Google may be synonymous with search. However, huge portions of the population have not integrated search into their lives as tightly as you and I have (Google says I've done 19k searches and averaged about 550 a month last year -- I rather doubt my typical customer has). Evangelizing search to the rest of the population makes Google serious amounts of money -- that is one reason they've been dumping a lot into advertising search as a desired behavior this year (in Japan at least).
Both the US and Japan are rich countries with ubiquitous net access and mature Internet markets, right? What do you think was the growth in the number of searches last year for each country? Pick a percentage.
Here's the real numbers: http://bit.ly/aFdenY (I used bit.ly only because the URL gives away the surprise.)
I don't think we're anywhere near Peak Search, either. (For example, I'm seeing YOY growth in the 50% region on some very popular queries for non-techie customers like, e.g., [halloween bingo cards].)
Thanks for that link. That's a huge change for 2009! I believe that hanging around tech people gives one the false impression that Google has saturated the search market.
Both the US and Japan are rich countries with ubiquitous net access and mature Internet markets, right? What do you think was the growth in the number of searches last year for each country? Pick a percentage.
Here's the real numbers: http://bit.ly/aFdenY (I used bit.ly only because the URL gives away the surprise.)
I don't think we're anywhere near Peak Search, either. (For example, I'm seeing YOY growth in the 50% region on some very popular queries for non-techie customers like, e.g., [halloween bingo cards].)