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Three years after being rebranded Ask.com, search engine reverts to Ask Jeeves in bid to take on Google.

Ask.com is to relaunch in the UK as Ask Jeeves three years after ditching the brand. The butler character will be reintroduced to the search engine’s branding and advertising after a makeover – by Savile Row tailor Gieves & Hawkes, no less – that will ditch Jeeves’s pinstripe trousers and coattail jacket for a trendier look.

The Jeeves brand will return in a national TV, press, radio and online campaign kicking off this week after research found that 83% of UK consumers still identified the search engine by the Ask Jeeves name and butler character.

Our users have emphatically told us that they find Jeeves enhances their search experience … they see Jeeves as approachable and trustworthy and, above all, helpful,” said Cesar Mascaraque, the Ask managing director.

“He will be everywhere [and] what I’d like to see, but we are not there yet, is using him like an avatar where people could, say, dress him up with a Hawaiian shirt and flip flops. We want to let people own him.”

Jeeves, who will only be reintroduced in the UK, was the virtual mascot for the search engine from its founding in 1996 until early 2006 when the butler was dropped along with the Ask Jeeves name following the £1bn acquisition of the company by Barry Diller’s IAC/InterActiveCorp in 2005.

As part of the relaunch Jeeves will be given Twitter and Facebook accounts – the latter will be updated later this week with a travel diary and “pictures” of where he has been during his three-year absence – and the butler will be involved in a series of events this week.