Both PC World and Forbes are reporting on a survey release by University of Michigan’s American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) regarding the customer satisfaction rate of the major search engines.
AskJeeves’s ACSI score has risen 16% since 2002, to 72. Its search queries in the second quarter have also surged 16%, while sales have doubled to 2004 from 2003. Freed says that the company has prospered in part by sticking to its knitting as a search engine, but if it is to grow more dramatically the company needs to leverage the considerable e-commerce resources of its parent company.
Google’s sales have ballooned to $3.2 billion in 2004 from $440 million in 2002, but its customer satisfaction rating has not kept pace. Its enviable rating of 82 is level with 2003. Yahoo!’s rating has grown from 71 in 2001, when it pulled in $717 million in sales, to a current rating of 80. The company had $3.5 billion in sales last year.
You got hand it to both Yahoo and Google. These kinds of customer satisfaction numbers are well above average when considering multiple industries. Ask.com wins the award for most improved, but still has a ways to go to catch Google.