Bing Crushes Yahoo Again In November
Another good month for Microsoft's Bing, and another very bad month for Yahoo, according to comScore's November search stats just delivered via a note from JPMorgan's Imran Khan. — Yahoo search is going down the tubes.
Context & Ripple Effects
The November comScore figures mark a reversal from Yahoo’s search-share gain over Microsoft in 2008. Bing’s repeated outperformance of Yahoo makes the contest less about Microsoft merely entering search and more about whether Yahoo can retain its position.
First-order effects
- Microsoft gains evidence that Bing is taking share relative to Yahoo, strengthening its search-market narrative with advertisers, partners, and investors.
- Yahoo faces a worsening search-position comparison at a moment when search traffic underpins the value of its advertising business.
Second-order effects
- Advertisers and distribution partners evaluating the two companies have a clearer incentive to treat Bing as a more credible alternative to Yahoo, rather than as a marginal Microsoft offering.
Third-order effects
- If successive comScore readings sustain the same direction, the search market shifts from a Google-versus-Yahoo framing toward a contest in which Microsoft becomes Yahoo’s more immediate share rival.
The trend: Search competition is reorganizing around Bing’s attempt to convert Microsoft’s investment into share gains at Yahoo’s expense.