Ask.com Continues to FallLatest Redesign Aims for More-Efficient Web Searches in Bid to Raise User Numbers
Internet search engine Ask.com, the flagship of Barry Diller's IAC/InterActiveCorp, plans to launch its third redesign in as many years Monday as the company continues to seek a firmer foothold in the search market.
The revamp undoes a heralded but largely ineffective overhaul last year that presented images, audio clips and other Ask search results in separate panels. The new Ask looks more like other search engines, but aims to dig up search responses more efficiently.
For example, a search for "What's the biggest state in the U.S.," won't just pull up links that a user has to click through to find the answer. Instead, culling from community-generated and other resources across the Web, Ask aims to dig up the answer -- Alaska -- in the main page of search results.
Ask hopes that making search listings more useful will persuade increasing numbers of people to use Ask, and will push loyal users to return more often.
"To call it an all-new Ask is wrong; it's an evolution of Ask," Mr. Diller said in an interview. "I think it's going to help us primarily in retention and frequency. That is really its goal."
Boosting Ask is more important now for Mr. Diller, who broke IAC into five pieces in August. The split leaves Ask as IAC's biggest business.
Already, IAC has shifted the search engine's direction twice since 2005, when IAC bought the business -- then known as Ask Jeeves -- for nearly $2 billion.
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.
Prior efforts haven't lifted Ask above a minor competitor in the internet search business. Traffic on Ask.com and other Web sites that use its search technology accounted for 4.8% of Internet searches in August, according to comScore Inc.
Google and sites that use its technology had a 63% share.
Jim Safka, who took over as Ask's chief executive in January, is taking a cautious approach to the search engine's latest iteration. Ask3D was trumpeted with $100 million of television commercials, billboards and other marketing. Mr. Diller said Ask will spend $5 million on marketing this time around to test consumer response.
IAC executives defend Ask by pointing to small gains in market share.
Executives also say Ask is a financial success even if it doesn't budge its search position significantly, thanks to a deal under which Google Inc. sells most of the ads on Ask. The recently renewed deal has improved the average revenue Ask receives for each search.
"Search revenue for us is very profitable and it's certainly growing," Mr. Diller said. "Does it matter whether or not we take big chunks of...market share? No. Would we like and hope to? Yes."
IAC and News Corp.'s Dow Jones & Co., which publishes The Wall Street Journal, jointly own a personal-finance Web site.
By: Shira Ovide
Wall Street Journal; October 6, 2008
