Ask wants you to ask more

Since beefing up its main site last summer, Ask.com launched a $100 million marketing campaign this year in an effort to boost its paltry market share of the search world.

Hitwise finds that its most recent TV campaign, where Ask pits its search offering against market leader Google (awkwardly, the two are currently reevaluating an ad deal), may have helped increase site traffic 23 percent: From 3.49 percent of all searches in August 2007, to 4.32 percent in September. (Watch an Ask vs. Google TV spot here.)

But then again, everybody had a good September. Google and Yahoo gained more search market share in September than Ask, with Google jumping to 63.55 percent of all searches. Even AOL caught up to and surpassed Ask.

TechCrunch wonders if parent company IAC's 9-figure marketing move will pay for itself. Out of IAC's $1.5 billion in quarterly revenue, its media and advertising businesses accounted for only $190 million.

That's a 40 percent, $54 million, raise from last year, but most of the boost came from the Ask network — search results it powers on other sites.