Bing's Share of U.S. Searches Declines for Second Consecutive Month

As it nears the year anniversary of its official relaunch, share of U.S. searches for Microsoft’s Bing has contracted for two consecutive months, according to data from Hitwise. The engine enjoyed three months of consistent growth until February, during which it reached 9.7 percent of searches, but that figure dropped to 9.62 percent in March, and further to 9.43 percent in April.

Year-over-year, however, Microsoft has almost doubled its share of searches from the 5.68 percent its engine represented in April 2009.

Having grown by a surprising 21 percent in March, Ask.com’s share nosedived 37 percent in April, accounting for just over 2 percent of searches overall. Yahoo’s share also dipped slightly, down 1 percent versus March.

Meanwhile, Google’s share grew 2 percent, month-over-month, accounting for almost 72 percent of searches. Year-over-year, Google’s share has therefore dipped by 1.34 percentage points.

Google accounted for almost 72 percent of all U.S. searches conducted during the four weeks ending November 28, 2009, according to data from Experian Hitwise.The search giant grew its overall share of searches by one percentage point in that period, while its closest competitors in the space – Yahoo and Microsoft’s Bing – both experienced a decline, dropping 5 percent and 2 percent respectively.Ranked fourth, Ask.com also experienced month-over-month growth of 1 percent – albeit from a drastically lower base – growing from 2.62 percent in October to 2.65 percent in November.The remaining 52 search engines monitored by Hitwise accounted for the remaining 1.07 percent of searches.