Ask Jeeves today became Ask.com as Barry Diller, the internet tycoon behind the search engine, dumped PG Woodehouse's butler as a part of a relaunch designed to up the pressure on Google, the market leader.

InterActiveCorp, the online conglomerate of which Mr Diller is chief executive and the controlling shareholder, bought Ask Jeeves for $2.3 billion last summer. It was decided that Jeeves, the face of the site for a decade, would have to go as he was seen as limiting the appeal of the service to key target audiences – such as teenage boys.

The revamped site could play a pivotal role in amalgamating the sprawling IAC empire, which ranges from dating sites to online ticket offices. Mr Diller will outline the part he hopes Ask.com will play within the group later today.

One key issue which IAC has refused to address so far is how the Ask.com search engine will treat pages from other IAC sites such as Ticketmaster and Match.com.

When Ask.com's biggest rival Google recently bought a stake in AOL, the internet portal, it suggested that AOL content would get preferential treatment on the Google search engine, which led to critics saying Google's reputation for impartiality would be damaged.

IAC will be particularly sensitive to any such charges as it invests heavily in building up the Ask.com brand.

IAC hopes that a multi-million-dollar television, print, radio and online campaign to promote Ask.com will break internet users out of the habit of "sleepwalking" their way to Google, which holds 46 per cent of the search market, or Yahoo!, the global No2 with a 23 per cent share.

However, in a market characterised by near-constant innovation, Ask.com, which accounted for 6 per cent of the US market in December, could risk falling behind even before it has set off.

There are fears that the market for conventional searches in mature territories are reaching saturation. To counter this, Wall Street analysts are already looking forward to online video search services and search engines for mobile phones boosting revenues in the sector.

Ask.com's expensive relaunch will not offer either type of service.

IAC is also not planning to venture into paid-search advertising in Europe - the most lucrative business for search engines and the source of more than 90 per cent of Google's revenues.

Instead IAC will outsource the adverts on its pages to Google in Europe and use a blend of its own ads and Google ads in the United States.

IAC executives have argued that advertising turns users off. Ask.com has therefore imitated Google's clutter-free homepage, but will limit the number of ads per page to three in the frame at one time.

Other features include the ability to preview websites on a page of search results so users do not have to click on links to see what's behind them, and the ability to refine searches step-by-step, to make it to easier to find relevant information.

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