Comments on: Will Google Compete With Facebook? Er…It Already Is, Folks.

By: Tunde

Tunde — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 14:16:57 +0000

The more you understand people and their intention when seeking information, the more you realize that search and social will coexist. So, the organization that is able to best integrate both will prevail. Why?
Have you thought of the times when your Google search results are validated by your friends/network and vice versa?
More and more, this is how search will happen - depending on your search intent - informational, transactional, navigational, public, or private.

By: Nastascia Zapata

Nastascia Zapata — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 02:13:07 +0000

I rarely ask questions on facebook instead of using google. In my opinion, it is much faster to just google a question rather than waiting a few minutes or sometimes a whole day before receiving a valid reply on facebook. Even then, how would you know if the replies are factual? The answer: Google.

By: Adrian Palacios

Adrian Palacios — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 03:30:49 +0000

John, I highly recommend taking a look at this (very long) presentation by a researcher at Google. They've taken a very hard look at the issues with Facebook (and other social networking technologies) and come out with some great ideas on how to design for social interaction online.

http://www.slideshare.net/padday/the-real-life-social-network-v2

By: Prefabrik RSS

Prefabrik RSS — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 06:12:26 +0000

Thanks you very much sir!..

By: Business Marketing

Business Marketing — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 23:05:58 +0000

They might be able to take a weeeeee bit of market share but to say they are real competition to Facebook is a stretch in my opinion.

By: Tom Nolan

Tom Nolan — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 08:19:24 +0000

I’m not sure that a move for either Google or Facebook into each others bread and butter would be a great move. They represent (atleast in branding terms) different things and a move into each others domains would dilute the messages they put across!

By: Gab Goldenberg

Gab Goldenberg — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 22:45:38 +0000

I see them competing in so far as they’re both in advertising, but the point raised by Mike Sommers doesn’t impress me much. Mike, you’re extrapolating from people having long tail questions answered on social networks – many of which are not commercial – that facebook can get into search. That’s a stretch, but even if it’s true, Google does fine on the short tail. Why would people change when it “ain’t broken”? (@John, your response would be interesting, too.)

By: Ike

Ike — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 11:42:59 +0000

Mike is dead on: http://ike4.me/o106

By: Personal Trainer CT

Personal Trainer CT — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 20:50:22 +0000

Well we can certainly see google as king in the past and future. Facebook may want to be careful what is said, they arent nearly close to googles standards. If you want something, you go to google, period.

By: Mike Sommers

Mike Sommers — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 19:37:13 +0000

Two years ago, where did you go first when you had a question? Google!

Where do you go now? More and more I find myself asking my friends on Facebook the kinds of things that I used to ask the computers who run Google.

Today, if I can't find my answer via my friend network on Facebook (sometimes I'm willing to wait a long time for a really good answer to a really tough question), I'll fall back to Google as a last resort.

I think this is a trend that will continue as "Page Rank" has less and less value in the world. The documents out on the web that my friends have marked as being important ("Liked") are in most cases more relevant than documents that have been linked to by a bunch of random strangers.

So I absolutely see Facebook going very hard after the search audience that Google currently dominates. They have the raw materials to offer a more relevant experience, and in the long run that's all that matters in search, relevance.