The results from a recent customer satisfaction study done by ForeSee Results were published, and they show that people are not as satisfied with the search engine services as they once were. The annual survey rates search engines and portals on a score of 0-100, with 100 being completely satisfied. The survey has been performed each year since 2003, and this year’s results are the lowest ever.
Across all the major search engines there was a drop in customer satisfaction between 2.6% and 6.2%, broken down as follows:
- Google – Scored 82 in 2012 and 77 in 2013 for a drop of 6.1%
- Bing – Scored 81 in 2012 and 76 in 2013 for a drop of 6.2%
- Yahoo! – Scored 78 in 2012 and 76 in 2013 for a drop of 2.6%
- AOL – scored 74 in 2012 and 71 in 2013 for a drop of 4.1%
One of the leading reasons given for the drop in total score across search engines was “advertising is diminishing the customer experience.” The survey found that 22% of search engine visitors reported that advertisements were what they liked least about their search experiences. This is striking some experts as odd because there hasn’t been any major shift in the number of advertisements on any of the major search engines over the past 12 months.
If anything, the quality of the advertisements has gone up in some places as more and more brands continue to use this method of advertising. Search engines are able to better match up the search terms with the right advertisers. The only thing that really makes since would be if consumers are simply becoming more aware of the advertisements themselves.
Many people don’t realize that the top results on search engines like Google are often paid advertisements and not organically generated search results. While it is labeled as paid advertising, it is sometimes hard to see where the paid ads stop and the organic results begin. In addition, most people don’t look closely enough to notice the disclaimer saying that the ads are paid.
Whatever the cause, the total search engine satisfaction ratings are dropping. Since it is pretty much across all the major search engines, it might be difficult for them to know where they need to improve.
You can see the full report HERE.
