Google’s grip on search slips as TikTok and AI startup mount challenge

livemint.com:

Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Google’s grip on the nearly $300 billion search advertising business is loosening. For years, the tech giant has seemed invincible in this corner of the ad market, which is the foundation of its business.

Now, rivals are beginning to eat into its lead, and new offerings—fueled by the rise of artificial intelligence and social video—threaten to reshape the landscape. TikTok, the wildly popular short-form video platform, has recently started allowing brands to target ads based on users’ search queries—a direct challenge to Google’s core business. Perplexity, an AI search startup backed by Jeff Bezos, plans to introduce ads later this month under its AI-generated answers.

Until now, it has made revenue mostly from a $20-a-month subscription offering that grants access to more-powerful AI technology. The new initiatives add to the pressure on Google from the rise of Amazon.com, which has taken a chunk of search ad spending. Many consumers begin product searches on the e-commerce platform.

Google’s share of the U.S. search ad market is expected to drop below 50% next year for the first time in over a decade, according to the research firm eMarketer. Amazon is expected to have 22.3% of the market this year, with 17.6% growth, compared with Google’s 50.5% share and its 7.6% growth.

“This space has been ripe for a shake-up for a long period of time," said Brendan Alberts, head of search and commerce at the ad-buying firm Dentsu. Google remains in an enviable position: far ahead of the pack in the search market, with plenty of resources to counter moves by its rivals. Still, advertisers are eager for more competition.