Inktomi Takes Center Stage

Another day, another rumor. It hasn't taken long for the rumor mill, once fixated on Google, to start grinding on Inktomi. It's like when an actor gets their first big starring role, and suddenly, they are in all the tabloids. Inktomi is the new search engine star, enjoying a meteoric rise from the lower ranks to the upper echelon thanks to a fortuitous chain of circumstances.

Here's how it worked:

1. Inktomi provides PPC listings for large sites, flat fee listings for smaller sites. Their fees are among the lowest in the industry in many cases, and the submission process is very straightforward. They are a popular submission for many low cost SEO plans for these reasons.

2. Inktomi is used as a secondary index by MSN, after LookSmart. They also provide either primary or secondary listings for a number of the smaller automated search engines including HotBot, InfoSpace, and About.com. This provides them a steady market for their listings.

3. Yahoo! purchases Inktomi in 2003, but continues to use Google, Overture, and Yahoo! Directory results.

4. MSN announces they are not renewing their contract with LookSmart, and instead will use their own search engine. No mention is made of Inktomi, which will apparently remain the secondary.

5. Google announces they will go public in 2004.

6. Rumors begin that Yahoo will dump Google as soon as they go public, either defaulting to their own directory, or to Inktomi. Eventually these rumors are confirmed, but nobody knows what will happen after Google goes away.

7. MSN has not yet unveiled their new search engine bot, although the LookSmart contract is dead. Rumors begin that MSN will default to Inktomi until they finish their own bot.

Suddenly, Inktomi is in line to provide primary listings for two of the biggest, best-known, and best-established search engines: MSN and Yahoo. Between them, they account for 45% of searches, with Google accounting for another 45% (according to recent statistics). That puts Inktomi suddenly on a parallel with Google in terms of the exposure it can offer your site.

Yesterday, my Yahoo searches were showing a different set of results, which were not from the Google database. Apparently, the switchover has begun. MSN is still using LookSmart results as of this date.

Today, I got a newsletter predicting that Inktomi would soon go to a pure PPC model, following LookSmart's lead, and no longer offer flat fee inclusion at a yearly rate. If this happens, many sites will be knocked off Yahoo since they can't pay for it. After an initial panic, I noticed the key phrase: "which some of us are expecting". In other words, there is no basis for this except a degree of paranoia based on the path that LookSmart followed over the past couple of years, and a suspicion that Yahoo will try to milk this for as much money as possible.

Personally I am adopting a "wait and see" policy. First of all, Inktomi clearly separates their PPC from their flat fee, and specifies which type of site should follow which model. It wouldn't make sense for them to switch over to using only the PPC (Index Connect) instead of the flat fee (Search Submit) if the PPC isn't designed for smaller websites. Second, anyone with any business sense is shaking their heads over LookSmart's highly questionable business decisions over the past year or two. LookSmart went from being a reasonably priced flat-fee submission which guaranteed you a listing on MSN, to being a PPC with no major partners, which seems doomed to failure within months. Finally, I don't think it's in Yahoo's best interests to have paid directory listings, paid sponsor listings, and then also demand money for general web listings; people are tired of paying out when Google still provides a strong alternative.

I'm hoping that Yahoo, in the persona of Inktomi, has better vision and a greater commitment to being a good search engine than some of their competitors.