Online Marketing Blog

Photo Credit Jim Boykin

Keynote presentation at Search Engine Strategies New York with Danny Sullivan and Barry Diller of IAC. Diller’s company acquired Ask Jeeves in 2005, now rebranded as Ask.com.

Diller: I have always liked Ask.com. I just felt they needed to drop the Butler (drop baggage). The butler limited the opportunity for Ask.com as a mass market player in search. He does not intend to change the “Ask” brand.

If it’s like everyone else, it doesn’t have a reason for being. Like when he started Fox, Diller didn’t want to make another of the same big networks. He Wanted to make something different.

Ask is differentiated by the way it works from the other engines. Market share doesn’t matter, relevancy does. Diller invites people to try Ask.com and see for themselves.

Despite a cancelled flight, re-route through Detroit and 2 hours on the tarmac before taking off, I was very happy to make it home by midnight yesterday from New York. I know some folks ended up staying overnight at JFK and flying out in the morning.

For the majority of the Search Engine Strategies conference, I covered sessions for Search Engine Roundtable with Barry, Ben and Chris and it was a good time. Since I picked what to cover last, I sat in on sessions that I might not normally cover. And you know what? I am very glad I did.