There’s no question that Google dominates the world of search. Its algorithms handle roughly 90% of all search queries worldwide. Its closest rival, Bing, has a market share of a paltry 3.33%; the next runner-up, Yahoo, clocks in at 1.34%.
With the above in mind, it’s hardly a surprise that the majority of search engine optimization (SEO) focuses on playing nice with Google’s algorithms. It keeps with one of the most basic tenets of doing business—be where your audience is. But could we actually be sabotaging ourselves?
Could it be better to expand our focus, even in the face of seemingly minuscule returns?
Why Bother Looking Outside Google?
We’ve all heard that adage about putting all your eggs in one basket. Google’s algorithms may form the backbone of the Internet as we know it, but it is, at the end of the day, still a business. And if you optimize exclusively with Google in mind, you’re arguably leaving your website at the mercy of that business.
After all, everyone’s heard at least one story of how a single algorithm update brought an entire company to its knees.
That isn’t the only reason you might consider shifting your attention away from Google. If you know for a fact that your target audience is incredibly privacy-conscious, then there’s a good chance you might not even find them on Google. They’re far likelier to use a search engine like DuckDuckGo.
It’s also worth looking at each search engine’s market share not in terms of percentage points, but search volume. Bing, for instance, saw roughly 1.2 billion unique global visitors in May 2022 alone. That may pale in comparison to Google’s 89.3 billion, but it’s still nothing to sneeze at.
If you could capture even a fraction of those unique visitors as leads, one could argue that your efforts have more than paid off.
Finally, a lower market share arguably means there’s less competition on the lesser-used search engines. It may potentially be easier to rank on Yahoo or DuckDuckGo than on Google, which could, in turn, lead to more traffic.
Optimizing for Other Search Engines
Here’s the good news—for the most part, SEO on other search engines isn’t actually that different from Google SEO. In the case of Bing and Yahoo, the process is almost identical. You might need to do a bit of extra keyword research, but optimizing for Google means you’ve effectively already optimized for other search engines.
That said, there are a few differences that you should keep in mind:
- There’s evidence to suggest that Bing may treat social shares as a ranking factor, something Google has yet to do.
- DuckDuckGo places considerable emphasis on usability, privacy, and high-quality backlinks, even more so than Google.
- Because DuckDuckGo doesn’t track user data, you’ll need to adjust how you target your keywords.
- Some search engines, like Baidu, require you to submit your URLs to them directly.
So, to circle back to our original question, is it worthwhile to optimize for search engines other than Google? Most definitely—at least in part because you’ve already done most of the work.
