

Now, How do I create an AdSense unit?

To create a new AdSense unit that you can manage within your account, follow the steps below. (
1. Sign in to your account at http://www.google.com/adsense.
2. Under the AdSense Setup tab, choose the Get Ads link.
3. Select AdSense for content as the product. The new AdSense units are only available for AdSense for content at this time.
4. Choose your ad type, format, colors, and channels just as you have in the past.
5. Give your AdSense unit a name that you can remember. We recommend including the site(s), page(s), or location(s) that the AdSense unit will be placed on, so you can easily identify it in the future should you wish to make updates.
6. Click Submit and Get Code.
7. Copy and paste the newly generated code onto your site.

You are done.
So start earning money NOW !!!

Comparing Online Marketing (SEM) with Organic Search Optimization (SEO) with Stats

Most of the startup online marketers and webmasters which are given additional responsibility to promote the designed website along the internet ( may or may not be a niche market), get confused with the balance to keep in SEO ( search engine Optimization) and SEM ( Search Engine Marketing) .

The one who takes a right decision, defers case to case basic, wins!!

Here is some data to help you in decision making about organic and paid website promotions.

The year on year data (2004 - 2008) with Google Trends (GT) suggests, SEO or organic search has never been so keen to compete with the online marketing, if we rely on the available results with us via the GT Interface for the searches on SEO and SEM

Regionwise India holds most of the searches with SEO and SEM, interestingly Japan ranks second and philippines the third. The searches and the Outsourcing SEO work, has its footprints in this countries, as most of the back-end IT / ITES work is done in India and Philippines with quality.
Language wise classification shows Japanese topping the list for Search Terms. Strange enough English comes to sixth place !

As per the latest data available on Comscore , the search engine shares are as follows which shows why people around the world are running after Google Adwords (for Advertisers) and Adsense ( for Web Publishers)



* Based on the five major search engines including partner searches and cross-channel searches. Searches for mapping, local directory, and user-generated video sites that are not on the core domain of the five search engines are not included in the core search numbers.

CUIL - The new search engine against Google?

New Search Engine Cuil ( www.cuil.com) has a lot of pages (121617892992+ web pages) in the index and it shows them in a friendly manner.


Cuil, the latest "said" competition to Google, was founded by several lead engineers from Google, mainly Anna Patterson, chief architect of the company's TeraGoogle search index.

Google's paid search business made up 40% of all online search dollars in 2007, according to eMarketer and the other majors of search ( Yahoo and MSN) were looking since a long time to attack Google. So is this a key to the eternal search and taking Google by horns?

Only time will tell.

Learn SEO Online!

Its learning time ... So if you are looking for Online SEO Training, some of the choices are :
1. Read a lot online, Start with Wikipedia on SEO
2. Join various forums like Webmasterworld, Highrankings, Digitalpoint etc and ask questions.
3. Search Various SEO / SEM Companies and their offerings
4. Go to the job sites like Naukri , Timesjobs or Monster and check what are the current expectations with the similar jobs and/or in Industry.
5. Contact me ( I do it for very serious people and with a high tution fee!!)

Here are some videos for SEO learning Online:

Search Engine Optimization and Marketing. PPC SEM SEO Search Engine Optimization Internet Marketing Website...



Easy SEO/Search Engine Optimization Tips
com and take advantage of this free tool while it is still free. ... SEO Tips Search Engine Optimization Optimisation ...


The three most important tips ... WebPagesThatSuck web design search engine optimization



Search Engine Optimization
how to do On-Page and Off-Page Search Engine Optimization. ... search engine optimization seo off-page on-page


SES Chicago 2007: Danny Sullivan of SearchEngineLand.com


Google's Matt Cutts | How to Get Better Visibility on Google
USA TODAY's Jefferson Graham interviews Google engineer Matt Cutts on how to get your site to the top of Google with 5 basic, common sense SEO tips. Matt Cutts guests on the USA TODAY Talking Tech

Top Ten Search Properties

Comscore announced its latest research on the Top search Engine shares in various countries and regions.

Useful information for search marketers who want to capitalize on brand building and also online promotion via SEO and SEM.

Showing the presence of internet people , Baidu China takes a lead and microsoft properties are lacking behind. Social media sites like MySpace and Facebook done seem to appear at the top, while friendster makes its presence felt. B2B is still a hot cake and its represented by Alibaba.

In country specific users, China is approximately four times creating unique searches opportunities while Japan ranks second followed by India. Interestingly there are more searches per searcher (102.6) for Japan than China (75.3).

