Google Now 65% of U.S. Searches, Up 5% YOY

Google now accounts for 65.1 percent of all US searches, while Yahoo Search, MSN Search and Ask.com received 21.2 percent, 7.1 percent and 4.6 percent, respectively, according to MarketingCharts, citing Hitwise.

The remaining 46 search engines it tracks accounted for less than 2.0 percent.

Microsoft Launches New Live Search

A new Microsoft’s Live Search has just launched:
The latest iteration of Microsoft’s Live Search, which was first “leaked” last week, is now live and in the wild. According to the Live Search team, the improvements cover four major areas: an expanded index (reports say Live now searches 20 billion pages), faster load times, a new [...]

Google retains lead in U.S. search market

The search giant’s market share among home, work and university Internet users climbed from 42.7 percent to 43.1 percent from March to April of this year–up from 36.5 percent in April 2005, ComScore said Monday.
In second place, Yahoo saw its market share hold steady at 28 percent between March and April, a decrease of 2.7 [...]

Creative (and Effective) Form Design

UK based Carphone Warehouse has created an innovative phone ordering application on their web site, The Phone Spot. There are two things I like about it.
First, they make creative use of animation on their cell phone ordering form. This ‘Step by Step Phone Finder’ has an animated character on the left which makes the search [...]

Alexaholic: Website Statistics and Graphs

Alexa isn’t always spot-on accurate, but it has its uses. This site allows you to compare stats for up to five domains, side by side. An interesting tool for competitive analysis.
Alexaholic blends Alexa website traffic graphs with a lightweight ajax-enhanced interface to satisfy hard-core Alexa traffic chart junkies – aka Alexaholics.
Webmasters, SEO/SEM specialists, and domain [...]

Google’s New Custom Search Engine

Want to build your own Google-powered specialized search engine for your web site or blog? Google’s new Custom Search Engine service allows you to set up your own unique search engine that searches on certain sites you specify, and allows you to completely customize the look and feel. Some of the features:

Make money (get [...]

DiscountClick Online Marketing Services

Businesses wanting web marketing services usually must pay a premium to agencies to get SEO and PPC assistance.  DiscountClick fills in the gap between do-it-yourself campaigns and high-dollar agencies.  Their affordable Search Engine Promotion Services costs as low as $50 per month. They provide:
… dedicated SEO Consulting, Natural Search Engine Optimization, Pay Per Click Management, [...]

Google Alone Allows Trademark Bidding

Google is the only search engine that currently allows you to buy a competitor’s name in paid search; this was recently upheld in court. Source

Only 11 Percent Of Searchers Use One Word Queries

11.4 percent of searchers use one-word queries, two-word queries 28.9% leads the bunch, followed by three-word queries at 27.85%, four-word queries with 17.1%, five-word with 8.25% and six-word queries with 3.7%. Source

Google Website Optimizer

Google Analytics Blog has announced a new Website Optimizer in limited release to AdWords advertisers:
Website Optimizer is a free tool that helps AdWords advertisers test different landing pages and determine which one drives the most conversions. A true multivariate testing tool, Website Optmizer allows you to test variations of headlines, promotional copy, and images. [...]