SearchIgnite has released a report, which indicates that paid search spending in the United States was flat year-over-year in the third quarter, yet up 10% quarter-over-quarter. This comes largely from multi-channel retailers, who increased paid search spend by 40% in the quarter, according to the firm. This is despite flat conversion rates and average order value.
“This is the second consecutive quarter of sequential growth for paid search spend, indicating marketers’ continued confidence in search marketing as an efficient component of their overall marketing mix,” said Roger Barnette, President of SearchIgnite. “Multi-channel retailers in particular have continued to rely more heavily on paid search as a key driver of sales in a challenging economic environment.”
According to the report, Bing saw the most pronounced growth in spend among the top three search engines, an increase of 15% year-over-year (presumably compared to Microsoft Live Search). Yahoo, on the other hand, was down 24% year-over-year.
The report also states the obvious, that there was no movement in search share, as far as rank, but year-over-year, Yahoo lost share to Google, while Bing showed “little” growth.
“Microsoft is headed in the right direction with Bing and attracting more advertiser dollars. That said, it’s an uphill battle against Google and there’s still a long way to go before Bing garners a significant amount of the search ad revenue pie,” said Barnette.
More information about paid search spend for the quarter can be found in the report. SearchIgnite says it manages over $350 million in paid search annually.
