In this screenshot of our tests, the boxed areas of the search results page are coming from Microsoft’s platform, while the rest of the page is still powered by Yahoo! – as we described when our search alliance received clearance earlier this year.

In the coming months, we will also be integrating Microsoft’s mobile organic and paid search listings, so Yahoo! Mobile search fans in the U.S. and Canada will also eventually see Microsoft organic and paid search listings on their phones. And, as with all Yahoo! Search experiences, Yahoo! will continue to innovate and enhance the overall consumer experience around those core listings.

Pending the results of our current testing, we anticipate that our U.S. and Canada organic search listings in both desktop and mobile experiences will be fully powered by the Microsoft platform beginning in the August/September timeframe, and paid search in October.

For more details on the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance, check out the Yahoo! Search Marketing Blog.

Kartik Ramakrishnan

Vice President, Yahoo! Search Product Operations

First up, we have three new sorting options near the top of the search page. You can now sort search results by “Relevance,” “Newest” and “Most Answers.”

If you have a tendency to search for a particular topic more than others, you can now perform an “Advanced Search” and save your filter settings for future searches. You can add up to ten saved searches to the “My Saved Searches” list and edit or delete them as you wish.

For more information, and a tip on how to score 20 easy Yahoo! Answers points, check out this post from the Yahoo! Answers blog.

Yahoo! Search Team

Soccer lovers followed coverage of the 2010 World Cup with Yahoo! Search tools and shortcuts, and today we bring you some of the tournament’s top search trends on Yahoo!.

Throughout the first week of play, U.S. fans were eager to know more about the World Cup opening ceremonies, the World Cup schedule and World Cup brackets. Even the venues were of interest, with queries about 2010 World Cup stadiums up more than 400% from the week before.

In week two, searches for World Cup standings were up over 425% from the first week. During the same week, action on the field may have inspired Yahoo! users to take the sport outside, as searches for soccer cleats increased by more than 60%. By June 20, devoted fans were already looking forward to the next World Cup, sending the number of searches for the 2014 World Cup location up by more than 45% from the previous week.

Interest in individual players like Cristiano Ronaldo, Kaka, and Robinho remained intense throughout the tournament, while searches for particular teams surged as the final games approached. When Germany began its climb to third place in week three, queries about the team saw a triple-digit increase.

Games aside, other notable World Cup searches included:
• The vuvuzela: Searchers were curious about the sound of a vuvuzela, how to blow a vuvuzela and “where to buy a vuvuzela”
• Soccer WAGs (wives and girlfriends), including team USA star Landon Donovan’s ex, Bianca Kajlich, Dutch midfielder Rafael van der Vaart’s wife, Sylvie and celebrity soccer spouse Victoria Beckham
• Paul the Octopus and his predictions for the finals

As the field narrowed to the final two teams, users had questions about members of the Spanish squad as well as queries concerning the Dutch team’s distinctive orange jerseys. When the hard-fought championship game moved into extra time, there was a spike in searches for soccer overtime rules. After Spain’s Andreas Iniesta scored the game-winning goal, users wanted to know more about his t-shirt tribute to his late teammate Dani Jarque. An uptick in searches for FIFA World Cup 2010 results marked the close of the event.

Can’t get enough of the World Cup? Check out what users searched for on their smart phones over at the Yahoo! Mobile Blog, including global search trends.

Mireille Majoor
Yahoo! Search

You probably already use Yahoo! Search Assist to conduct your searches quickly, but now you can get even fresher suggestions, which will be especially useful when there are recent top news or events related to your search topic. With the new suggestion algorithm we’ve launched, you will see near real-time suggestions to help you easily find the freshest content.

For example, I was wondering which team the Netherlands would be matched with in the World Cup today, so I typed “Netherlands vs.”, and the first suggestion is for today’s game. Clicking on the first suggestion, I was able to see game information right in the search result page.

You can also find near real-time suggestions in Yahoo! News Search. Again, when you type “netherlands” in Yahoo! News Search, you will see today’s match — “netherland vs brazil” as the first suggestion. This functionality helps you find the most timely information quickly.

We hope the near real-time Search Assist feature helps you find the latest information about your query and enhances your search experience. Give it a try on Yahoo! Search and then give us your feedback or ask questions in the comments below.

Linda Wang
Senior Product Manager
Yahoo! Search

The UI is simple and compact to fit the size of your phone screen. Under the covers, we’ve packed in some cool features.

You can type the query using the touch screen or use the voice input to speak your search query. Whether you enter the query by touch screen or voice, you’ll see search suggestions that help you find exactly what you’re looking for.

In the Yahoo! Mobile Search results, you’ll see shortcuts, news and deeper results only a tap away. Try searching for “World Cup” and you’ll get a concise set of the latest scores and news, with deeper results about the games.

While the app is currently only available in the U.S., the voice input package is available in multiple languages.  Look for your country-specific version to roll out soon in your local Android Market.

Try out the Yahoo! Search widget and our other widgets by scanning the barcode below with your Android phone. We’d love to hear what you think.