Five of the Top Ten Search Properties are Region-based Engines

Although Google Sites and Yahoo! Sites captured the majority of the search share in the region, five of the top ten search properties are local country entities, including China's Baidu.com (16.7 percent) and Korea's NHN Corporation (5.3 percent), which owns search engine Naver.com. Chinese properties Alibaba.com Corporation, Tencent Inc., and Sohu.com Inc., which host Internet-search functionality although they are not strictly search engines, rounded out the list of key local players.


China Accounted for the Most Searches among Asia-Pacific Countries
More than 82 million Chinese Internet users conducted 6.2 billion total searches in April, an average of 75 searches per searcher. Interestingly, Japan’s 60 million Internet searchers conducted nearly the same number of searches (6.1 billion) as the 82 million Chinese searchers, a result of the heavier search volume per person in Japan (102.6 searches per searcher). Korea (104 searches per searcher) and Singapore (101 searches per searcher) also exhibited notably heavy search volume per person.


More: Comscore Press Release

Yahoo Sticks Glue to Pages

Yahoo has just launched its "Glue Page" Beta version.

Contains : (all about the search query)
1. Related pages
2. Search Results
3. News
4. Stock charts if available
5. Google Blog Search ( interesting)
6. Sponsored Results
7. India Jobs

The service is available in India only www.yahoo.in ahead of the world.Developed at Yahoo’s Bangalore R&D labs, comes out to be an edge over rival search engines ( Google, MSN and ASK).

This is how it works in pictures.

Google Internet Share March 2008

Google Inc. (GOOG) received 67% of all U.S. Internet searches during the four weeks ended March 29, according to information service Hitwise.

Google received 64% of all U.S. Internet searches in the same period a year earlier.

Yahoo Inc.'s (YHOO) search engine received 20% of U.S. Web searches in the more recent period, while Microsoft Corp.'s (MSFT) MSN Search drew 7% and Ask.com 4%.

The remaining 46 search engines in Hitwise's search engine analysis tool accounted for about 2% of searches in the U.S.

Source : CNN Money

Yahoo Stand with Google for OpenSocial Network

Yahoo said on Tuesday it is backing a program by rival Google to make software work fluidly across different social networks, and will create a joint foundation to promote the effort.

The normally fierce competitors are working together in the OpenSocial network, which Google formed in November to lure Web software developers and other social network sites away from the emerging market leader in social networks, Facebook Inc.

Many social networks -- including News Corp's MySpace, Friendster and LinkedIn -- support OpenSocial, a set of technical specifications that lets software developers build applications such as games and photo shows that can run on any social network, expanding the audience for such software.

However, neither Facebook nor Microsoft Corp, which gave Facebook $240 million in backing last year, has signed up to support OpenSocial. Microsoft, which has mounted a $42 billion hostile takeover bid for Yahoo, also has an agreement to sell advertising on Facebook's site.

Source : Yahoo News

Microsoft Bids $44.6 Billion for Yahoo

Breaking news from NYTIMES,

SAN FRANCISCO — Microsoft said Friday that it has made an offer to buy Yahoo for about $44.6 billion, or $31 a share, in a mix of cash and stock.

The offer represents a 62 percent premium over Yahoo's closing stock price of $19.18 on Thursday.

If consummated, the deal would redraw the competitive landscape of the Internet consumer services business, where both Microsoft and Yahoo have struggled to compete with Google.

Microsoft said the combination of the two companies would create efficiencies that would save approximately $1 billion annually. The software giant also said that it has an integration plan to include employees of both companies and intends to offer incentives to retain Yahoo employees.

What is the www going to be , say if Microsoft buys Yahoo! ( for example), what will Google do? any threat to the search giant?

Google Note

Google adding some online bookmarking / collective diary stuff to its SERP's


The new functionality observed ( well checkout if its really new)

Google now provides the "note this" utility. Its a bit of online notes taking for future reference which will be of great help while surfing the internet and for those who are not that genious when it comes to long lasting memory.

The utility was observed working well for blogger and uploaded posts, as well as the personalized interface which we get after logging in.

2008 : Top Online Security Concerns

The 2008 Olympics is likely to spur a flurry of hacker activity, says Websense Inc, which specializes in web filtering and security software, releasing the top ten computer security threats for 2008.

The top 10 security threats are:

1. Olympics: New cyber attacks, phishing and fraud
2. Malicious spam invades blogs, search engines, forums and Web sites
3. Attackers use Web's 'weakest links' to launch attacks
4. Number of compromised Web sites will surpass number of created malicious sites
5. Cross-platform Web attacks: Mac, iPhone popularity spurs increase
6. Rise in targeted Web 2.0 special interest attacks: Hackers targeting specific groups of people based on interests and profile
7. Morphing JavaScript to evade anti-virus scanners
8. Data concealment methods increase in sophistication
9. Global law enforcement will crack down on key hacker groups and individuals
10. Vishing and voice spam will combine and increase

Source: Rediff News


The second point shows there is a lot to be done for the search engine companies like yahoo, google, msn etc.
Webmasters have to check the site too often for malicious attempts and hacking threats.

