Google Risks Missing Social Media Train, Facebook Aside

Implications: Google doesn't 'get' social media and their pandering to entertainment media via "Universal Search" offers proof.  Need more?  Microsoft just moved on Facebook. Google has compounded their missed opportunity with social media by letting company politics seep into their PageRank update.  Not only do they stand to lose a huge amount of face and standing, they could cede control of making social media an integral part of their business. Google could have leveraged its Toolbar product in the world of social media to the extent that wildly successful StumbleUpon has (acquired by eBay who will use it to drive e-commerce transactions-- another ball dropped by Google).  Google doesn't get social media to the extent that it is actively warring with it by penalizing virally successful Web sites. Google's Orkut social media experiment is a total failure to all but the Brazilian drug cartel.

Analysis: Google doesn't get social media and their recent "Universal" algorithm update (where they are beginning to include video and images in search results pages) is proof.  Considering how marketers don't much use video yet -- or have images properly tagged for search engines to discover them -- this seems obvious and, hence, the move translates to the initiative being less about Google 'getting' social media and more about pandering to big entertainment.

Google wants to monetize social media, not protect it.  Wonder why Google took forever to release its copyright violation "fingerprinting" detection software?  Simple: to figure out a way to use that same technology to monetize it (rather than protect it) and cut entertainment companies in.  Did they wait too long and will the ad models they're testing on consumers pan out?  We'll see in short time.

Google has compounded their missed opportunity with social media by letting company politics seep into their PageRank update.  Clearly Pagerank sits at the heart of HOW Google rates and ranks Web sites.  However, industry luminaries/insiders agree -- it is all but dead in terms of a viable means to rank sites.  Why?  Google's platform has been gamed to death (Businessweek: 'Hotwiring Your Search Engine') by marketers and their (the biggie) affiliates.  In simple terms, the system was so easily defeated by commercial interests it is now becoming less and less powerful, useful.  The core is rotting and Google is worried... and not afraid to react as they did this week.  Kudos for that.

Yet Google is running scared from social media.  Insider Wayne Smallman of BlahBlahTech.com says...

Instead of 'Googling' for something, we find stuff being sent to us as emails from friends, in our profiles, in a friends' lists of favourites, or any number of user-generated websites, blogs, RSS feeds, Social Networks and Social Media portals.

While we're busying ourselves voting and commenting on this stuff, we're not using Google’s search algorithm, and we're not clicking on Sponsored Links, either.

As pointed out by Mr. Smallman's readers, Google is resorting to blackballing "paid links" and has been creating FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) among Webmasters for a while now via bloggers like Matt Cutts.  Google is clearly on the social media defensive.

More proof: Google has been, for some time now, actively warring with social media by penalizing virally successful Web sites in its search index -- ranking them lower in search engine results pages (SERPs). This is documented all over the Web.  In fact, in a colossal slip-up, Google once mistakenly targeted its own AdSense blog for deletion!

Meanwhile, widgets and ad-driven widget networks (i.e. WidgetBucks.com) race across the Web at light speed -- capturing ad dollars.  As well, RSS (real simple syndication) powered syndication tools are making it possible for consumers to find ways around Almighty Google.  The consumer reviews space is red hot now.  Certainly these make for potential acquisition targets for Google and others.

According to Forrester Research, "Social media will drive emerging channels to $10 billion by 2012. Spending on social media alone will grow to $6.9 billion." 

Google is, of course, gearing up for a November announcement in the area of social networking.  What might they have in store?