Last week Computerworld released numbers about search engine market share. The leader Google grabbed 59.3% followed by Yahoo at 22% with MSN at 12.1% in third. Google has held the lead for a long time now, but search engine competitors are always attempting to improve their engines in order to regain market share from the giant.
I think someone will have to develop a product that is much more innovative than the search engine products we currently use today. Web 2.0 will play a big part in providing better usability in search. There is potential in that market, but it will be very difficult to have users switch from their search engine of choice.
If people are already happy with a product, it is difficult to switch them to something new. People tend to feel comfortable using a product they already know how to use and if it gets the job done for them that is usually good enough. Better needs to be much better than good enough.
