For the last few weeks, the internet has been buzzing with the news that Microsoft and Yahoo have decided to band together to take on the overwhelming dominance of Google in the search advertising market.

The arrangement still has to get a nod from antitrust officials in the US. However, given both companies' relatively small market share next to Google's as well as bolstering a competitor to the market leader, this should be a formality.

But Google no doubt will raise objections, especially since its own search deal with Yahoo was rebuffed last year by the antitrust people.

Microsoft and Yahoo’s 10-year deal will allow them to focus on their respective strengths. By using Microsoft’s search technology Yahoo can focus on the sales of its display advertising and creating engaging content to attract more visitors to their web properties.

Microsoft, on the other hand, gets the opportunity to showcase Bing, its new search technology, to a much wider audience. Taking Yahoo’s search audience into account, this deal would more than triple Bing’s market share.

However, even with a tripling of market share, Google is still in a very commanding position with a 65% market share worldwide (higher in the UK where it stands above 90%). And it’s this dominance of the market that makes Microsoft and Yahoo’s partnership such good news. A stronger player in the search market that offers credible competition to Google can potentially work for advertisers.

Online has traditionally been an area that has seen great competition and this competition have driven technological innovation that has benefited everyone.

Microsoft has invested billions in search technology and is counting on Bing, unveiled last month, to seriously challenge Google. Bing has driven mostly positive responses from those who have used it but this deal with Yahoo will allow them to show it to a much wider audience. Google won’t sit idle and allow its market share to be eaten away.

It has already announced measures to upgrade its own search engine with ‘Google Caffeine’. While this could also be a PR exercise to counter the buzz around the Microsoft/Yahoos partnership, Google Caffeine is seeking to improve search results in terms of size of index, indexing speed, accuracy, comprehensiveness and relevancy of search results. Google is also going after Microsoft’s traditional business with news of developing a free operating system for inexpensive PCs as a challenge for Microsoft Windows.

This increased competition in the online world will lead to better services for consumers, advertisers and publishers. While the actual partnership between Microsoft and Yahoo is still a few years away, the threat has already caused Google to up its game.

At the same time, if Bing is to catch Google, both Microsoft and Yahoo will be forced to be extremely innovative with their products to eat into the Google lead.

Good news for all of us!