Research Says Less Than 10 Percent Of Searches Are Through Yahoo

Some recent data out on Yahoo shows the fewer people than ever are using the search engine.

Ben Schachter of Macquarie Research said Yahoo's share of the search market is under 10 percent for the first time ever, according to Business Insider. It's at 9.8 percent.

Here's part of the report first posted by Business Insider:

We are particularly concerned with the ongoing deterioration in search share for YHOO, which has been steadily declining since we began tracking in 2006 and dropped another 20bps to a new all-time low of 9.8% in June. YHOO share is now down more than 160bps y/y, and has fallen nearly 320bps from two years ago.

We'll break this down for you. A 20bps drop by itself is not too substantial but what it signifies is not good.

It's the furthest it's fallen and so it's making headlines, but it's a reminder than the overall picture for Yahoo, in terms of the search market is bad. Here's the rest of a segment of the report published.

YHOO's share remains firmly entrenched in its long-term downtrend, taking another step down in June after briefly stabilizing in the 10.4%-10.0% range earlier this year. Notably, YHOO's total query volume growth (down 21% y/y) continues to meaningfully lag GOOG and Bing (down 6% and up < 1% y/y, respectively), and the industry in aggregate (down 7% y/y). With no apparent structural bottom in YHOO's search business, it is difficult to envision how YHOO will be able to sustain the paid click volume growth it has reported for the past two years. We note that YHOO's reported search revenue includes its partner network; many of these partners were restricted by GOOG and thus switched to YHOO (generating faster revenue and paid click growth). We believe that this is not sustainable, and we remain cautious on the LT structural challenges facing Yahoo in search advertising.

In other words: Yahoo's boat has taken on more water than it can hold. If something drastic doesn't change, and advertising slows or doesn't come in, who knows what action would be taken. 

By comparison, Google searches reached an all-time high market share of 67.7 percent and June comScore data showed Bing at 19.2 percent — also an all-time high.