On Friday 2nd September Baidu launched its new Android-based mobile OS called ‘Baidu Yi’ (Yi meaning Simple) at the Baidu World event in Beijing.

Because it is based on Google’s Android OS it has [...]]]> On Friday 2^nd September Baidu launched its new Android-based mobile OS called ‘Baidu Yi’ (Yi meaning Simple) at the Baidu World event in Beijing.

Because it is based on Google’s Android OS it has kept most of the same core features such as integrated voice search and a single sign-in  to provide access to a vast offering of cloud-based apps and mobile backup services. Baidu has however replaced most of the Google Apps and replaced them with its own. There is Yue for eBooks, Baidu-powered maps and Shen Bian which offers similar functionality to Google Places with its local search recommendations.

Baidu Yi’s music app also integrated to Baidu’s extremely popular Ting service, which launched earlier this year and received very positive reviews.

Baidu also has some good Android apps that have been available for a while that it can now integrate into its new Baidu Yi platform, such as its input-method editor (IME) for typing or hand-drawing Chinese characters.

Baidu Yi will offer direct competition to Alibaba’s recently launched mobile OS called AliYun. The company began discussions with Qualcomm to develop internals for low-end smartphones this summer, and it’s also working on bringing a branded tablet to market before the end of the year.

Both Baidu and Alibaba have massive user bases in China, and the introduction of their new operating systems and hardware will have a significant impact on the world’s largest mobile internet market.

As Forbes reported Dell has signed a deal with Baidu in which Dell should provide tablets, such as the Streak 5 tablet, and smartphones to Baidu and based on reports from Bloomberg the devices will be using the Baidu Yi platform. Dell smartphones/tablets running Baidu Yi OS could hit the market as soon as November though Dell has not provided any official date for such a launch.

If you would like to find more information about Baidu Yi, there are a lot of screenshots and videos on the official Baidu site, but bear in mind that all the information is in Chinese.

More resources on Baidu-Yi

http://www.forbes.com/sites/greatspeculations/2011/09/07/baidu-deal-could-be-a-catalyst-for-taking-dell-to-21/

http://www.forbes.com/2011/09/06/dell-partners-with-baidu-on-tablets-smartphones-marketnewsvideo.html

http://yi.baidu.com/feature_search.html

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2011/09/02/baidu_android_fork/

http://www.geek.com/articles/mobile/baidu-yi-is-an-android-fork-for-china-2011092/

http://9to5google.com/2011/09/05/baidu-launches-its-own-android-based-mobile-os-in-china-leaves-out-google-search-and-services/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+9to5Google+%289to5+Google+-+Beyond+Good+and+Evil%29&utm_content=Google+Reader

http://www.penn-olson.com/2011/09/02/baidu-yi-mobile-os/

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/cndy/2011-09/03/content_13610372.htm

No related posts.

Baidu has announced that its Q2 net profit has almost doubled compared to the same period last year and is predicting a further increase in Q3. Baidu is benefiting from the increasing number of advertisers investing heavily in the world’s [...]]]> Baidu has announced that its Q2 net profit has almost doubled compared to the same period last year and is predicting a further increase in Q3. Baidu is benefiting from the increasing number of advertisers investing heavily in the world’s largest internet market, which passed 500 million users last week, and has grown its number of customers by 17%. As the majority of its revenue comes from search advertising the Chinese-owned search engine is constantly developing its product, including the recent launch of a new keyword advertising system.

Google’s decision in 2010 to pull its search engine out of the country, has also been of benefit to  Baidu, which now has 75.9% of search share in China, compared to just 18.9% for Google.

No related posts.

According to DCCI, Data Center of Chinese Internet, China reached 500 million internet users in the first half of 2011. They also estimated [...]]]>

According to DCCI, Data Center of Chinese Internet, China reached 500 million internet users in the first half of 2011. They also estimated that it will reach 551 million this year. The sixth national population census estimates China’s population has reached 1.37 billion which make the internet penetration rate at only 36.4 percent. This compares to the US which is at 77.3 percent or 230 million internet users, according to Internet World Stats.

The number appears to be inflated as another recent estimate by CNNIC, China Internet Network Information Center, put the number of internet users at 485 million. According to some analyst this number is also inflated as CNNIC considers a person six years and older, who has connected to the Internet in the past six months, as an internet user. CNNIC also reports 318 million Chinese now access the Internet from their mobile phones,

Nevertheless these numbers are incredible when compared with the US, other Asian countries and the rest of world.

No related posts.

