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Since the announcement of Ask Jeeves launching their own branded search advertising service, many were surprised Ask would elect to leave Google's AdWords service seeing how financially successful the partnership was for both parties.

However, Ask Jeeves did indeed go ahead with the launch of their Ask Jeeves Sponsored Listings service, which many thought was being done to cut the ties from third-party support in order to maximize their profits. However, there were rumors that in order to successfully provide the service they were offering Ask would be partnering with an unnamed company being discussed as well.

Apparently, these are no longer rumors, but appear to be based on evidence. According to a post written by John Battelle, Ask did indeed partner with a third-party company, one that goes by the name of Looksmart. In order to state this definitively, John featured a URL from an Ask Sponsored Listing ad that showed part of the path pointing to a Looksmart location:....//tm.ask.com/r?t=an&s=a&uid=0082EE2D8DA597E24&sid=180D69D8C158F0F24&o= 10234&qid=90C8B368E677CD50AB1CE9E57874F586&io=0&sv=0a300514&ask=e- loan&uip=43a922b6&en=aj&eo=&pt=E-LOAN%20%3F%20(Official%20Site) &ac=24&qs=1&pg=1&u=http%3A%2F%2Faskj-adtrack.looksmart.com%2Fog%2Fpr% 3DPsr%3Bro%3D1%3Brc%3D1%3Bla%3D365857%3Blm%3D322774%3Bkw% 3D14557279%3Bed%3D20050801%3Bii%3D78ea.79f6.42f0fcc9.94b%3Bpn%3D%3Bto% 3D%3Btc%3D1%3Bpo%3D1%3Bpc%3D1%3Bpi%3Daj_reply_13%3Bts%3D%7Chttp%3A% 2F%2Fwww.eloan.com%2F%3Fuser%3Dask%26mcode%3Daskkw4mdq...As John indicates, this certainly looks like both companies are sharing the APIs necessary to produce such a URL. What does the use of Looksmart technology say about Ask's ability to branch out by themselves? Perhaps nothing at all; or perhaps they got tired of dealing with all things Google and wanted to try another, more limited partner. Or could it be Ask doesn't have the necessary technology and/or client database to run such a service with assistance?

Whatever the reason, Ask has been reluctant to speak about any third-party partnerships with their new PPC service. Do they not want to take the spotlight away from any perceived Google independence observations by introducing another partner?

Chris Richardson is a search engine writer and editor for WebProNews. Visit WebProNews for the latest search news.