Bing Increased Share of US Search Market in January

Microsoft's new Internet search engine Bing slightly increased its share of the US search market in January, the eighth month in a row of modest gains, online tracking firm comScore said Wednesday.

Bing's share of the US search market rose to 11.3 percent in January from 10.7 percent in December, comScore said, while its search partner Yahoo! saw its share dip from 17.3 percent to 17.0 percent.

Google remained the overwhelming leader of the lucrative US search and advertising market last month although its share fell to 65.4 percent in January from 65.7 percent in December.

Ask.com's share rose to 3.8 percent from 3.7 percent while AOL's dropped to 2.5 percent from 2.6 percent.

December was the eighth consecutive month of modest gains in search share for Bing, which Microsoft unveiled in June accompanied by a 100-million-dollar advertising campaign in a bid to challenge search juggernaut Google.

Microsoft and Google have been consistently upgrading online search service features in what has thus far been a lopsided duel favoring the Mountain View, California-based Internet king over the software giant.

The competitors have been focused on improving mobile search offerings and incorporating real-time content from popular online communities such as Twitter and Facebook into search results.

Yahoo! and Microsoft unveiled a 10-year Web search and advertising partnership in July that set the stage for a joint offensive against Google.

Under the agreement, Yahoo! will use Microsoft's search engine on its own sites while providing the exclusive global sales force for premium advertisers.