SAN MATEO, California — November 22, 2005 — Keynote Systems (Nasdaq:KEYN), the worldwide leader in services that improve online business performance and communications technologies, today announced the kickoff of the world's first competitive intelligence study of user experience on the leading search engines in China. The timely inaugural study, which has been localized for the Chinese market, builds on Keynote's four previous and highly regarded North American search studies. Keynote is managing 1,200 Chinese consumers using patented customer experience management technologies, and will leverage its proprietary measurement computer infrastructure in major cities throughout China to perform the technical component of the study examining service levels.
The sites to be included in the China search study are Alibaba/Yahoo!, Baidu, Google China and Sohu/Sogou. The goal of the study is to determine which of the leading search engines delivers the best overall customer experience and service levels to consumer-users of the engines. The exhaustive study includes in-depth analysis, competitive detail, data mining tools and recommendations by Keynote professional services experts.
The results of the Keynote study should prove particularly interesting to media and consumers given the tremendous interest in search in both North America and China. Recent well-publicized events such as Baidu's high visibility public offering, strategic investments from other global portals, and a study indicating that Alibaba/Yahoo!, Baidu, Google China and Sohu/Sogou control over 80% of the Chinese search market share, will make the study results that much more provocative to media, consumers and investors in both the U.S. and China.
The results of the China search study will be announced in January 2006. Citigate, Dewe, Rogerson, a large, internationally known PR agency, has been secured by Keynote to publicize the results to the media across Asia.
The China search study will enable Chinese companies to see how well their search sites are meeting customer needs and expectations. It will provide a complete look at which Chinese search sites are out-performing the competition and why. The study will help Chinese companies to prioritize online initiatives to proactively make the biggest impact on business goals and provide strategic guidance to help China's online businesses gain a competitive edge. As the study will be run annually, year over year metrics will reveal which Chinese sites are making changes that improve their performance over time.
Similar studies run annually in North America between notables like AOL, Ask Jeeves, Google, MSN, and Yahoo! are widely anticipated and often help to steer site improvements, developments, consumer satisfaction and investor interest.
"The hundred million plus Internet user search marketplace is extraordinarily hot — and at stake is their preferred search engine brand," said Jeff Kraatz, vice president and managing director of Asia Pacific for Keynote. "Keynote's studies for the first time will give search engine operators in China concrete intelligence to better manage their businesses. By applying the results of our studies, the search operators will be able to accurately improve customer experience, usability and stickiness, which could translate into millions of dollars of bottom-line revenue. We are looking forward to bringing these world-class tools and information to China's unique online community — and many years of close cooperation with these and other online portals and businesses."
Keynote possesses a tremendous amount of insight and analysis on the U.S. search market, having already completed four in-depth studies of North American search. Once the Chinese search study is completed, Keynote will be uniquely positioned to compare and contrast the customer experience of consumers in the U.S. with that of consumers in China using the leading Chinese search engines.
Study Background and Methodology
To assess the customer experience of Chinese search engines, Keynote will analyze the experiences of 1,200 Chinese consumers accessing designated search engines from their normal setting (such as home, office, Internet cafe;). Leveraging the Keynote WebEffective platform for conducting in-depth customer experience and market research studies, participants will be asked to search for various items such as general search, products, news, images and MP3s. Keynote's proprietary technology will track the consumers' ability to complete these searches, capture and collect their thoughts, feelings and direct answers as they interact with the sites. Keynote analysts will then use the behavioral, qualitative and quantitative data collected from the panelists to rank the Search Engines according to how well they are accomplishing key business goals such as:
Keynote analysts will also perform a driver analysis to identify which specific aspects of the sites have the biggest impact on these business goals. The analysts will rank the sites on their performance on each of these areas. With this analysis, Keynote will be able to tell companies what specific changes they should make on their sites in order to acquire new customers, build brand affinity, drive customer loyalty, etc.
To assess service levels of the Chinese search engines, Keynote will use its proprietary network of Transaction Perspective® measurement computers to track more than 35 performance metrics and collect over 6,500 data points on each site. Keynote analysts will use these data points to rank the sites in the study on each of seven key performance factors, which are critical aspects of an operationally excellent site. These factors include:
For each of these key performance factors, Keynote will identify which sites excel, which do not, and exactly what changes the sites can make to gain a competitive edge. Keynote will then use the rankings and scores for each of these key performance factors to rank the sites in terms of their overall responsiveness and reliability thereby providing a high-level competitive benchmark of operational excellence.
For a data sheet on the Chinese search study view:
http://www.keynote.com/downloads/datasheets/1118chinese.pdf
For further information on Keynote's Competitive Intelligence studies view:
http://www.keynote.com/solutions/competitive_intelligence_tpl.html
About Keynote
Founded in 1995, Keynote Systems (Nasdaq "KEYN") is the worldwide leader in services that improve online business performance and communications technologies. Keynote helps approximately 2,300 corporate customers and 13,000 individual subscribers become "the best of the best" online. The business premise supporting Keynote's mission is: "Online businesses can't manage what they don't measure." As an independent and trusted third-party, Keynote provides IT and marketing executives with unbiased benchmarking data, competitive analysis and operational metrics from the customer perspective. This data measures service levels and customer experience of Web sites, broadband services and mobile communications.
Known as The Internet Performance Authority®, Keynote manages a market-leading infrastructure of 1,600+ measurement computers and mobile devices in over 114 locations and 66+ metropolitan areas worldwide that assess service levels and a panel of over 160,000 consumers who participate in interactive Web site tests that assess user experience. These online user experience tests capture customer attitude and behavior to answer the critical "why" behind the "what." Keynote's geographically distributed measurement services, on-site monitoring appliances, competitive intelligence and custom studies ensure that its customers outpace their competitors in online service levels and overall user experience.
Keynote Systems, Inc. is headquartered in San Mateo, California and can be reached at www.keynote.com or by phone in the U.S. at 650-403-2400.
Keynote, The Internet Performance Authority and Perspective are registered trademarks of Keynote Systems, Inc. Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. © 2005 Keynote Systems, Inc.
Editorial Contacts:
Dan Berkowitz Keynote (650) 403-3305 dberkowitz@keynote.com