• by Wendy Davis  @wendyndavis, June 30, 2005

Google apparently sends more online users to e-commerce and other business sites than all other search engines combined, according to a study released this week by analytics company WebSideStory.

For the report, WebSideStory looked at all traffic on June 6 to Web sites of the businesses in its network--ranging from large companies such as electronic retailer Best Buy to thousands of smaller operations. WebSideStory found that more than half--52 percent--of the U.S. traffic to those sites that came from search engines originated with Google. That proportion represents growth from about 45 percent last June.

Twenty-five percent of the U.S. traffic came from Yahoo!, down from around 27 percent last June. MSN accounted for just 10 percent of referrals, down from 16 percent last June--which was before MSN launched its own search engine.

WebSideStory also found that Google accounts for a large proportion of referrals abroad. Google was responsible for 91 percent of referrals from Germany, 81 percent from Australia, 74 percent from the United Kingdom, and 42 percent from Japan.