Google Inc. (GOOG) and Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) in December again saw a slight increase in their shares of the U.S. online-search market, according to market research firm comScore Inc. (SCOR).
Americans used search giant Google for 65.7% of their 14.7 billion core searches last month, up from 65.6% in November. Microsoft’s share was 10.7%, compared with 10.3% in the prior month.
Yahoo Inc. (YHOO) fell 0.2 percentage point to 17.3%. Ask Network, owned by IAC/Interactive Corp. (IACI) captured 3.7%, followed by AOL Inc. (AOL) at 2.6%.
The total number of searches rose 2.1% in December from the month before.
Microsoft search-engine Bing, which launched this summer, again saw large growth in comScore’s analysis of Websites where search activity is observed. Bing’s queries jumped 6% to nearly 1.4 billion searches.
EBay Inc. (EBAY) and Amazon.com Inc. (AMZN) also experienced gains, of 7% and 21%, respectively, in December as consumers increased their retail search activity for the holiday season.
For social networking sites, Facebook posted a 1% decline, while MySpace, owned by News Corp. (NWS, NWSA), declined 5%.
