Liz Gannes

Recent Posts by Liz Gannes

Yahoo Climbs Back Above Google in U.S. Web Traffic

Though recent attention paid to Yahoo often focuses on its refreshes of tired products or its famous CEO, Marissa Mayer, the easily forgotten story is that the site is still really freaking popular.

Yahoo properties got more unique U.S. visitors than any other company’s in July, according to comScore. They had 196.6 million, compared to 192.3 million for previous leader Google.

What’s more, Yahoo’s numbers didn’t include the new Yahoo-owned Tumblr, which came in 28th place.

Yahoo’s ascendance was first pointed out today at Marketing Land, by Greg Sterling, who theorized that it was the first time since 2008 that Yahoo had been in the top spot.

However, comScore VP Andrew Lipsman said that Yahoo had taken first place as recently as May 2011. He noted that Yahoo and Google have been “very close for the past several months.” In June, Google was ahead by less than four million.

But don’t get too excited, Yahoo fans. These Web traffic stats don’t include the all-important category of mobile.

Lipsman said it’s quite possible that Google will regain the top spot in upcoming comScore multi-platform rankings, given how strong the company is on phones.

Yahoo spokeswoman Anne Espiritu said the company doesn’t comment on third-party metrics; Google has not gotten back with a comment.

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The problem with the Billionaire Savior phase of the newspaper collapse has always been that billionaires don’t tend to like the kind of authority-questioning journalism that upsets the status quo.

— Ryan Chittum, writing in the Columbia Journalism Review about the promise of Pierre Omidyar’s new media venture with Glenn Greenwald