One of the persistent story lines to earnings call season, at least in technology, has been the mention of “green shoots.” Companies like Datadog and AWS are mentioning that Q4 momentum had carried into January, and that, at Datadog, “the rebound we’re seeing from the slower end of December is better than what we experienced last January.” Though there’s plenty of earnings calls left, it’s a datapoint we were curious about as it related to search. And, sure enough, we’re seeing the same thing. January’s MoM growth in opened searches was 39% over December 2023, three raw percentage points higher than the January 2023 MoM rebound over December 2022 (36%). When viewed YoY, the story is equally encouraging, as January is now lapping a lower market comp. Still, 26% YoY growth for January 2024 looks a lot better than a -38% YoY decline in opened searches for January 2023. The numbers, it seems, shows two things: There does appear to be modest momentum. We’re in a market that falls squarely between the peak and the valley. As we discussed in our 2023 report, we’ll see how long we live here.