It hasn’t gone unnoticed by the search engine optimisation (SEO) community that veteran search engine Yahoo has given signs of a planned return the market it once spearheaded.
One indication of a planned relaunch of Yahoo Search has been recent Twitter activity. The company has been reminding followers of its role as a forefather of search, hinting it will “BRB” (be right back). Another tweet has alluded to an “opportunity for prosperity”.
Just popping in to remind everyone that we did search before it was cool.
BRB making it cool again.
— Yahoo Search (@YahooSearch) January 20, 2023
The year of the 🐰 is said to bring tranquil energy and opportunity for prosperity. 😌🧧
Love that for us.
— Yahoo Search (@YahooSearch) January 22, 2023
Elsewhere, Search Engine Land has spotted that Yahoo Search has advertised an available position for a Principal Product Manager, with the job listing citing a vision to:
“…change the way folks interact and use search.”
Those who used the internet in the 1990s might remember the days when Yahoo was the dominant search engine, allowing users to browse through categories of pages to find what they were looking for. One of the most frequently told tales of ‘the one that got away’ is that Yahoo had an opportunity to buy Google for a mere $1m in 1998, but turned it down.
Yahoo was launched as a directory in 1994 and developed into a search engine the following year. Over the decades since it has had on-off spells of being independently powered but is currently powered by Bing. Google has also been the technology behind it in spells from 2001 to 2004, and 2015 to 2019.
With the hype over ChatGPT and other artificial intelligence (AI) writing tools, there does appear to be an element of panic at Google HQ at the moment, and even speculation from the creator of Gmail that AI could severely disrupt Google within the next couple of years. Ever since it became the go-to search engine, Google has never really faced any serious threat to its dominance, which is perhaps why names like Yahoo are choosing now as the time to make their move.
Online search appears to stand at an interesting crossroads right now, which is why forward-thinking SEO strategies are more vital than ever. At Engage Web, we are monitoring AI and search engine movements closely as we continue to deliver ranking results for our clients. If you’d like to be more visible online and bring in more business, speak to us today.
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