Amazon Ditches Google For Microsoft

[Seekz]

If you do a search at Amazon's A9 search engine you will notice that they have stopped using Google as their default search provider. It now says powered by Windows Live. Here is a news story about it:

http://www.informationweek.com/showA...leID=187002497

[hans51]

changing Google for MSN is another form of suicide
if I look at my MSN referrers and compare to Google
MSN is so tiny in search database
if MSN search disappears today from the globe, i wont even notice a traffic loss

[dannysullivan]

We've also got some coverage up on the SEW Blog, touching on how this impacts paid listings on Amazon. Hitwise also posted some new stats refecting how Amazon was the far larger driver of Google paid clicks than A9, which you'll find here.

[Seekz]

Alexa is using Windows Live too. I use Alexa more often than A9.

[Iguana]

I remember a few years back Affiliate sites would more often than not outrank Amazon pages for specific albums. In fact, Amazon did poorly in Google overall in general. After the Adwords tie up, Amazon began to be ever-present near the top of the SERPS. I don't believe Google changed anything in their algo to prioritise Amazon - but I suspect that they did send engineers/consultants in to advise on how best to mazimise all those affiliate links so that they counted for something. Amazon redesigned, and suddenly began to fill 5 out of the top 10 results for, say, a band search. The tie up and the massively increased ranking was too much of a coincidence for me - but still pure speculation on my part.

I wonder if Amazon have now put their rankings at risk. I notice that the .com pages have changed url to /gp/product/ recently. Considering all the trouble that Google has had with 302 redirects/hijacking and canonicalization recently, Amazon may lose a lot from their new relationship with MSN and distancing from Google.

[johnbirch]

Co-incidentally today I've just been trying to buy a copy of the new Wisden, so naturally I started with Froogle to see what deals there were out there (normally pretty good ones for a title like this).

Having browsed through the results I suddenly realised that there were no results from Amazon. Strange... So I tried again with the Plyafair Cricket Annual. Again no Amazon results.

Needless to say both titles are on Amazon - and Amazon is acctually cheapest as well!

I've now tried a few other titles - and I've yet to get anything mentions on Froogle of anything from Amazon.

[caugas]

Is there bad blood between AMZ & Google? Did Microsoft & MSN promise better long-term strategic pricing? Perhaps cross advertising benefits; [Quid pro Quo] i.e. placement of Microsoft verbiage on the A9 (search box/results page) for AMZ placements in MSN? Branding is Big Business!

[ferret77]

changing Google for MSN is another form of suicide
if I look at my MSN referrers and compare to Google
MSN is so tiny in search database
if MSN search disappears today from the globe, i wont even notice a traffic loss

Maybe you should optimize for more competitive key words

[jjspirko]

Originally Posted by hans51

changing Google for MSN is another form of suicide
if I look at my MSN referrers and compare to Google
MSN is so tiny in search database
if MSN search disappears today from the globe, i wont even notice a traffic loss

I don't see any logic here! How would the traffic Google drives or MSN does not hurt Amazon in anyway. This relationship was sending traffic from Amazon to Google and now is sending traffic from Amazon to MSN, NOT THE OTHER WAY AROUND.

The winner in this is MSN the looser is Google, cut and dry. The effect on Amazon is what ever incentive MSN gave them and that is all. No one was using A9 because it is Google in the first place they use it because they are doing something at Amazon and are not a tech savy surfer.

Here is the end result, Amazon had a little share of web traffic that until now was owned by Google it is not gone from Google and given to Microsoft.

No one looses anything here except Google,

Jack Spirko