Barry Diller is not backing down. The media mogul’s IAC/InterActiveCorp has once again relaunched its Ask.com search engine — aiming to increase its share of the lucrative Web search market.
Ask.com Chief Executive Officer Jim Safka told Reuters in an interview that the revamped site — with its faster, better searches — would keep customers coming back for more. He said early tests showed a 16 percent increase in the rate at which customers returned to the search page.
The problem is that Ask.com has a long way to go. Google is the dominant Web search service in the United States, growing in August to more than 63 percent market share, according comScore, a Web audience measurement firm. Yahoo was second with a fall to 19.6 percent share and Microsoft dipped to 8.3 percent. Ask was fourth, growing slightly to 4.8 percent.
And, as the Wall Street Journal points out, this isn’t Ask’s first effort at redesign:
IAC first shifted away from the hallmarks of Ask Jeeves, which was known for answering search queries posed as questions. Then last year Ask tried again with the tech-savvy redesign, Ask3D.
