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New Tools and Funny Commercials, is Ask.com a Player?
Having fired Jeeves, Ask is now trying to re-brand themselves and create a reputation. Their latest Monkey Ads which have aired during prime time and can be viewed on their blog, talk about their new binoculars tool that let’s you see a screen cap of the sites directly from the search results before you click through, and tries to depict other search engines without this tool as the sites used by monkeys.
Here’s a screen shot of the new tool:
I remains to be seen if these latest moves will make any change in search behavior, but with low barriers to switching search engines, one never knows. Ask.com is a bit easier to type than Google.com.
My bet is that Ask will remain an also ran search engine, and that no amount of funny monkeys are going to catapult them into the race, the real question is what will happen when Vista comes out and search is integrated into the desktop operating system. This creates a real switching barrier for many people, and is in fact why MSN gets the traffic they do today.
Let the search wars continue…
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I agree, yet, I did try the new feature you showed and I think it’s cool, but I’m an Internet geek. Not sure my Grandma or niece will care about it, or even realize it’s there.
After seeing a few of the commercials I decided to sit down and play around with the new Ask.com. I have to say, the innovations are impressive and worthwhile.
Sure it won’t be a sole search provider for most people, but as a supplementary search, I think Ask.com has made a bold and effective reentry to the market.
Dave,
I agree, the binoculars tool is cool; I think the others should adopt similar features, is it enough for me to replace my Google tool bar or start typing in ask.com when I want to find something? Probably not. I do think the commercials are fun.
Adam
I wish more people would use Ask.com, for some reason it loves my sites. I’ve always liked the SE Mark Cuban, owner of the Mavs, is behind:
http://www.icerocket.com
The monkey commerical drove me to my computer to check out Ask.com. Sounds like it worked for other jaded marketers.
I consider myself to be rarely influenced by commercials, so I think they are doing something right with their marketing and product.