Official: Microsoft ‘bribes’ companies to use Live Search

By Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Sunday, 18 March 2007 21:01

Entertainment

With a tiny 6.76% of the search market, compared with Google’s 60%+ search share dominance, Microsoft has decided it’s time to leverage their massive base of global Windows users with juicy wads of cash to switch search providers!

Unfortunately for some, Microsoft’s decision to pay companies money to switch their default search engine from Google, Yahoo or something is only companies can take advantage of, and not (as yet?) for individual users who would consider being paid to search with Windows Live Search.

But if you’re a company with thousands of PCs installed, all using Windows, Microsoft’s new program is official, and there’s a golden opportunity to convert the searches your employees do on a daily basis into tens of thousands of dollars, or even more.

Microsoft’s new program is called “Microsoft Service Credits for Web Search” and has been unveiled by John Batelle’s ‘SearchBlog’. The money on offer is significant, especially when multiplied across thousands of PCs. The deal means that companies can earn between US $2 and US $10 per computer on an annual basis, plus a US $25,000 “enrollment credit” which is a nice big wad of cash that will likely need a large-ish, strong and sturdy brown paper bag to hold securely while being passed under the table.  

For companies that have thousands of computers, this could translate into anywhere from US $100,000 to $200,000 per year, which is money that could be put to good use in the IT department or elsewhere in the company.

Microsoft will use a ‘Browser Helper Object’ installed into IE7 to track search queries and send information on search back to Microsoft, so they can use the information to improve the results that Windows Live Search delivers. Because of this, IE7 must be used – it doesn’t work with Firefox, Opera or older versions of IE browsers.

Microsoft is encouraging companies to take up the program, and once they do so, to promote it internally to staff. Examples of promotions include an ‘in-house training session on how to get the most from web search’, with the search to be used naturally being Windows Live Search, setting the homepage to ‘Live Search’ or even a ‘message of encouragement’ to all staff from the CEO.

Windows Live spokesperson Whitney Burk said in a statement that: “Currently, we are conducting a trial program through which Microsoft is providing service or training credits to a select number of enterprise customers based on the number of Web search queries conducted by their employees via Live Search.”

Burk continues that: “These customers, in turn, are providing valuable feedback to Microsoft on the use of Web search in an enterprise environment. As search evolves into more of a productivity tool, and revenue sharing becomes more commonplace across the industry, we are engaging in mutually beneficial partnerships such as this and our recently announced deal with Lenovo to more easily enable customers to choose Live Search.”

So, is Microsoft really that spooked by Google's dominating success in search, and why is Robert Scoble so unimpressed with the deal? Please continue to page 2 for the conclusion...