Baidu (BIDU), China’s number one search engine has today announced an agreement for the distribution of digital music with One-Stop China (OSC), which is a joint venture formed by three of the leading global record companies, namely Universal Music, Warner [...]]]> Baidu (BIDU), China’s number one search engine has today announced an agreement for the distribution of digital music with One-Stop China (OSC), which is a joint venture formed by three of the leading global record companies, namely Universal Music, Warner Music, and Sony Music.

Baidu will be providing its users with the opportunity to download or stream both Chinese songs, in both Mandarin and Cantonese alongside international releases, directly from Baidu’s servers.

The company is describing this as a “Landmark deal” and it helps Baidu to respond to the critics who accuse Baidu of encouraging users to download illegal music from other sites. This inlcudes the companies who form part of One-Stop China who have agreed to drop any actions against Baidu in return for the deal. Baidu, however, has always claimed that it did not allow illegal downloads from its own site and it is significant that Baidu’s servers will be used for this project.

Music content owners will be paid by Baidu on a per-play and per-download basis for all tracks delivered through the Baidu MP3 Search service, as well as Baidu’s newly launched social music platform, ting!. The new product offers users the ability to discover and share music and music-related content.  Baidu has also recently launched a new music site ting! where users can sign up for membership free of charge with Baidu making its money through advertising on the site.
 
“Baidu has always striven to provide the best possible experience to our users,” said Jennifer Li, Chief Financial Officer of Baidu. “Our partnership with One-Stop China marks an exciting new beginning. I’m confident that Baidu, the Chinese music fans, recording artists, and the record companies alike will all benefit from this win-win partnership,” said Ms. Li.
 
Lachie Rutherford, President Warner Music Asia Pacific, Max Hole, COO Universal Music Group International, and Thomas Hesse, President, Global Digital Business, US Sales and Corporate Strategy, Sony Music Entertainment, said: “This deal connects One-Stop’s world-class repertoire of licensed music to a massive audience, creating crucial new opportunities for artists. All parties, especially music fans, will benefit from the growth of this type of compelling music service.”
 
The three music giants created One-Stop China to facilitate the licensing and availability of digital music in China. It aims to provide progressive digital music services with the widest possible range of repertoire to serve the needs of consumers, while solving the problem of ensuring that the music industry including the artists is able to generate revenues from their efforts.  

No related posts.

Baidu has announced a deal with Microsoft’s Bing to power its English language results within China. Baidu’s Kaiser Kuo explained, “We have an increasing number of people entering English-language queries on Baidu, and that’s never been our strong suit. [...]]]> Baidu has announced a deal with Microsoft’s Bing to power its English language results within China. Baidu’s Kaiser Kuo explained, “We have an increasing number of people entering English-language queries on Baidu, and that’s never been our strong suit. We’ve been looking for a way to beef up our English search offering and partnering with Bing is by far the most effective way to do it. We already have a partnership with them to provide paid search results for their Chinese language search in China.” The service will launch by the end of 2011.

Left to right: Kaiser Kuo, Director, International Communications and Andy, Baidu Reception, Beijing

The paid search results agreement dates back to 2006 so the connection between Microsoft and Baidu has already been established for some time. However, Microsoft will earn nothing from presenting its English results to a Chinese audience, rather it will gain more traction in the global market place which is mostly significant in its global competition with Google.

Chinese searchers who choose to search in English represent a relatively small proportion of the Chinese population — but the volume is growing and the demographic is attractive to advertisers because they are typically urbanised cosmopolitan people and at the higher ends of the income graph.

Whilst Google’s greatest weakness globally has always been that is search results were originally conceived to server English language searches and then have been converted to suit other languages, it is also its greatest competitive opportunity against rival regional search engines. Search engines, such as Yandex in Russia or Baidu in China, have not been able to provide effective English searches which has meant losing users to Google because of its ability to work in multiple languages.

Yandex launched Yandex.com, its own response to the same situation in May of 2010. It chose to launch and control its own version and I asked Baidu why they did not take the same approach? Kaiser Kuo replied, “Producing our own world-class English-language search would be a non-trivial undertaking. At this point, it’s not at all worth the effort when there are other more attractive and sensible options available.” Baidu have said they are working on search in other languages and not producing results in English saves bandwidth in the reported 12 additional languages they are targeting.

The deal is only for English language results in China and only for organic results. Baidu does not sell a lot of keywords for English search terms at present — which is not surprising since they don’t focus on providing English results. Of course, this situation may change as a result of this deal.

A number of points are intriguing analysts. First, China is the largest internet market in the world with currently 470 million users — a number which represents just one third of the population. If China had the same internet penetration as the US, there would be four users online in China for every American online.

Additionally, Baidu dominates the market particularly since Google withdrew to Hong Kong complaining about the censorship regime of the Chinese Government. Baidu receives at least 80% of all search queries in China and that share is heading towards 85%. Microsoft has a very different position towards Government control than Google saying that it always complies with local regulations.

