When evaluating the best search engines to spend your marketing budget and effort on, usually the blanket rule of biggest is best, is applied. While being highly visible to a large audience is a great initial search engine marketing goal, when ROI becomes your campaigns driving force, the real objective is being seen by potential customers in a search engine that generates results. And this is when all search engines are not the same especially when evaluating Google vs. Yahoo! vs. MSN.

BIGresearch have just released their latest Simultaneous Media Study (SMM) which after consulting with 15000 respondents provides a great insight into which search engines are best for influencing purchase decisions on particular product categories. In lay terms - which search engine people use to buy specific products.

And here's where it gets interesting.

For all of you, like me, who thought that Google was sure to be at the top of most of the product categories - you'll be surprised!

The top 5 places overall for "influence on purchase decision" rank as follows:


Yahoo! (score of 13)
MSN (score of 21)
AOL (score of 23)
Google (score of 26)
Ask Jeeves (score of 32)

So already the landscape of search looks very different when you start rating search engine effectiveness based on their ability to generate the results you want - sales. Below I have provided a breakdown of top search engines by product category. When you start your next round of search engine marketing planning, it will pay to bear these ratings in mind when choosing where to spend your marketing budget. Focus your search engine marketing based on your product category.

Electronics
Google
Yahoo!
MSN

Apparel
AOL
Yahoo!
MSN

Grocery
AOL
Yahoo!
Ask Jeeves

Home Improvement
Yahoo!
MSN
Ask Jeeves

Car/Truck
MSN
Yahoo!
Google

Medicines
Yahoo!
AOL
Ask Jeeves

Telecom
Google
MSN / Yahoo!
AOL

Eating Out
Yahoo!
MSN
Google / AOL

Source: BIGresearch Dec 2005