Social Media

...perform as well as other types ads. Weve always liked to think that its because social network users arent there for advertising or product info. Not so, says Greenfield: Rather, . . . Googles algorithm isnt well-suited to social-networking sites " and thats something Google isnt necessarily concerned with.

And theres a good reason for that. And no, it has nothing to do with clicks from social networks being less valuable than clicks from elsewhere on the net. Its jealousy:

The reason the company -Google- doesnt care, said Greenfield, is that the basic functionality of social platforms like MySpace, Facebook and Twitter is diminishing the importance of search. He points to users growing inclination to search for specific information by tapping into friends and colleagues knowledge through platforms like Twitters own search product, as well Facebooks status update tool.

Okay, lets get this straight. So because people are using the Internet to talk to their friends and browse what their friends are doing right at this moment (in 140 characters or less in some cases), they dont need Google anymore (How did he know I used to spend my free time Googling What is Kim Habermann doing right now?).

Therefore, petulant toddler that it is, Google isnt doing all it can to work on its one and only algorithm that serves search results and ad results to make it cater to these social networks.

</sarcasm>

Lets look at this seriously now. Never mind the fact that Google has been saying for more than a year that theyre not doing social search because it doesnt show much promise. Some searches on social networks arent going to win clicks. Some social search involves looking for product reviews from people you trust, finding old friends, making plans.

There are still going to be searches on social networks that do yield paid clicks for Google, but in general, even if youre already on MySpace, why use their search product to conduct those searches? Its not that hard to hop over from your social site to Google proper to type in your query.

So do searches on social networks simply not make as much money? Probably. And is it Googles fault? Probably"if they hadnt gone and created such a powerful brand, people would probably be content to use search anywhere for anything.

What do you think: does Google care about social? Should it?

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