Other reports of the deal:

China Daily
BBC News
Wall Street Journal
New York Times
CNN
Search Engine Land

No related posts.

It hasn’t been a good year for Google in China, and the search engine has suffered another blow this week when China’s most popular portal Sina stopped using Google’s search box on its website.  Sina, which is China’s third most [...]]]> It hasn’t been a good year for Google in China, and the search engine has suffered another blow this week when China’s most popular portal Sina stopped using Google’s search box on its website.  Sina, which is China’s third most popular website and has almost 1 billion page views daily has stated that its contract with Google has come to an end, and that it intends to use its own search technology going forward.

Google has seen its market share diminish in China since March 2010 when it withdrew from the country and began to service Chinese users from Hong Kong, to avoid the Chinese government’s strict censorship regulations.  Discord between the two has been rife ever since, with Google claiming only last week that its gmail email service was  being blocked in China, an allegation which the government denied. And with its main search rival Baidu increasing its search share continuously (it now has around 75% share), Google is very clearly the poor relation in Chinese search – and in the world’s largest internet market of over 420 million users, that is of some significance.

How the search giant will attempt to recover some market share in China, or whether it will even try, remains to be seen.

Attendees at the International Search Summit @ SMX Advanced in Seattle will hear from Cui Min, Senior Product Manager at Baidu on search marketing in China. Early Bird rates are still available.

No related posts.

Alibaba has leapt ahead of Google in terms of the share of online advertising revenue it earns in China — it’s home market. According to Analysys International, Alibaba’s Taoboa keyword advertising and the further development of its interactive advertising [...]]]> Alibaba has leapt ahead of Google in terms of the share of online advertising revenue it earns in China — it’s home market. According to Analysys International, Alibaba’s Taoboa keyword advertising and the further development of its interactive advertising offer in China are the root cause of this development — rather than Google’s failure.

Baidu continues with the lion’s share at over 30% but after Alibaba and Google, the market is pretty fragmented with Tencent also having shown a spurt of growth — just not quite enough to see it jumping ahead of Sina anytime soon.

Alibaba was founded in 1999 by 18 founders including Jack Ma and thanks to funding from Softbank and Goldman Sachs amongst others. The company employs roughly 18,000 people in 60 cities and regions. Whilst it is most successful in the Far East, it also has operations in the UK and USA.

Taobao is Alibaba’s online retail marketplace. Alipay is its payment portal which reputedly has more than 300 million registered users.

No related posts.

The sixth International Search Summit London has been and gone. And it was a very international event, with over half of the speakers coming from non-English speaking countries, and only 3 speakers from the UK.

As is now customary at [...]]]> The sixth International Search Summit London has been and gone. And it was a very international event, with over half of the speakers coming from non-English speaking countries, and only 3 speakers from the UK.

As is now customary at International Search Summit events, the delegates voted at the end of the day for their favourite speaker of the day,  who receives the Medallion Speaker award, and this time the vote went to Inway Ni, VP of Chinese gaming site 4399.com.

4399.com is one of the most popular sites in China, with over 100 million users and 30 million unique visitors each day and Inway explained how the site has become so successful and gave his key tips for anyone attempting to target a Chinese audience online.

Delegates had a further insight into the Chinese market when Cui Min from Baidu spoke about the products and services offered by the country’s leading search engine and helped delegates understand the opportunities available to them.

There were also lively sessions on social media, in particular Facebook, from Massimo Burgio and Mary Weintraub, an introduction to the Semantic Web from Professor Martin Hepp and case studies from The British Council and Autodesk on how they manage SEO across global websites.

If you want to learn more about some of the topics covered at the Summit, Louis Venter blogposts at State of Search cover many of the sessions from the day.

The International Search Summit is now done for 2010, but will back for events across North America and Europe in 2011 – so watch this space for updates on speakers, sessions and locations!

No related posts.

China’s leading search engine Baidu will be joining Russian market leader Yandex and Middle Eastern search engine Ayna at the International Search Summit London on 28th October.

Senior Product Manager for Baidu, Min Cui, will be speaking on the Chinese [...]]]> China’s leading search engine Baidu will be joining Russian market leader Yandex and Middle Eastern search engine Ayna at the International Search Summit London on 28th October.

Senior Product Manager for Baidu, Min Cui, will be speaking on the Chinese search market and giving delegates insights into how marketers can use Baidu to reach a Chinese audience.

Min Cui manages the Product team that looks after the Phoenix Nest Platform, Baidu’s own ad management and ad serving system.

China, Russia and The Middle East are 3 of the fastest growing global internet markets, and a recent study has shown that web users in China and The Middle East spend more time online than in any other markets.

