MSN and Yahoo! Search Tied for Second Place in the UK

London, 6^th June 2006

Reports on the search market typically focus on which search engine will grow to compete with Google. However in the UK, the battle is currently for second place, with Google far and away the favourite.

The latest analysis from Hitwise, the world's leading online competitive intelligence service, reveals that Yahoo!'s share of executed UK searches has grown to be tied with that of MSN. Yahoo! Search and MSN Search each powered just over 7% of UK Internet searches in the four weeks to 20^th May 2006 (combining the UK and .com search properties).

"Yahoo! has been slowly gaining market share of executed UK searches over the past few months and has crept up to be tied with MSN for second place" said Heather Hopkins, Director of Research for Hitwise UK.

Google continues to dominate the UK search market, powering more than three-quarters (77%) of UK Internet searches for the 4 weeks to 20th May 2006. Google UK is also the most visited website in the UK, receiving more than twice the share of visits compared with the #2 ranked site, MSN Hotmail.

In the US, Yahoo! Search is a stronger competitor. Amongst US Internet users, Google.com powered 59% of all searches, compared to Yahoo! Search at 22% in the four weeks to 20^th May 2006.

Google sub-domains fail to gain traction

Google has launched several new services in the past few months, however Hitwise analysis reveals that while these attract the attention of industry commentators and webmasters, they are not gaining traction with UK consumers. For example, in the four weeks to 20^th May 2006, Google Finance (finance.google.com) ranked 201 in the Business & Finance - Business Information category with a 0.04% share of category visits; Yahoo! UK & Ireland Finance (uk.finance.yahoo.com) in contrast ranked #1 in the same category, with 8.3% of market share in the week ending 20^th May 2006.

Google's association with search is so strong that 85% of UK visits to Google properties went to either the UK or US search engine. By contrast, Yahoo!'s portal and its email service are its strongest properties and MSN's strengths are in its communication services.

"Google is the undisputed favourite in search in the UK, however Yahoo! and MSN are much more popular for other services" said Heather Hopkins. "Consumers are moving among these three Internet brands and seem to clearly distinguish the users of each. UK consumers use Google to navigate and search the web, MSN to communicate and Yahoo! for content." 

Hitwise is the leading online competitive intelligence service. Each day, Hitwise monitors how more than 25 million Internet users interact with over 500,000 websites across 160 industry categories.

By monitoring more people, more websites, more often, Hitwise provides marketers with timely and actionable marketing insights on how their online presence compares to competitive websites. Companies use this information to maximise the return on their online investment, in efforts such as affiliate programs, search marketing, online advertising, content development and lead generation.

Hitwise collects Internet usage information via a combination of ISP data partnerships and opt-in panels, and complies with local and international privacy legislation as audited by PricewaterhouseCoopers. Founded in 1997, Hitwise is a privately held company, headquartered in New York City and operates in the US, UK, Australia, New Zealand, Hong Kong and Singapore.

More information about the Hitwise Competitive Intelligence service is available at www.hitwise.co.uk.

For up to date analysis on online trends, please visit the Hitwise Intelligence-Analyst Weblogs at weblogs.hitwise.com.

For media enquiries, please contact:

Jannie Cahill
jannie.cahill@hitwise.com

Tel: 020 7378 3619