Search Engine Marketers are unhappy with the aftermath of the Microsoft/Yahoo talks and failures, which has ultimately led to Google gaining an even stronger hold over the search market share, now nearly 70 percent.
“We always have a need for multiple sources of quality traffic and we don’t see that need going away as Google’s share increases,” Will Margiloff, CEO and founder of Innovation Interactive, an online marketing agency, said during a panel discussion. “Complexity is good, consolidation is bad.” (source)
While online marketing spending has remained rather solid through the economic downturns of the past year, the consolidation of power in Google is hurting some.
AOL’s ad unit reported a weak 2% growth in quarterly ad sales, where as both Google and Yahoo have reported double digits.
Marketers report that Yahoo and other competitors remain attractive and high converting areas to invest in advertising. Users of Yahoo, for example, often spend considerably more time on the site than at Google.
In the end, however, all search marketing companies interviewed had reported an increase in business for 2008, so things can’t be all that bad in the end.
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