All three search engines will be presenting at the event, as well as participating in a Q & A session.

Also speaking at the Summit is Inway Ni, the VP of 4399.com – the largest gaming site in China. He will be discussing how he has achieved such success with his website and giving tips and advice on effective SEO and SEM strategies for the Chinese market.

The Summit will also feature case studies from global organisations Autodesk and The British Council, and sessions from leading global search experts including Mikkel deMib Svendsen, Marty Weintraub and Massimo Burgio.

Tickets for the Summit are still available.

No related posts.

China Mobile, the world’s biggest cellphone carrier and Xinhua, China’s official state run news agency, signed an agreement to establish a new Internet search engine and international media company, “Search Engine New Media International Communications Co.” It was not [...]]]> China Mobile, the world’s biggest cellphone carrier and Xinhua, China’s official state run news agency, signed an agreement to establish a new Internet search engine and international media company, “Search Engine New Media International Communications Co.” It was not immediately clear whether this new venture would cover mobile search only or develop a traditional search engine as well.

There are more than 420 million Internet users in China with an additional 800 million mobile phone subscribers. China’s online search market is currently dominated by Baidu which according to Analysys International controls 70 percent of China’s market share. Google ranks in second place with 24.2 percent falling from 30.9 percent in the first quarter. falling from 30.9 percent in the first quarter.

In the mobile search space Baidu leads with about percent share, followed Easou, a WAP-based mobile search partnering with Chinese Web portal Sohu.com, with 17 percent and Google with about 12 percent.

Google pulled out of China earlier this year, complaining about online attacks that appeared to be coming from hackers within China. It now operates its search engine from Hong Kong but Google recently renewed its license to operate its search services in China.

Xinhua New Agency Vice President Zhou Xisheng was quoted as saying “Search engines, which have powerful information integration abilities, play an increasingly important role in disseminating information and influencing public opinion.”

No related posts.

In a Wall Street Journal interview, Baidu CEO Robin Li stated that international expansion will be a key revenue driver for the Chinese search engine in the coming years. Baidu launched a Japanese version of its site in 2008 [...]]]> In a Wall Street Journal interview, Baidu CEO Robin Li stated that international expansion will be a key revenue driver for the Chinese search engine in the coming years. Baidu launched a Japanese version of its site in 2008 and according to Li, expects to see international markets providing a significant amount of their revenue over the next 5 to 10 years. The US, however, will not be a key target, due to the strength of the global players such as Google and Microsoft in that  market.

Baidu is a homegrown Chinese search engine, which saw huge success in that market long before Google withdrew its Chinese website and its local appeal to the Chinese people, as well as compliance with the Chinese government makes it successful in China – and very hard to beat.  However, does it have what it takes to enter new markets and challenge existing and established search engines?

Li is very positive about the future at Baidu and the “revolutionary” product it is currently working on for the mobile market – although he wouldn’t give any details on what it was. Whatever happens, the search world should prepare to see Baidu as more than a Chinese search engine for Chinese users.

No related posts.

The Financial Times reports today that David Wei, Chief Executive of Alibaba.com, has revealed that George Soros has become one of the organisation’s largest shareholders. Mr. Wei also told the FT that Alibaba intends to buy out Yahoo’s [...]]]> The Financial Times reports today that David Wei, Chief Executive of Alibaba.com, has revealed that George Soros has become one of the organisation’s largest shareholders. Mr. Wei also told the FT that Alibaba intends to buy out Yahoo’s stake in the Alibaba parent company. The Financial Times makes the common mistake of describing Alibaba.com as a ‘Yellow Pages’ type organisation which it is not. Unlike the ‘Yellow Pages’ concept, it is not targeted at consumers. The other key difference is that it is used by both buyers and sellers making it much more akin to a dating site for businesses who need to find partners, agents, distributors, manufacturers or stockists around the world.

Currently Yahoo owns 40 percent of the Alibaba company which also runs Yahoo in China. Alibaba.com has been working hard at its global presence and has aggressively developed its U.K. operation and opened up to India and Turkey.

So what is Alibaba?

In addition to running Yahoo China, Alibaba owns Taobao.com, which is its auction platform similar to eBay. Alibaba.com, which features the slogan “Global trade starts here” beneath its logo, also runs Chinese-language (china.alibaba.com) and Japanese-language (Alibaba.co.jp) sites. Founded in 1999, it now has more than 40 million registered users, all of whom are focused on doing business-to-business (B2B) trades.

No related posts.

