Search Agency’s State of Paid Search report for the third quarter has been released, and it shows continued growth in click share by the Yahoo Bing Network (YBN). Click share is defined as the share of a single entity in the universal clicks for a business category.
In the third quarter of this year, click share on Google dropped to 78.7% and the Yahoo Bing Network rose to 21.3%. This represents the fourth quarter in a row that YBN posted gains. Here’s a look at click share over the past 12 months:
Data and Image by The Search Agency.
The report also showed a 27% increase in click traffic. In the 3rd Quarter of this year, click traffic increased 27%. This means that although Google’s share of the traffic is less than in the past, it comes from a greater amount of traffic and therefore may still represent growth. In fact, the report says that according to another metric, “click traffic,” Google is outpacing YBN:
Bottom Line: This study shows that pay per click usage is growing, which is no great surprise, and that clicks for YBN are increasing a little faster that for Google. But both Google and YBN are working for a share of a growing amount of traffic. This is a shift that needs to be watched by online marketers that work in the Pay Per Click (PPC) world and shows subtle shift towards YBN network.
Eric Van Cleave is a Partner in Zenergy Works, a Santa Rosa, California SEO, Website Design, PPC Management and Online Marketing Firm.