Yahoo! (YHOO) outdoes Google (GOOG) in customer service

In one of the bigger, brighter stars recently for Yahoo, Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO), the Internet giant has seemingly won one against larger rival Google, Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG). In a recent American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) report, Yahoo! took home first place in customer satisfaction, beating the more financially successful and larger Google.

Now, the term "customer service" can span many areas and can be hard to define, but the ACSI report published by the University of Michigan rated areas like search engines, online news, e-commerce transactions and other areas across a span of 70,000 Internet customers. The results? Yahoo! took home the top spot at a time when the company is seen as struggling mightily against Google and a resurgent Microsoft, Inc. (NASDAQ: MSFT).

Yahoo!'s rating was 79 out of 100, with Google scoring a 78 (a drop of 3 points form last year). Yahoo!'s recent well-publicized troubles will at least get a break with this one and will allow the Sunnyvale, Ca. company to toot its trumpet for a while. An interesting twist is that of Google, whose 3-point drop was the largest since this specific ACSI survey began in 2000. Are Google customers becoming more dissatisfied every year with the services it provides or is this a temporary blip for the Mountain View, Ca. company?

From where I sit, Google still proves much more popular on almost every front compared to Yahoo!, with most of its services being free and highly reliable, in addition to being easy to use. But Yahoo! has made quite a stride here and it appears devoted Yahoo! customers are quite satisfied with the company even if the market is not.