I am as guilty as anyone of referring to Google as if it were the only search engine. It grew market share in May, but Bing and Yahoo are going to change the game. According to this PCWorld article, internet search ads are projected to grow from $13 million to $27 million by 2014. The merger of Yahoo and Bing will enable law firms to focus their natural SEO efforts on 2 algorythm, instead of three, and make 1 ad buy as opposed to 2. This should enable attorneys to benefit from volume purchasing.
The landscape will look differently when Google has rough 2/3 market share and Bing/Yahoo have a 1/3. Perhaps one can look past either individual search engine at 14% market share or less, but one cannot ignore a single provide who delivers ~30% of search.
What we be the real kick in the pants will be effects on those focusing solely on Google using companies will questionable inbound link selling strategies to deliver results. Those who rely on canned content with an annual “re-fresh” powered solely by this links will feel the affects on their client intake. Those with an engaged webmaster consistently working to provide a better search experience will reap what they’ve sown.
One way to think about a balanced internet marketing plan is comparing it to an 8 cylinder engine. Should one of those cylinders not spark, it will still get you home. Now if you’re running a single cylinder engine and you loss that which provides it spark, you’re dead in the water. Attorneys are becoming more and more knowledgeable, as is their nature, of how the search engines work. The days of “who cares as long as it works” are coming to an end. One should care because if the game changes without your knowledge, you lose.