Microsoft Add-inBeta for Excel 2007

After a long wait on any updates in Search Marketing and latest tools, Microsoft is back in business with its new Adcenter Tool Add-in , Add-inBeta for Excel 2007.

A link from Microsoft has more info here:

This new adCenter tool helps optimize keywords to improve advertiser campaign ROI. The adCenter Add-in provides immediate access to advanced keyword data including market segmentation, monthly traffic, monetization, categorization, and other advanced tools. This new tool makes adCenter keyword research and optimization easy and efficient by providing unparalleled keyword information to help advertisers choose the right keywords for the right audience to capture the right customer.

The key benefits are:
- Free, simple and quick download for Excel 2007
- Easily research, analyze, and manipulate data in Excel.
- Quickly research keyword monetization for KPIs—CPC, CTR, impressions, and - clicks—to help maximize campaign ROI.
- Keyword categorization allows users to input URLs or keywords, and the tool suggests a category based on the market segment for more effective advertising spend.
Keyword demographic and geographic information helps to target the right audience.
Leverage keyword historical data to anticipate future trends to choose the right keywords at the right time.

Orkut Hate Clubs flourishing online..

There are communities you can identify with persons (fan clubs), names, hobbies, professions and even cities and alphabets too. But have you ever been to visit a "Hate Club"
Google and other social networks do a lot of efforts to curb such menace which will be some-day affecting the use and number of visitors; effectively reducing the online spending and income for the service provider.

A news from Techtree has something to surf on....

If you happen to hate Big B's smug face, beaming across from every other channel, or those tireless 'K's' from Ekta Kapoor's 'soap factory', you now have space to vent your emotions.

Hate communities or hate clubs are becoming increasingly popular on social networking Web sites like Google-owned Orkut.

On Orkut, the Ekta Kapoor hate club leads the pack with a membership of nearly 76,468 and counting. Followed by Himesh Reshamiya (of the nasal twang) with 33,137 members; Shah Rukh Khan with 11,179; Greg Chappell with 7,659; yes, Mahatma Gandhi with 6,647; General Musharraf with 1,362; and the Big B with 1,410.

Ironically, while the Father of the Nation boasts a thousands-strong hate club, his killer, Nathuram Godse, does not even warrant a mention on Orkut or Facebook.

Psychiatrist Sameer Parikh explains that people possess a certain amount of hatred, dislikes, and complexities, and they get a chance to express these on such communities and groups. However, Parikh says, too much thought should not be dispensed on this entire phenomenon.

Yet, in recent times, concerns have been raised over certain communities for hurting social sentiments. So much so that the social networking sites themselves are opting to play safe on such issues.

A Google spokesperson voiced the view that they take abuse of Orkut very seriously, and are constantly developing new tools to review inappropriate content on the site.

Orkut users too can report content to reviewers by clicking on the 'report as bogus' button. Recently, a priority reporting tool has been introduced for reporting serious aberrations on the site.

A news article from MSN shows something like that, here the target is Dogs and those who hate them ( may be due to personal reasons or social) are observed using hate as a medium to discuss the feelings.

Drop them from building tops, run them over with your car - are just some of the ways to kill dogs that Orkut's canine-hating members suggest while socialising online
Animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India has now complained to the police.

Peta accused Orkut, the social networking site, of promoting cruelty to animals and has demanded action against it by cyber cells of the government.

Peta has written to the Mumbai police and complained that among topics discussed on Orkut community sites was "I hate dogs".

Here organizations like PETA come into picture to save the interest of the pets.

Forthcoming Internet Problems in 2010

Predict the future of Internet?
Many people say its bright...
Some say its a bit dull...
How about a warning that it will be a infrastructure crisis ?
Dont believe me....

Here is a news from chinadaily.com,

Booming demand for Internet services combined with insufficient infrastructure investment could leave the Web vulnerable to brown outs within three years, a study released Tuesday predicted.
Nemertes Research said Internet providers need to invest from $42 billion to $55 billion -- or 60% to 70% more than current plans call for -- to stave off interruptions to the digital economy that could happen if the Net bogs down. "The next Google, YouTube, or Amazon might not arise" if the situation isn't fixed, Nemertes said.
The problem, the group said, is that bandwidth usage is outpacing infrastructure build outs. While core fiber and switching/routing technology "will scale nicely," Internet access resources could soon be overwhelmed in three to five years, Nemertes said.

Read the complete story here