Search Engines as Leeches on the Web

[James Bull]

The subject of this posting is the title of a Jakob Nielsen Alertbox article back in January. Please let me know if there's already been a discussion on WPW that I've missed.

Basically, Nielsen's argument is that pay-per-click advertising siphons off the profitablilty of webistes, and ultimately the search engines can be the only winners from companies bidding against each other for keywords.

He predicts that "liberation from search engines will be one of the biggest strategic issues for websites in the coming years."

It's a long article and this is only the briefest attempt to paraphrase it. The full article is www.useit.com/alertbox/search_engines.html

[Burf.com]

I will read this tonight but I very much doubt people are going to go away from se's. I would say people rely on them more and more now.

My friends site does 90% sales just from Google and reading a few anger posts when google change there ranking system, shows that alot of people reply on it to keep their company going.

[vangogh]

I think some of his assumptions are off in the article. He assumes that I'd be willing to spend $399 to make $400 in sales and I don't think too many businesses would do that. I'd want a greater return on my investment or I wouldn't consider it worth the time.

I also don't think that PPC prices infinitely go higher as Mr Neilsen suggests. There comes a point where I'm going to invest my money elsewhere as will most other people which would drive the price of the click back down.

His argument also seems to ignore that just because a customer found me that first time through the paid click that they might come back again and again and this time not through a paid click. It's generally less expensive to keep a customer than acquire a new one. So maybe I really would spend that $399 to generate $400 in sales because in the long run I haven't generated $400 in sales, but $4000.

The search engine may have made most of the money off that initial sale, but over time I've made much more money from a source that might never have known of my existence if not for that initial PPC ad on a search engine.

[Burf.com]

I finally read this, well to be honest it misses a point. I am pretty sure something like only 15% of people click on the adverts, I personally dont, I might click on maybe 1 a week and I spend hours on the net.

As mentioned in the document, the advert just shows who can pay the most for a advert, it does not mean its revelant.

I think the key is to be number 1 in the organic listings.

[webmaker]

I have been working on my engine for a while now. I can say that the search engines of now will never last without changing the way they present results to the user. As far as the advertising aspect. I do not see the ppc changing. Atleast, not the concept. What will need to change is the search. We have to give the power to the searcher. Our search engines now are like drugs. Just a quick fix, browse 2 or 3 pages and then start clicking. If you are not in those pages you are not even on the net. (In most cases). This needs to be changed.