The whole SEO industry revolves around search engines. After all, if your website sits on top of a popular search engine for a commonly-used query or search phrase then, in theory, you should be sitting pretty.
But it simply doesn’t work like that in practice. An SEO company should never guarantee you top spot on page one of the rankings, simply because of the shifting nature of the industry. Search engines don’t have their feet planted firmly on the ground. They’re constantly racing against each other to serve you, the searcher, and are always making constant improvements. It’s our job to keep up with them!
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Google is the example for everybody to follow and all other search engines are working hard, desperate to emulate its phenomenal success. Currently the world’s largest search engine, it’s incredibly easy to use and delivers relevant content to searchers at incredible speeds.
Google has become such a powerful brand that it attracts well over a billion search requests per day. Not bad for a company that was founded by two students in a dorm room in Stanford University. Larry Page’s and Sergey Brin’s mission statement was simple. To make all the world’s content easily-accessible, universal and useful.
Google’s algorithm is the most respected on the planet. They have also extended their arm to other applications including images, street maps and view, AdWords, international translation and many more. Google isn’t just a search engine. It’s a trend-setting global prodigy.
Yahoo!
The name Yahoo! is as instantly recognisable as Google’s. There were an avalanche of search engines plying their trade in the 90s – most didn’t survive. Yahoo! did however, and still attracts a vast number of users to its engine on a daily basis.
One of the oldest search engines available, founders David Filo and Jerry Yang started Yahoo! in 1994 as a way to keep track of all their personal interests on the web. Gradually the list became too long and the pioneers found themselves spending more time on their hobby. Yahoo! is thought to stand for ‘Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle’, yet Filo and Yang also claim they chose it because they were ‘yahoos’.
Yahoo! has since grown to become one of the largest search businesses on the globe and offers comprehensive search results. It was resilient enough to survive the dot com bubble burst of 2000/01 and continues to evolve. Just recently a 10-year partnership has been announced with Microsoft that will give it full access to the Yahoo! search engine for future Bing products.
Bing
Bing is the newcomer and has a lot of work to do to shake that tag. With Microsoft’s backing though it has every chance of succeeding and becoming a powerful rival to Google – given enough time. They have already incorporated an aggressive advertising campaign to increase its brand awareness as the ‘decision engine’, and is pushing a range of different features to set itself apart from its competitors.
The public got its first peek of Bing when it was unveiled by Microsoft CEO, Steve Ballmer, at the San Diego All Things Digital expo in 2009. Bing is already the third biggest search engine on the internet, but only commands 3.24% of web query volume as opposed to Yahoo!’s 6.19% and Google’s whopping 84.80% (source: Net Applications as of June 2010). Figures like this show just what a fight Bing has on its hands, but its share of the market, no matter how small it may seem, cannot be ignored.
Bing, for instance, currently powers Yahoo! Search and has a series of quirky, innovative and eye-catching features. It updates its homepage picture daily, has a variety of media search features, can provide users with instant answers such as instant company stock symbols and more.
These are the three most important search engines currently gracing the internet and you’re bound to hear their names more often than not when you choose to incorporate an SEO campaign into your online marketing strategy. Getting visible high up on the results pages of these search engines is your key to success, and the best way of promoting you brand online.
