Ahrefs, a leading SEO firm, is planning to launch a search engine that supports content creators and provides user privacy. The announcement was made by Ahrefs CEO Dmitry Gerasimenko who revealed plans to compete with the dominant search engine, Google.
Dmitry has proposed a more free and open web where content creators can directly generate revenue from search ads with a 90/10 split in favor of publishers.
In a series of tweets, he discussed several existing problems with Google, even though it is the most commonly used search engine.
Ahrefs is working on general purpose search engine to compete with Google. Sounds crazy, right?
But lets talk about two huge problems with Google which they will never want to fix:— Dmitry Gerasimenko (@botsbreeder) March 27, 2019
Firstly, he raised privacy concerns on Google — something we have all known for a long time about how the search engine giant tracks us. The CEO has plans to ensure that user privacy is protected through the new search engine.
Secondly, he points out that Google’s revenue model is unfair for content creators. Citing Wikipedia as an example, Dmitry argued how the popular website has to struggle for funds despite being so helpful.
The CEO also believes that Google is intentionally keeping the site visitors to itself by “showing scraped content on search results page more.” This, in turn, prevents users from visiting a website and thus reduces content authors’ opportunity to monetize.
He concluded by saying that a search’s job is to encourage the growth of quality content and innovation in publishers. This is what he aims to achieve through the new Ahrefs search engine.
The response to the announcement was quite positive on Twitter, with several people appreciating the initiative.
What do you think of the upcoming search engine by Ahrefs? Leave your thoughts below in the comments section.
