WebProNews

Like the kid who tells his mom that he got an "A" in art - while not mentioning the fact that he got "D"s in every other subject - Yahoo's acting happy with the results of a Keynote Systems study.  Yahoo's takeaway: Yahoo Search Assist works.

Yes, believe it or not, Yahoo did indeed score higher than its competitors in the Search Assist & Suggestions rankings gathered during November of last year.  And this represents a marked improvement over its May position in the same category.

But Michael Kronthal, who reported these standings in a post titled "It's About the Customers" on the Yahoo Search Blog, dutifully linked to his source, and that's where we saw some problems.  The Keynote Systems report states, "In the December 2007 Keynote study, Google makes a clean sweep of first place in all four key index rankings: Overall Customer Experience, Brand Impact, Future Usage Impact, and Customer Satisfaction."

As for a certain acquisition target, "Yahoo! takes second place in every category, and Ask.com, MSN, and AOL follow in order."

So maybe our imaginary kid got "C"s, or even "B"s, instead of "D"s.  That's not bad.  But it's what got Yahoo threatened by Microsoft, so while the company deserves to be pleased with Search Assist's performance, no one should think it aced every test.