Search Engine Demographics

**mgallone** · October 10th, 2010, 7:24 AM

Hi everyone.

When looking through the StatCounter stats for a couple of sites this morning, I noticed a trend in the keyword terms that had never really been apparent to me before. I won't divulge the exact term, but I rank number 2 on Yahoo for the term Student *blank*. On Google, I rank at position 8. (Bear in mind that this is a long(er)tail phrase that I never intentionally tried to rank for, so I'v no idea how the page suits Yahoo still well when the term that I do want to rank for is much lower in Yahoo)

Despite being higher in the rankings, I never see any visitors coming to the website from Yahoo for that term, yet plenty coming over from Google. This got me thinking- are there some search engines that are more favoured by certain groups than others, and if so, what does it mean for the webmaster? The (admittedly relatively very small) sample that I have at hand would suggest that the ratio of students or prospective students using Google is far higher than that of students using Yahoo. It might also point to a slightly worrying indication that we're growing up in a 'Google World' where G becomes the first and only search engine that younger people use in schools and home.

Has anyone else noticed similar, or completely different, trends? If so, do you optimize your sites to meet the needs, or use the advertising system of, your target audience's favoured search engine?

**hooperman** · October 11th, 2010, 4:47 AM

Originally Posted by mgallone

Has anyone else noticed similar, or completely different, trends? If so, do you optimize your sites to meet the needs, or use the advertising system of, your target audience's favoured search engine?

The only trend I've noticed is that I get most of my traffic from Google. I don't get much from the other SEs (I've just checked one site and it gets 5% from bing and 2.75% from Yahoo, another site gets even less), and to be honest I don't do much optimising either!

**JJMcClure** · October 11th, 2010, 5:35 AM

Yahoo (especially so now it's powered by Bing) has always relied more on on-page factors than Google so I often find that I rank better for phrases on Yahoo than on Google but I still get more traffic from Google, simply because more people use it. The ratio isn't exact though considering Yahoo's market share in the UK is only about 8%, I get more traffic from Yahoo than I ought to, about 25% of my total traffic.

Interestingly for the site I'm looking at, the bounce rate for Yahoo traffic is 40% better than the site average but traffic from Google bounces 25% more than the site average...

I always optimise for Google because they account for 90% of daily searches in the UK and because I think that they're identified better than anyone else what signals really represent a good quality resource and their search engine is the best currently available.

**hooperman** · October 11th, 2010, 5:42 AM

Originally Posted by JJMcClure

Interestingly for the site I'm looking at, the bounce rate for Yahoo traffic is 40% better than the site average but traffic from Google bounces 25% more than the site average...

Is that for the same search terms?

**JJMcClure** · October 11th, 2010, 5:49 AM

Originally Posted by hooperman

Is that for the same search terms?

If you mean organic traffic that's what I was talking about. Not sure what you mean?

**hooperman** · October 11th, 2010, 6:06 AM

Originally Posted by JJMcClure

If you mean organic traffic that's what I was talking about. Not sure what you mean?

The search terms that bring traffic via Yahoo: are they the same as the search terms that bring traffic via Google? I suppose it'll be a hard comparison to make, as the group of search terms will be different. I was just trying to find a good explanation of why the bounce rates varied so much.

I'm guessing that one reason Google bounces are so much higher might be that Google is serving your pages when it shouldn't i.e. if the page Google displayed was a good fit for a visitor's search, then the searcher might explore more pages. But if Google serves up a page that is a poor fit for what the searcher wants, they'll leave the site without exploring further. Not sure whether that holds any water...

**JJMcClure** · October 11th, 2010, 7:28 AM

sDoh... I must have misread your question, even though it's only 7 words long. No, it's not for the same search terms but I just had a close loook for the results for the same search terms.

Originally Posted by hooperman

I'm guessing that one reason Google bounces are so much higher might be that Google is serving your pages when it shouldn't i.e. if the page Google displayed was a good fit for a visitor's search, then the searcher might explore more pages. But if Google serves up a page that is a poor fit for what the searcher wants, they'll leave the site without exploring further. Not sure whether that holds any water...

I made a mistake, closer analysis shows that Google are getting it right. The site sells 12v solar panel(s) and on Google I rank No 2 & 4 for that phrase (plural and singular). On yahoo I rank No 2 for the phrase 'solar panels' which is not technically what the site sells because that phrase usually refers to domestic solar panels not 12v panels plus it's ridiculous that I rank that well for such a competitive phrase without even having put any serious effort into it.

The 12v traffic that Google sends spends 9,796.38% more time on the site (and 7,053.73% for the phrase in the singular) than the site average compared to the 24.12% and -1.19% for the Yahoo 12v traffic. Bounce rates are actually comparable although Google's are better. The implication from the 'Time on site' stat is that the Google traffic is better qualified.

So, 93% of the traffic Yahoo sends me is for something I don't even sell and the 7% they get right doesn't spend as long on my site as the same Google traffic. Hmmm, that's really interesting.

**hooperman** · October 11th, 2010, 8:04 AM

Originally Posted by JJMcClure

The implication from the 'Time on site' stat is that the Google traffic is better qualified.

So time on site is longer and bounce rate is lower for "12v solar panel(s)" than for "solar panel(s)"? That makes sense.

**JJMcClure** · October 11th, 2010, 8:47 AM

Originally Posted by hooperman

So time on site is longer and bounce rate is lower for "12v solar panel(s)" than for "solar panel(s)"? That makes sense.

Actually no, wierdly. The 'solar panel' traffic that Yahoo sent stayed on-site for 38.93% more than site average but the 12v solar panel traffic also sent by Yahoo stayed on site for less than that.

(Don't know why these aren't showing as images)

Attachment 107 - Yahoo
Attachment 108 - Google

So Yahoo is sending mostly the wrong traffic and the right traffic it sends doesn't spend much time on site and Google is sending the right traffic and it's staying on site massively longer than the Yahoo traffic.

It's not anywherre near a big enough sample to be calling it a firm trend but it does agree with expectations so far, I would expect Google to be doing a better job of ranking.

**hooperman** · October 11th, 2010, 9:05 AM

Originally Posted by JJMcClure

Attachment 107 - Yahoo
Attachment 108 - Google

I'm not sure you're comparing apples with apples here. The Yahoo report is comparing against the site average for time on site, whereas the Google report is comparing against the site average for visits.