Google Drops From Alexa #2
Alexa.com’s rankings of popular websites, never terribly accurate but always debated and used in arguments, have dropped Google from their number 2 spot all the way to #4. Passing Google.com are Google’s own YouTube, now #2, and Microsoft’s Live.com, now #3. Here’s Alexa’s traffic graphs of the top five sites:
Alexa’s data is based on installations of its toolbar, which skews it to a particular and not always representative audience. However, the audience would tend not to use YouTube or Live.com as much as the general population, which makes this graph all the more interesting. While Google isn’t dropping, its competitors are recording significant gains, and Google may need to watch its back (or front, depending on who you believe).
live.com more popular than Google and gets 3% of all page views across the entire web? Something sounds strange here..
Comment by Matt Cutts | February 21, 2008
Keep in mind just how many services Microsoft jams into Live.com, including Live Hotmail, which should provide an unvbelievable amount of pageviews. If Microsoft has moved most of its users from MSN.com to Live.com, and enjoyed even modest growth, it makes sense it could pass Google.
Comment by Nathan Weinberg | February 22, 2008