Live Search, where people search for better search options
The numbers would probably be much different if Live Search was considered a decent search engine. Right now, not so much. People would rather use Live to search for a better place to search than to perform their actual queries.
Does the same thing happen on Google? Not quite. Yahoo appears at #20 on Trends, and it's the only search engine in the top 100 results.
Apart from the fact that Live isn't the first name people think of when it comes to search, I'm willing to bet that a large volume of the searches are coming from Windows users who don't know where to type web addresses in Internet Explorer.
The support call usually goes something like this:
"Do you see the big white bar at the top of your Internet Explorer window?"
"Yes."
"Type Google.com in there, and press your enter key."
"I did that. All it does is show me this Live Search thing with a bunch of writing under it."
"No, type in the wide bar. The not-wide bar is for searching."
"I did. I must have a virus, it just keeps showing me this Live Search thing."
No, that's not a virus. It's just a search engine you never knew about even though you were looking right at it.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Chedstone said 3:45PM on 4-30-2009
Haha. Live Search fail. I help support a lot of 'non-techy' types to put it nicely and the typing the domain name in the search box happens WAY TOO MANY TIMES!
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Quikboy said 11:40PM on 4-30-2009
Hmm. Maybe it's not necessarily that these people do not like Live Search - it's possible that they don't know its existence or they haven't even tried using it personally.
You always here someone saying, google this or that, and so this user (who knows little about tech) will just automatically try to look where Google's search engine is, and using IE, may accidentally get Live Search.
That's a plausible theory at least.
Dan said 3:46PM on 4-30-2009
LOL! There are SO many people who don't know the address bar from the search bar. It's astounding.
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timothyhudson said 3:58PM on 4-30-2009
I like Live Search. Mainly because Google is the devil, and I'm a Microsoft fanboy. :>
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TruthBringer said 6:24PM on 4-30-2009
I only use Live Search for the same reasons. People may think poorly of it, but on Live, I usually get what I'm looking for on the first page of my search. On Google? Not so much, usually have to go through 2 or 3 pages to find what I need, Live search provides me with faster searching, without a lot of hassle.
alex1jam said 4:04PM on 4-30-2009
Google is the best i dont even know what to do if Google was not around.
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der_tuxman said 4:09PM on 4-30-2009
... which actually expresses a lot about you.
der_tuxman said 4:08PM on 4-30-2009
I use everything but Google. Yes, also Live search.
Reason:
I don't want them to sell my search results. AdSense crap.
Also, ALL competitors I use DON'T add "paid results", so it is way faster to find anything.
Google users should have a look here:
http://google-watch.org
Bah!
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sitruc said 4:44PM on 4-30-2009
I wouldn't be surprised if Google is the most searched for word for Google as well.
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Jash Sayani said 4:51PM on 4-30-2009
Nice post title Lee !
And yeah, Live search is lame. They had come up with some "cash back" online shopping scheme that no one really noticed and bothered about.
I guess, they should invest their time, energy and money in something better.....
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Quikboy said 11:25PM on 4-30-2009
"online shopping scheme that no one really noticed and bothered about"
Uh, you should take a look at this post written a few days ago: http://liveside.net/main/archive/2009/04/25/live-search-cashback-exponentially-growing-5m-pageviews-and-10k-purchases-every-day.aspx
5 million pageviews and 10K purchases daily is nothing to sneeze at.
It's not just a gimmick - It's pretty useful, and eBay has invested a lot in it. It's also pretty convenient, and pushes competition amongst sellers who offer the best prices and rebates.
Of course, since it's MS, it must be a scheme.
Jash Sayani said 7:52AM on 5-01-2009
@Quikboy: That's really cool. 5 million page views and 10K purchases is definitely not joke. I had only read about it when it was released, then there was no news about it. So I did not know that its grown so big...
MS has surely got the potential !
Quikboy said 11:53PM on 4-30-2009
I've been using Live Search to see how well it compares to other search engines, and it does pretty well for me. Sure, there are some big hits and misses, but not too much that I feel compelled to switch to a different search engine. Google, and every other search engine will also have hits and misses too.
I love the Instant Answers that come up in the search engine; I think Live had this before Google did, though I'm not sure. They're convenient and quick to glance at, rather than sifting through a webpage.
I also think that the most underrated parts about Live Search is the Image search and the Video search: These are way better than what's out there.
Image Search:
- results are uncluttered; info. about image can be seen by hovering over the thumbnail
- infinite scrolling - No need to load up more web pages if I don't find what I want at the top, or if I want more.
- filters by size, aspect ratio, color, face, etc.
Video Search:
- video thumbnail preview; The main reason why this search type rocks. Just hover, and a preview comes instantaneously.
- includes tons of video websites, not just YouTube
- filters by duration, aspect ratio, resolution, source, recency
Honestly, Live Search isn't as awful as you think, if you've used it for a week in my opinion. It's just that most people feel that anything associated with Microsoft leaves little to be desired, and Google is a major popular brand that's hard to wiggle away from.
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sitruc said 12:48AM on 5-01-2009
The images and video searches are much better than Google. It is probably the best image search and the video search is one of my favorites along with the yahoo video search(live has previews while yahoo can play all of some videos in the search results). The regular search is a mixed bag, but I like it. It has seen a lot of change in the last year alone. (I often prefer ask for general searches.) I made it the default on a few of my work computers and browsers and it has impressed quite a few that had given up on Microsoft. Google results have been getting worse while the others have caught up and in some areas have surpassed them.
feraligatr8 said 4:10AM on 5-01-2009
The amount of people that don't know how to use the address bar suprises me, I can't believe they don't know how to type in URL's. Google can fail to load sometimes and when that happens all hell breaks loose.
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wrabbit said 9:53AM on 5-01-2009
Of course this whole thing could've been avoided if the search bar was intelligent enough to actually go to an address if it's a proper URL. All it takes is a quick regex check and you're good to go.
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Dave said 5:33PM on 5-17-2009
If you are looking for a really great location for doing people searches that gives you several options for finding people, including searching criminal records I believe, check out the following site:
www.peoplefinder.comze.com
They even have a free downloadable document with info that helps you fine tune your search.
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Brad said 5:21PM on 6-19-2009
If you are wanting to do a people search if you know the phone number or email address, you can visit this site including background checks,
http://www.people-scanner.com
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