The Digital Corner

Now that the buzz around the Yahoo and Microsoft deal has calmed down. I wanted to take a deeper look at what this really means for the search landscape. According to ComScore Google searchers remain loyal to the brand and Google is actually growing market share globally despite the release of Bing.  There has been some traction in the US market for Bing, but the US market is not only the most mature, it only represents 17% of the global search space. The MicroHoo deal instantly made Baidu the world’s third largest search engine. And with China having the worlds largest internet community is number and growth, Baidu could eventually become the worlds number two search engine. In addition to the growth of competitors globally, the landscape for “portal searches” has changed. More people are using their mobile phones and twitter to search, which offer faster and more relevant information making the 1 year courting of Yahoo! search seem pointless.

Not all the news is bad though. The MicroHoo deal could be the beginning of a powerful partnership and a competitor to Google’s real growth opportunity, display advertising. Yahoo and Microsoft combined have a powerful display network filled with a quality audience and global reach. Between the two companies there are 4 ad network systems, which doesn’t create confidence that a display partnership is close (in execution not on paper).

In the end, Microsoft had to do this deal. It was necessary and the right thing to do. This partnership is not only needed for Microsoft, but for the advertising community. I just get the feeling that Microsoft may end up feeling buyer’s remorse once the “new” feeling is gone.