The overhaul of Ask.com will provide users with answers to questions directly within the results page, rather than suggesting pages to click through to in order to find what they are looking for.
For example, a search for 'is it safe to eat seafood during pregnancy?' displays real-life examples from blogs, answers from professional content sites, and images.
- The move, which is designed to differentiate Ask from its rivals, marks a return to the search engine's roots. Ask.com was founded on the premise that users would type questions into the query box and Ask would answer them. Searches were originally answered by hand, but now it's done by mining existing online data.
- Ask is also working to integrate more content into its search, including recipes, blogs, images, music and videos. These will be displayed in the central results panel with data-driven listings.
- In an effort to further assert itself against Google, Yahoo! and MSN, Ask is planning a number of product launches in the areas of semantic search, web extraction and ranking over coming months.
- Ask's new look is being promoted with a brand-building campaign that is aimed at giving the site more personality. The ads mark a volte-face for Ask, which ditched its Jeeves character two years ago in favour of a cleaner, more Google-like search engine model.
- Last year, Ask launched a campaign warning consumers that 75 per cent of all the information on the web flowed through one site, implied to be Google. The unbranded 'Information Revolution' drive caused a backlash when users discovered it to be a promotional campaign for Ask.
- Ask currently commands a 3.1 per cent share of total UK internet searches, compared with 87.3 per cent for Google, according to Hitwise. And despite trailing its competitors, Ask has repeatedly denied rumours that it plans to abandon its search engine offering in favour of becoming an information resource for women.
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