How much of it is real? Analysis of paid placement in Web search engine results

Authors:
Scott Nicholson;Tito Sierra;U. Yeliz Eseryel;Ji-Hong Park;Philip Barkow;Erika J. Pozo;Jane Ward
Affiliations:
Syracuse University School of Information Studies, 245 Hinds Hall, Syracuse, NY 13244;North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC 27695;Syracuse University School of Information Studies, Syracuse, NY 13244;Syracuse University School of Information Studies, Syracuse, NY 13244;Syracuse University School of Information Studies, Syracuse, NY 13244;Syracuse University School of Information Studies, Syracuse, NY 13244;Syracuse University School of Information Studies, Syracuse, NY 13244
Venue:
Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology
Year:
2006

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Abstract

Most Web search tools integrate sponsored results with results from their internal editorial database in providing results to users. The goal of this research is to get a better idea of how much of the screen real estate displays “real” editorial results as compared to sponsored results. The overall average results are that 40% of all results presented on the first screen are “real” results, and when the entire first Web page is considered, 67% of the results are nonsponsored results. For general search tools such as Google, 56% of the first screen and 82% of the first Web page contain nonsponsored results. Other results include that query structure makes a significant difference in the percentage of nonsponsored results returned by a search. Similarly, the topic of the query also can have a significant effect on the percentage of sponsored results displayed by most Web search tools. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.