GoDaddy, the world’s largest domain name registration company, stopped registering websites in China on Wednesday after it received demands for additional information about its existing customers. This was revealed in Congressional hearings focusing on Google’s decision to stop censoring [...]]]> GoDaddy, the world’s largest domain name registration company, stopped registering websites in China on Wednesday after it received demands for additional information about its existing customers. This was revealed in Congressional hearings focusing on Google’s decision to stop censoring search results. Network Solutions stopped registering the “.cn” domain names in December last year in response to new government rules enacted. Those rules required anyone registering a “.cn” domain name to provide a color photograph of themselves as well as a business registration number in China and signed registration forms which would then be forwarded to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC).

Go Daddy, has been registering domain names in China since 2005 and hosts many websites the Chinese government finds politically sensitive. They currently manage about 27,000 “.cn” domain names. The “.cn” names continue to be available through other resellers.
Rep. Christopher H. Smith (R-N.J.), sponsor of a bill that would prevent US based companies from sharing personal information said, “Go Daddy and Google deserve more than praise for doing the right thing in China — they deserve our government’s support”.
countries.

No related posts.

Chinese search engine Baidu is the undisputed market leader when it comes to search in China – and following Google’s closure of its Chinese website, its market share is likely to rise. Organisations attempting to reach the 380 million Chinese [...]]]> Chinese search engine Baidu is the undisputed market leader when it comes to search in China – and following Google’s closure of its Chinese website, its market share is likely to rise. Organisations attempting to reach the 380 million Chinese internet users should already be targeting Baidu but it is now even more important to ensure your website is indexed by -  and ranking well in – Baidu.

Here are a few key factors to consider when conducting SEO for Baidu.

1.Get the language right- use simplified Chinese

There are several variations of the Chinese language, but Simplified (or Mandarin) is the official language of the People’s Republic of China and therefore Baidu – so use it!

2. Don’t scrimp on keywords

No surprises there! Make sure your keywords appear in every element of the page. Utilise the title and description tags to help both the search engines and users to understand what your page is about and reinforce your message by including the important keywords in the copy, anchor text links and alt tags.

Your keyword research should be done using Baidu’s own keyword tools to ensure you are targeting the most effective terms.

3. Focus on Quality links, rather than quantity

Baidu places value on the quality of the sites linking to you, rather than the quantity so focus your attention on attracting relevant, good quality links. Naturally it is links from Chinese sites and sources that will carry the most value.

4. Use native speakers 

Just like any multilingual seo activity, you’ll get the best results if a native speaker is involved in the optimisation process. This will ensure that your content, keywords and links are relevant and appropriate for the Chinese audience you’re targeting.

5. Host your site in China

Although websites hosted outside China will still rank in Baidu, the search engine does favour sites hosted in the country. This will just give you an extra advantage in the competition for ranking positions.

6. Avoid flash and javascript

Baidu cannot recognise flash and javascript files, so stick to text if you want to be sure your content will be indexed.

No related posts.

Google’s announcement that it is re-directing Chinese users to uncensored Chinese-language results at Google Hong Kong is an historic turning point when one ‘empire’ sees its apparently unassailable position as no longer certain. In China it is hugely important [...]]]> Google’s announcement that it is re-directing Chinese users to uncensored Chinese-language results at Google Hong Kong is an historic turning point when one ‘empire’ sees its apparently unassailable position as no longer certain. In China it is hugely important to maintain ‘face’ and not to embarass another party. Google’s move could either be a convenient way for China to get itself off the political hook – essentially what Google is gambling – however, the Chinese goverment is just a likely to see this as a loss of face and to begin rapidly blocking Google’s Hong Kong results.

The primary Chinese language in Hong Kong is actually Canonese which uses the traditional Chinese alphabet – not the simplified version used by mainland China Mandarin speakers. Note that these are different languages NOT simply different alphabets – though Mandarin is also recognised in Hong Kong as a language. What this means is that running Mandarin results via the Google.com.hk page is clearly a ‘workaround’ and not what you would normally expect to see there.

Politically, you have to sympathise with Google’s predicament – see Google in China – a Timeline – but it leaves a hole in Google’s claims to be global and in its ability to achieve leadership in all markets. Strategically, it also leaves Google with more limited scope for development in Asia – unless of course, the Chinese government decides not to block Google Hong Kong at all.

Google’s inability to come to terms with the Chinese Government means that it may have gifted the world’s largest internet market to a search engine which ranks alongside the Microsoft/Yahoo partnership as its greatest global threat – namely Baidu and potentially at the same time to the Microsoft-Yahoo partnership. According to the China Internet Network Information Center (CNNIC), by the end of December the number of Chinese internet users had reached some 384 million or 28.9% of the Chinese population and the growth rate during 2009 was 28.9%. In January 2009, Comscore released data showing that China had overtaken the US in size of internet population with China representing 17.8% of the total internet population – that percentage will almost certainly be signficantly higher at the end of 2009. All of these figures combined mean that:

“In the worst case scenario where all of Google China’s users switch, or are forced to switch to Baidu, Google has gifted up to 2.25% of the global search market to Baidu.”

