Summary
The way that we disseminate, receive and digest information has been forever changed by the internet and further evolves today with these announcements. Search results will now provide traditional indexed and now realtime Tweets. The entire online community and many organizations will be quickly impacted. All internet users will be immediately exposed to social media and the power of user generated content. If leveraged correctly, the opportunity for business application is exciting!
Analysis
Passionate opinions are flying back and forth in the online community as people digest the recent announcements by both Bing and Google that they have confirmed individual search deals with Twitter. Both announcements were released today within hours of one another. Per the agreements, when you search Google and/or Bing, the results will include realtime streaming Tweets in addition to the two types of results, organic and paid, that you traditionally receive.
The advocates of the new search model, including Bing and Google, are ecstatic to be a part of what they feel is a huge benefit to the online community. Both Google and Bing state it takes them one step closer to their similar goals of providing the most inclusive, comprehensive and easy to use search in the world. Explaining that results will be more robust, advocates highlight the power of having consistent access to realtime information.
A familiar example that has been used repeatedly today is that of a family on vacation in Colorado. The family is deciding if they want to spend the day in town at the movies or head to the mountains to ski. When they hop onto Google to search for skiing conditions, they also see realtime Twitter conversations about the weather, crowds and restaurant waits, painting a true picture of what the atmosphere is like on that specific day. Despite good skiing conditions and nice weather, the family learns from Twitter results that the crowds are horrible and you can’t get a table anywhere. They decide to spend the day at the movies whereas with out Twitter search results, they may have made the alternative decision and spent the day waiting in terrible lines. In this case, Twitter introduced new criteria that were actually more important that the initial factor, skiing conditions, the family went online to explore. When digested in this regard, realtime Twitter results aid in better and faster decision making.
On the other hand, many people are annoyed by the announcement. The general sentiment amongst this group is that Twitter is a collection of useless “who cares what you are doing right now” statements. In addition, there is push back that that Twitter results will further crowd and already chaotic results page. From this perspective, streaming Twitter search results are simply an additional distraction that takes your focus and time away from the search at hand.
As you probably guessed, I’m a huge advocate of the Bing, Google & Twitter deals. In my opinion, this is an important step in the evolution of search. We are beginning to move toward a truly holistic search providing for historical, recently indexed and now realtime data. When I translate the example of the family on vacation to business applications, I start to get really excited! For a marketing leader, the ability to understand your market has just become more efficient. As you are doing demographic research on your audience, you can simultaneously see what people in that demographic are saying this second. For a sales executive, you can now see what your client’s customers are saying about that them at the same time you research basic company information and recent news for tomorrow’s appointment. Imagine the applications for customer service, operations, and e-commerce…oh the possibilities!
It will be interesting to see how people and businesses begin to integrate this new search model into their decision making. Bing’s Twitter results are already live in beta. Google is a month or more out from their release. Regardless of our individual opinions, I am confident that this is just the first step in a continual shift in the way we receive, digest and respond to information.
Articles on Twitter, Bing & Google – 10/21
Analyses are solely the work of the authors and have not been edited or endorsed by GLG.
