An effective digital marketing strategy is a key part of any modern business, especially in today’s increasingly interconnected world. When building a digital marketing strategy, businesses need to consider a lot of different factors, including the regional search engine landscapes.
While Google is the most popular search engine for Europe and North America, the Asia and Pacific region (APAC) is home to a diverse range of cultures, languages and search engine preferences. Although Google may be used in some countries, others have different preferences when it comes to searching online.
In this article. We’ll explore the search engine situation in APAC and look at how it affects digital marketing strategies for businesses looking to operate here. Based on search engine dominance and other cultural trends, companies may need to adapt their digital marketing strategy with the help of local experts such as APACSEO.com.
Search Engine Popularity by Numbers
When it comes to search engines, Google has been the most popular option in the West for more than two decades, not long after it first launched in 1998. In the Asia Pacific region, Google is still very popular, with a total market share of 91% as of 2021. Meanwhile, the market share for Baidu is 3.5% across the whole region, and Yahoo has 1.5%. However, this varies drastically depending on the individual country.
China
China’s search engine usage is very different from the West, with Google being the fifth most popular tool when it comes to looking things up online. It has a market share of just 2.1% in China, while Haosou is at 2.3%, Bing is at 3.5%, and Sogu is at 7.6%. Meanwhile, the most popular search engine by far is Baidou, with 222 million daily active users and a market share of 82.5%.
Japan
In Japan, Google remains the favourite option for online users, taking around 75% of the market share. However, Yahoo! Japan is also popular, with 20% of people preferring it. On the other hand, Bing is fairly low in the rankings, with just 4% of the market share.
South Korea
Google also has the dominant share of the market in South Korea at around 70%, but many people prefer using alternative options too. Naver and Daum are two search engines which are unique to the South Korean market and have a market share of around 15% and 2%, respectively.
Adapting Digital Marketing Strategy to Different Search Engines
A search engine is an interface with which people are able to discover and look up web pages. Although all search engines provide the same service, they index sites and display results in different ways. This can mean that the strategy you use to reach consumers on Google may not work on alternatives like Baidu, Naver and others.
Aiden, the founder of APACSEO, highlights the importance of changing your company’s digital marketing strategy based on which country you’re operating in. This is especially true when the search engine works in a different way compared to the one you’re used to dealing with. For example, there are a lot of similarities between search engines like Bing, Yahoo and Google, but Baidu, Naver and other options index and display results differently.
If you’re planning to move into the APAC region, it’s important to understand the nature of the popular search engines in that country and how they work. Your digital marketing campaign will need to be tailored to the algorithms that these search engines use. You should also ensure that your website has been properly localised.
The APAC region represents a massive market, with more than 4.3 billion people living here. To harness the potential of this region, it’s important to recognise the diversity of search engine preferences and adapt SEO and digital marketing strategies accordingly.
