With the exponential rise of Facebook and Twitter, and the introduction of Google+ to the social media arena, would marketers be foolish to still consider search as a query-driven disciple? Is it that these ever developing online social destinations are infact the new search engines through which consumers find and follow the information, products and brands they have an interest in- after all YouTube is the officially the second largest search-destination on the internet.
Back in the day we marvelled at ‘search’. It was like questioning the all-seeing internet oracle and being granted a whole world of knowledge. How we laughed when it threw up weird fuzzy-logic responses. Remember the rumour that the world would end if you typed ‘google’ into Google!? Not any more. Now you want the one result you’re looking for, and you want it now! Enter Bing – the new search, or should I say ‘decision’, engine from Microsoft. Its aim? To shift work from consumers to search engines – actually answering more queries on the search engine page itself, without having to click through to the result. You enter ‘weather’, it’ll give you an instant forecast based on your IP address/location. You enter ‘flights’, it’ll tell you whether the fares are likely to go up by tomorrow morning. Is it really so new though? Google already offers much of this functionality. Also, I think it might get on my nerves after a while. Like some over keen minion that jumps to conclusions before I’ve even finished a sentence. If the inference is wrong, I’ll have to start all over again anyway. Ho hum. They are throwing a multi-million dollar campaign at it though. Will it be enough to make people switch from Google though? We’ll have to wait and see.
You soon could have. That’s because the Internet Advertising Bureau has just put together a ‘best practice’ code on how you go about it. The three main tenets for behavioural advertising are consent i.e. you’ve got to give people a chance to opt out/in; education i.e. you’ve got to tell people how you’re going to use their data; notice i.e. tell people that you’re going to use it for a specific purpose.Is it going too far or not far enough? The key point of conjecture is that the companies that ‘cold ping’ you don’t actually have any of your personal data. It’s all down to that pesky cookie code on your hard drive. So, in effect, it is you and it isn’t you. It’s hardly the same as cold calling though. Indeed, if you head onto the Internet shouldn’t you expect it? Isn’t it all in the spirit of the web? Isn’t it great that companies are hunting you down to bring you thoroughly relevant offers and deals?
Google’s Q4 revenues are up 18% but Microsoft’s online operating losses have doubled. What’s going on? According to Google, their modest success is all down to folk who are still ploughing modest advertising spend into search. Then there’s the fact that they’ve super-turbo-charged the engine itself with over 300 enhancements. However, only last week it was reported that search marketing budgets in the States have fallen 8% year-on-year in Q4 2008 (Revolution). So, the big question – is Google’s crunch trouncing success sustainable? And, if so, for how long? Of course, the real question is how useful either of the businesses’ quarterly reports/forecasts are in predicting their future. Given the new rules of the market, can anyone really predict who the winners or losers will be?
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