Microsoft’s Live Search Cashback and Searchperks: Desperation?
Microsoft’s launch of Live Search Cashback was met with a good deal of skepticism. It was broadly defined as a way to bribe users into trying out their Google competitor, Live Search.
However, the timing wasn’t too bad for Live Search Cashback: as concerns about the economy grow and more people are tightening the purse strings, the service is seeing a surge in traffic. Over the last three months, the percentage of Live Search traffic coming from Live Search Cashback has doubled, although it apparently hasn’t made much of a dent in Live Search’s overall rating, partly because it’s simple to use Live Search Cashback without ever touching Live Search proper.
I’ve actually used Live Search Cashback and saved a lot of money on a product I really wanted. It is useful. But it appears to be the first step in Microsoft’s user bribery program.
Far more brazen is their new program, Searchperks. With Searchperks, users have the opportunity to win “tickets” that can be redeemed for–you guessed it–”exciting prizes.” It’s really not far different from a credit card rewards program, I guess, except banks actually make money when you use their cards, whereas Microsoft is just trying to get a foothold. It’s desperate. Worse yet, only Internet Explorer users can participate.
Users can earn up to 25 tickets a day. One of the top prizes, after gaining 5500 hundred tickets, is an XBox 360 controller. For 1100 tickets, it looks you like you get a t-shirt. I wonder if the shirt says, “I Spent a Month and a Half On Internet Explorer and All I Got Was a Lousy T-shirt?”
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