It appears that companies may soon have to consider changing their search engine optimization (SEO) strategies as a new study finds that Microsoft’s Bing search engine is gaining traction in the search market at the expense of Google.
New figures from comScore show that Microsoft sites – including Bing – had 8.9 percent of online searches in July. This means the software giant has seen steady increases in its portion of the market since its 8.4 percent share in June and the 8 percent the company had in May, prior to the launch of Bing.
While Google still maintains a strong hold on the industry with 64.7 percent of searches in July, it did see a 0.3 percent decline. Yahoo also saw its share fall by 0.3 percent to 19.3 percent of the market.
However, the decline of Yahoo may be less of a problem for the business following a partnership the company signed with Microsoft last month.
According to comScore, a combined Microsoft/Yahoo search engine would account for 28.2 percent of the market.
Microsoft and Yahoo have said they hope a deal – which would have Microsoft’s search technology conducting queries on Yahoo – is finalized by the beginning of next year but Wisconsin senator Herb Kohl, chairman of the Senate Judiciary Antitrust Committee, has said the deal would be "closely reviewed."
