Skip to main content

What Bing might cost Google (it's not peanuts!)

Part of the excitement over Microsoft's new Bing search engine has been the fact that it seems to be getting a pretty fair amount of traffic.

So far, it seems that Microsoft (MSFT) has gained search share at the expense of Yahoo! while Google's search share has remained relatively steady. If Bing's popularity grows, however, it's bound to make a dent in Google's dominance of search.

So what would be the impact if users began to give up Google (GOOG) in favor of Bing?

Here are a few numbers to consider:
  • Google derives 99% of their revenue from advertising.
  • Google derives 69% of ad revenue from "Google web sites". This means Google search and other sites owned by Google such as YouTube. The vast majority of the revenue is derived from search advertising.
  • According to the most recent annual report, advertising revenue from "Google web sites" was $14.4 billion.
  • Google's overall share of search according to ComScore's most recent measure for May is about 65%, a 0.8% increase over April.
If Bing begins to gain search share from Google, the financial impact to Google would look something like this:

A 65% search share equates to $14.4B in annual ad revenue for Google. So for every percent of search share that Google loses, it would cost the company roughly $220 million in revenue.

At this rate, Google will not take the Bing threat lightly. Look for Google to respond aggressively if Bing starts to really take off.

Disclosure: no positions

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Trade Radar gets another update

Some of our data sources changed again and it impacted our ability to load fundamental/financial data. In response, we are rolling out a new version of the software: 7.1.24 The data sourcing issues are fixed and some dead links in the Chart menu were removed. So whether you are a registered user or someone engaged in the free trial, head over to our update page and download the latest version. The update page is here:   https://tradingstockalerts.com/software/downloadpatch Contact us if you have questions or identify any new issues.

Unlock Stock Market Profits - Key #4

This is the fourth article in a series of posts describing 10 tools to help you identify and evaluate good investing ideas. It is based on a post that provides a summary of the ten keys that individual investors should use to identify profitable stock trades. ( Click here to read the original post ) With this fourth post, we will continue another step along the path of finding stocks that seem to have some potential. The first post in the series discussed how to use unusual activity to identify investing ideas. The second post described how to use stock screeners. The third post described how to use lists of new highs and new lows. This post will focus on identifying social or business trends in order to find investing ideas. Information on new trends might turn up anywhere. In conversation with friends or business associates, in newspapers or magazines, on TV or though your work. The key is to be aware of trends and how they start, stop or change. We'll start by describing what...

Pick 'o the Month - a two'fer

Usually I focus on a single smaller, more obscure stock. In this case, I would like to submit two stocks, a large-cap, Cisco Systems ( CSCO ), and a small-cap, Big Band Networks ( BBND ). These two stocks embody a resurgence in the network infrastructure space. That theme is what ties these two picks together. With the rising tide of video, music and movies downloaded over the Internet and cable companies offering bundled TV, phone and Internet, we have finally absorbed the glut of network capacity created during the Internet bubble. This deluge of multimedia is changing service providers’ business models, and the ways they manage and develop networks. The focus now is on how to move, manage and monetize content that is richer and more complex than ever before. In response, as telecommunications companies ramp up newer, faster networks to handle all this traffic, Cisco Systems is a prime beneficiary. As the dominant player in network infrastructure, it has already seen profits begin to...