2.25%, which is my estimate of the potential share of the global population affected, isn’t the end of the world. Nonetheless, as the following charts show, it would raise Baidu’s global share from Comscore’s 6.54% to 8.79% and give Baidu second place globally ahead of Yahoo in Comscore’s league table of share of searches globally. Baidu drops back to third place if Microsoft and Yahoo are combined.

How damaging is this for Google?

Whilst the numbers don’t seem to suggest that much of an impact – this development is damaging for Google in a number of ways; firstly, for the first time it has had to admit defeat in a major global market and accept that, for some considerable time, it is not going to achieve the top spot everywhere. That may well have an impact in markets where Google is competing with other local engines to achieve the top position – such as Russia.

No doubt Google will redouble its efforts in Russia with the China debacle behind it investing more time and resources to ensure it doesn’t let this other major global market, which has been stalling its global progress, escape from its clutches. Even though the censorship issue is not at stake in Russia, the events in China may also bring forth further investment in Yandex, the Russian number one, because investment is about confidence and psychology and it will no longer seem inevitable that Google must be number one everywhere.

The second reason is much more practical in that Baidu will pretty much have the Chinese market to itself and will be able to develop in the knowledge that Google has complied with a safety net which the Chinese government have thrown around it, even if that wasn’t the prime motivation. It will be able to focus its attentions on markets other than China – or potentially to other alliances.

The biggest threat of all for Google is that Baidu signs up to an alliance with Microsoft. We’ve heard comments from Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer that Microsoft will continue to work in China within Chinese laws and regulations. There are some very good reasons for that including the fact that much of the work for Bing was completed by developers in China – many of whom previously worked for Baidu. There has already been a minor alliance between Microsoft and Baidu whereby Baidu sells advertising on Microsoft sites in China. This alliance is inconsequential – but a broader alliance across more markets could be potentially very attractive to both Microsoft and Baidu.

“An alliance between Baidu and Microsoft’s Bing would pose a considerable threat to Google and is far from inconceivable.”

Why would Google withdraw search from China?

The public rationale for Google taking this step is a moral and political stance. It also plays well to audiences in the US and outside China who can see Google as standing up to the Chinese government and putting freedom of speech first. But there are other factors at play here – you might call them “conveniences”.

Firstly, China consumes considerable resources in both time and personnel. But it doesn’t pay fantastic returns because the prices per click can be compared to Baidu which has higher volumes and sometimes lower cost per click prices. So, whilst Google hasn’t publicly said that that effort simply isn’t worth it in China (since it’s about freedom of speech right!) it may actually be losing money in China. Closing Google China most probably will only help the Google bottom line.

It’s also true that Google has had a pretty chequered history of chasing Baidu with moments of increased share – and then drops in share. It certainly cannot be said that it was close on the heels of the market leader as at no point has that been the case. The chances are the it would have taken years for Google to follow its current path and win. In fact, it couldn’t really win. So the Google executive team may well be taking a calculated gamble that by pulling out of China, they will win greater success in other markets, gain significant public support and appeal and turn themselves into a desirable to the Chinese public who may go to any lengths to gain access to an uncensored source of information.

“Google becomes defender of the free against the Chinese oppressers, no longer Google the evil doer privacy invader.”

How will Baidu react?

Of course, Baidu will work to capture the share given up by Google. It will indeed be a measure of Baidu’s strength to see if it can gain the majority of that share and strengthen its position – if it should fail to do so then will not be good for Baidu going forwards. Furthermore Baidu has aspirations internationally. It has already opened operations in Japan early last year where it has some connections with local player Rakuten and has made noises in the past threatening to move to Europe. Realistically, however, with the growth in the Asian market – it is most likely to develop successfully in Asia based on its strong Chinese base. An alliance with Microsoft, however, could be very attractive to increase its importance rapidly in the western world.

Where does Google not achieve number one spot ?

The markets where Google is currently not first include:

• China
• Korea
• Japan
• Russia
• Czech Republic
• Hong Kong
• Taiwan

Putting this all in perspective

It’s worth noting that Google is not the only western organisation to have had difficulties in China. Amazon has only 8% market share in its field, Ebay has already left the country and Facebook has been blocked there.

What should Google China advertisers do?

Firstly, stay calm since there are always ways to deal with this. WebCertain is currently contacting its affected paid search advertisers to discuss moving their Google China budget to Baidu should the Chinese government block access to Google Hong Kong. Many are not hugely affected as their budgets in China are already largely spent with Baidu in the first instance.

