Search Engine Optimisation with the major search players

Surveys frequently show Google in the lead in terms of search engine market share (70 to 80% of users choose Google) whilst Yahoo! is in second place with 10 to 20% and MSN trails behind with 5%. For further details you can look at http://marketshare.hitslink.com/search-engine-market-share.aspx?qprid=5.

Besides Google, Yahoo! and MSN there are a few smaller competitors such as AOL and Ask, however it’s probably not worth your while spending too much time and money on them. Due to its market domination you will be better off focusing your attention on Google rather than on the smaller players. However, in terms of rankings the differences between Google, Yahoo! and MSN are relatively minor.

Having said that Google does have to compete with some quite large competitors in other parts of the world, Baidu in China being one example. In an effort to compete globally Google has made great efforts to deliver localised results in other countries around the world.

In any event the main purpose is to generate more ad revenue, and they all do this by encouraging customer loyalty for their search engines and toolbars. This is something that can only be done if they produce good search results. In one respect they work together, and that is in the fight against spam and low quality results which do not deliver value to users. You can learn more about these kinds of issues at http://www.google.com/support/webmasters/

You need to base your own SEO strategy on things that work across all the search engines. In particular, you need to make sure you do not violate the guidelines as well as developing your own high quality site.