Google dominates search, but Yahoo! gets more clicks: study

By Michael Santo
Executive Editor, RealTechNews

While Google clearly dominates search, it’s Yahoo! that gets the most clicks, according to a study released this week by Compete, Inc., a site with a vested interest in search analytics, as it says on its site, “Compete’s Search Analytics are the starting point to build search marketing campaigns that create brand awareness, drive site traffic and increase sales.”

The report determined that Yahoo! did the best at “search fulfillment,” which is when the results of a search are clicked on, resulting in a “referral.” About 75% of searches performed on Yahoo! in August resulted in a referral. On the other hand, searches on Google resulted in a referral about 65% of the time while MSN searches resulted in a referral about 59% of the time.

We Say: Based on this, while Google just kills everyone else in terms of search engine share, Yahoo! is more satisfying to its users. ‘Course, that’s not going to make me start using Yahoo! search.