If Baidu isn’t the centrepiece of your strategy, then it makes sense to think about making this change now. Baidu can be targeted using both paid search – with a pay per click programme increasingly similar to Google’s. Equally, Baidu has high volume traffic and, if the far east is in your targeting, then you should consider investing into SEO for Baidu.

If you’re using Google China’s self-service facilities – then you may not be able to make the move to Baidu and these type of facilities are not available yet in a comparable way. You would need to contact an agency in China or to work with a multinational global agency to get you moving.

If you’ve been thinking about moving into China – this shouldn’t make any difference to you unless you’re thinking of launching a search engine there! You just won’t be able to do it directly alongside your Google activity.

No related posts.

As Google announces its withdrawl from the Chinese market, this post highlights some of the key events in Google’s ten year history in the country.

2000 – A Chinese language version of Google.com is launched – and over the next few [...]]]> As Google announces its withdrawl from the Chinese market, this post highlights some of the key events in Google’s ten year history in the country.

2000 – A Chinese language version of Google.com is launched – and over the next few years is often blocked or at least temporarily unavailable. It does not have widespread usage in the country.

January 2006 –Google releases a new site in China – Google.cn – that will block content prohibited by the government, complying with China’s censorship policies.

Sergey Brin defends the decision by saying that by doing so, they are making sure Google is still available to people in China and that otherwise around 50% of users can’t access the search engine due to the great firewall of China. However, the decision is proclaimed morally wrong by many – especially given Google’s “Don’t be Evil” mantra.

Google continues to make Google.com available in China – however the site is still often blocked and made inaccessible to users.

January 2007 – Google founders admit that the decision to censor its Chinese search engine had damaged the company’s reputation in the US and Europe.

Eric Schmidt states that Google is making significant progress in China and is on track to become the leading search engine in the country. However, in 2007  Google has around 20% market share in China, compared with 57% for Baidu, China’s own search engine so it still has a way to go.

Early 2008 – Google receives more bad press about its China operations when Chinese human rights activist Guo Quan threatens to sue the search engine for blocking his name and making him unsearchable in China. He claims they have violated his political rights but Google defends its actions by saying it is complying with the conditions of doing business in China.

March 2008 - China overtakes the USA to become the world’s largest internet market, with over 220 million users and in 2008 the number of .cn domains grows by 51% to become second only to .com in number. Its easy to see why Google are prepared to sacrifice some morals in order to remain a major player in such a huge market.

Google, along with Yahoo and Microsoft, signs an industry code of ethics to safeguard human rights and the freedom of speech online. However, Google does continue to censor results on Google.cn.

June 2009 - For the first time in years, Chinese authorities block Google, citing pornography as the reason. Google- owned video site YouTube is also blocked.

July, 2009 – The Chinese government delays the launch of its controversial censorship software which it was insisting be installed on every computer in China. Green Dam is designed to block “harmful content” however has been strongly opposed by governments around the world. No new date for launch is announced.

January, 2010 -  Google threatens to pull out of China following a cyber attack on the gmail accounts of human rights activists, that originated in the country. It describes the attack as highly sophisticated and targeted, and claims that it will no longer continue to censor its search results.

However, the search engine states it will enter talks with the Chinese government to enable it to remain in China but asserts that it wishes to stay in the country.

Following the attacks, Google postpones the launch of Nexus One, its answer to the iphone, in China – a big move given the size of the mobile market in China and the potential revenue available.

 March, 2010  Google redirects its Google.cn search engine to Google Hong Kong stating, as reported at SearchEngineLand.com, that it believes this makes its position ‘legal’.

No related posts.

Google has threatened to withdraw from China after a cyber attack out of China tried to break into the Gmail accounts of human rights activists. They also targeted twenty other companies. In a blog post Google said it experienced [...]]]> Google has threatened to withdraw from China after a cyber attack out of China tried to break into the Gmail accounts of human rights activists. They also targeted twenty other companies. In a blog post Google said it experienced a “highly sophisticated and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure, with the probes originating from China” beginning in mid-December, which it said resulted in “the theft of intellectual property”.

They also cited attempts by the Chinese government to tighten censorship. Google said it was prepared to pull out if it was not permitted to run its local service without further censoring. U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on China “for an explanation” of Google’s allegations. “The ability to operate with confidence in cyberspace is critical in a modern society and economy,” Mrs. Clinton said.

In June 2004 Google bought a 2.4% stake in Baidu, China’s biggest search engine, Baidu. Then, in April 2005, it paid a cyber-squatter for the google.cn domain name. Google entered the China market in 2005 and set up a China research and development center in July 2005. They launched google.com.cn in January of 2006. On their blog they state ‘At the time we made clear that “we will carefully monitor conditions in China, including new laws and other restrictions on our services. If we determine that we are unable to achieve the objectives outlined we will not hesitate to reconsider our approach to China.”