Anil Panguluri
Yahoo! Search

Individual players are also seeing  a spike in searches, with interest on the rise about jet-setting  Portuguese forward (and fan favorite) Cristiano Ronaldo; Ivory Coast sensation  Didier Drogba; Cameroonian captain Samuel Eto’o; striker Lionel Messi, the pride of Argentina; and American Landon Donovan, whose game-winning goal over Honduras  in 2009 gave his team a place in this year’s tournament.

In the battle of the sexes, men are taking the lead in searching queries so far, with 66% of searches on the term soccer and more than 80% of the searches for “futbol “coming from the owners of XY chromosomes. But where are all these burly futbol fans, anyway? Among the regions leading the U.S. in searches for the term “soccer” on Yahoo! are Los Angeles, Houston, Detroit, and Raleigh-Durham. And if the over 700% increase in searches for World Cup soccer TV schedule is any indication, you’ll find them parked in front of their flat screens until the action stops on July 11.

Even before the first ball was dropped, some forward-thinking users were already asking who will win the World Cup? To find out, use the sports shortcut on Yahoo! Search to see real-time scores and everything else you want to know about all the players and teams – on and off the field.

You can also get the latest images from the World Cup and track your favorite players in Yahoo! Image Search.  Yahoo! Video Search brings you coverage of some of the most popular teams and also takes you down memory lane with selected videos from the previous World Cup tournaments.

We’ll have more search trends for you as the World Cup progresses, so be sure to check back and see what’s buzzing on Yahoo! Search.

Mireille Majoor
Yahoo! Search

Yahoo! has been at the forefront of content discovery since our early days as “Jerry and David’s Guide to the World Wide Web.” Today we provide a unique blend of the most popular and most effective types of online discovery – from editorial, communications, and search to newer social sharing. Every day, people are sifting through the massive amount of information on the web and exploring news, videos, images, and other information on Yahoo! Search technology is becoming more critical to helping people find the stuff that interests them most, no matter where they are online. Today, tons of searches can actually be done without ever hitting return on a search box – for example, by checking out our contextual shortcuts for underlined words while you’re perusing the latest news, or using cool new mobile apps.

The industry as a whole is changing rapidly, and as search continues to evolve, so will the measurements used to understand the market. People no longer search to find a list of blue links; they search to find answers in the shortest amount of time possible. We believe that surfacing the right information at the right time is more important than the number of total results delivered or number of traditional queries conducted.

As we push forward with new search features to bring relevant search results to more people in more places, we look forward to talking with folks like comScore and the industry at large about how to measure the new paradigm of search. Our goal is to help evolve measurement standards, definitions and metrics so the industry has what it needs to accurately understand trends in search share across different types of searches and different companies.

What do you think is the best way to measure the success of a search provider – share of queries, share of query type, share of revenue, engagement, consumer loyalty, search sessions per month?  There is no single answer to this question, but I expect that as the industry evolves, we will identify a blend of metrics to better meet the needs of all audiences who are interested in what’s happening throughout the search industry.

Shashi Seth
Senior Vice President of Yahoo! Search Products

You can easily access scores, photo gallery, new videos, and latest news from these Shortcuts. You can also see the team page and the match page where you can get the stats and the details about each team and match.

Of course, we will keep bringing more videos and news coverage through the general World Cup Shortcut (just go to Yahoo! Search and type “world cup” to see the shortcut). Since its launch less than a month ago, we’ve already seen 150% increase in search volume for World Cup topics, and a 25% increase in engagement with the World Cup shortcut on our Search results pages.

So give the World Cup Schedule shortcuts a try and search for your favorite team, group, or a match.

Yuko Kamae
Yahoo! Search

We’ve just launched the new Yahoo! News Search page for French, Spanish, German, and Indonesian language users in 11 international markets.

For example, check out the new Yahoo! News Search results page in German for soccer star Michael Ballack, with new refiners on the left side of the page:

This is a part of our effort to focus on the needs of international markets. If you use Yahoo! in French, German, Spanish, or Indonesian, be sure to search for any hot news topics in the enhanced News Search page. We will be rolling out the new Yahoo! News Search page in more global markets so please check back for updates.

Paul Ko
Yahoo! Search

With both video and image search, we are featuring up to five pages of topics that are trending in search. You can scroll through the pages or turn on autoscroll to watch the search trends of the moment.

Find today’s top trending image searches on the Yahoo! Image search home page:

Or go to the Yahoo! Video search home page and see the latest trends in video:

Already, we’ve seen double-digit percentage increases in engagement for both image and video search since launching these new homepages, with a 60% increase in time spent on the image search homepage.

Now you have another way to get a quick picture of what’s happening around the search world, from World Cup to Dancing with the Stars. This is just the start of a set of changes we’ll be making to help you find the information you’re looking for. So come back to Yahoo! Image and Video Search often and see what we’re up to.

Anuj Sahai and Sriram J. Sathish (Thiru)
Yahoo! Image Search