Choi Soo-yeon, the representative of Naver, recently noted that there is no indication that search traffic may decline due to the growth of generative artificial intelligence (AI) in the current trend of Naver search queries.
Choi explained this during a conference call for the first quarter earnings announcement held on the morning of the 9th, saying it is attributed to the characteristics of the Naver search service. Recently, Eddy Cue, Apple's institutional sector head, appeared as a witness in the trial regarding the dissolution of Google's parent company Alphabet's monopoly and said, 'AI-based search will ultimately replace standard search engines like Google,' causing Naver's stock price to drop more than 5% in a single day.
Choi stated, 'Naver's search service itself has been focused not on answer-type searches as in the past but rather on increasing user satisfaction regarding various exploratory information, such as shopping or finding restaurants.'
He continued, 'So far, I think generative AI services are affecting competitors who have a relatively higher proportion of non-commercial answer-type informational search queries.' He added, 'As for Naver, the volume of relatively strong business queries, exploratory queries, and queries without definitive answers is actually continuing to increase.'
However, Choi said, 'The ways generative AI search services are being utilized are diversifying, and I am aware of various trends attempting to consolidate places and search shopping.' He continued, 'As this generative AI search evolves further, I believe that users' information consumption patterns will ultimately diversify.'
Choi mentioned, 'In such cases, I believe that providing content and information tailored to each individual's fragmented interests or contexts is most important. Therefore, we plan to revamp the app service and integrated search based on the vast data and technology unique to Naver within this year.'
He added, 'Through this, we will enhance exploration and expand personalized content consumption, ensuring that through AI-based features, the experiences can be well consolidated with services such as Naver's strengths in search shopping places.'