Google appointed Kai-Fu Lee, a Microsoft corporate vice-president, as Google China president and head of the new center which led to a lawsuit. Microsoft settled out of court with Google in December 2005. Terms of the agreement were not released. Dr Lee left Google in September of last year.

No related posts.

The Mobile Marketing Association announced the results of its Annual Global Mobile Attitude and Usage Study conducted in 2008. The markets surveyed in the Asia Pacific segment of the study include: Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Singapore and South [...]]]> The Mobile Marketing Association announced the results of its Annual Global Mobile Attitude and Usage Study conducted in 2008. The markets surveyed in the Asia Pacific segment of the study include: Australia, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Singapore and South Korea. It shows the strong market opportunity for mobile marketers in APAC region.

The study’s key findings for the selected Asia Pacific markets include:

* Overall, heavy penetration and reliance on mobile phones combine with strong feature and mobile web usage in these regions to indicate strong market opportunity for mobile marketers.
o In total, the top five mobile phone features used are non-voice in nature and include camera, games, text messaging, saving images to a photo library and MP3 player.
o Strong use of text messaging and mobile web (61% and 36% overall respectively) indicates mobile phone users in these regions are willing to view their mobile devices as full scale communication devices not restricted to voice services.

* Over one-third report using mobile web and one-in-five use it on a weekly basis.
o Common applications include news, browsing the internet, accessing mobile specific sites, and visiting sites related to music, weather and entertainment.

* Overall receptiveness and interest in opting-in to mobile marketing efforts is fairly strong; nearly half (48%) are moderately/highly interested in mobile marketing and more than half are somewhat/highly likely to opt-in to mobile marketing efforts.
o Applications that garner the greatest interest include mobile coupon, status alerts regarding current accounts or products owned and alerts for special sales and discounts.

No related posts.

Baidu, China’s leading search engine announced yesterday that it has signed an agreement with China Unicom to provide wireless search. China Unicom is the country’s second largest cell phone operator with 141 million mobile users. China Telecom, the largest cell [...]]]> Baidu, China’s leading search engine announced yesterday that it has signed an agreement with China Unicom to provide wireless search. China Unicom is the country’s second largest cell phone operator with 141 million mobile users. China Telecom, the largest cell phone operator has 450 million users.

In May, Baidu reached a deal to provide search service in a value-added service platform run by China Telecom. Baidu services, including text, image, MP3 and news search, will be installed on China Unicom’s 3G mobile phones. It will also provide search services for China Unicom’s mobile Internet websites. China Unicom also plans to launch the iPhone in China this month.

According to Analysys International, Baidu leads with over 60 percent of the search market share but Google is currently leading China’s mobile search market with 26.6 percent compared to 26 percent for Baidu.

“We hope that Baidu’s cooperation with major telecom providers in China will accelerate the development of 3G services and allow us to provide the rapidly growing population of mobile search users better access to information,” said Ren Xuyang, Baidu’s vice-president, in a statement yesterday.

No related posts.

Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) announced its launch of SEMPO APAC Committee.

SEMPO APAC plans and organizes SEMPO activities in the Asia-Pacific region to educate the market, grow membership and awareness of the Online & Search Marketing Industry, as [...]]]> Search Engine Marketing Professional Organization (SEMPO) announced its launch of SEMPO APAC Committee.

SEMPO APAC plans and organizes SEMPO activities in the Asia-Pacific region to educate the market, grow membership and awareness of the Online & Search Marketing Industry, as well as to provide support to working groups under SEMPO APAC. Currently the committee has volunteers from China, Japan, Hong Kong, India, Singapore, Jakarta, Australia and the US. Committee representatives are highly regarded industry professionals in each market, and are frequent speakers at local industry events.

SEMPO APAC’s recent activities include a series of webinars, seminars, networking meetings, an Asia tour with SEMPO leadership conducted in Beijing, Mumbai, and Singapore, as well as market surveys carried out in India, Japan, and Singapore.

“Our development in Asia-Pacific has been inspiring. The teams that have come together to form Working Groups are passionate and continue to drive growth. We are pleased to see the APAC team focus on the broader region to include Australia and surrounding markets. With 41% of the Internet Users in Asia-Pacific, SEMPO will continue to make a commitment in the region. We are thrilled with the Asia-Pacific talent that continues to take leadership roles in SEMPO.” Sara Holoubek, president of SEMPO Board of Directors said. ”

For more information visit http://www.sempo.org/public_groups/apac/ or write to Motoko Hunt (Chair of SEMPO APAC & Multilingual Search editor) apac-chair “at” sempo.org

No related posts.