Google Plus: The New Social Network?
So, a lucky few (invitation only at the moment) have had about a week to digest the new Google Plus offering; Google’s latest attempt to crack the social media arena currently occupied mainly by the likes of Facebook and Twitter.
Features
So what features can one expect to see when you get your invitation from a Plus account holder, how do these compare to services already available, and what potential is there for Google to become a bigger player with a social platform?
- Circles: these are groups of friends – categories, so to speak. These are named by you and are hidden from others, but the best this about this is you can see the stream of these circles separate from others. Unlike Twitter, which simply dumps your entire followee’s (if that’s the right word) onto your homepage.
- Hangouts: Great tool that allows multi-person video chat (up to 10). “It’s like you’re really hanging out!” Maybe not quite, but certainly useful for collaboration and conferencing. With Microsoft adding Skype to it’s arsenal, I can see a similar function being a much bigger part of Microsoft’s future offering.
- Sparks: I found this to be more like a news feed, or set of search results based on the term I entered. The results seemed tailored towards the small number of people I had in my circles, so assume it bring in this data in as part of the filtering. I also compared these Sparks results with a normal Google search and Google News search. This showed up something completely different.
- Photos: Like any half decent social network, the ability to share photos is a necessity. I imagine for Picasa users, there is/will be a level of integration here.
As I trial Plus, I notice that there are some nifty features. Things like only sharing photos with certain circles, turning off the ability for others to share and comment on your sharables. Too many to mention here (and maybe too many for an initial offering – Facebook didn’t have Apps when it started, and was limited purely to friends and photos).
What about Search?
My perspective on this is very much about how this will impact online search marketing. Social media is already having a huge impact on search results. At the seminars I currently speak at, we’ve accepted (and built the case for) people’s Likes, Tweets and other forms of recommendations should affect search results, and that those results are tailored to individuals (and not one SERP fits all). As marketers, we accept that, and integrate social media into our marketing mix (which should be more than just adding a Tweet button to your website).
However, up until now, Google hasn’t really controlled (or owned) these Likes or Tweets. Facebook and Twitter aren’t associated with Google, and are very much competitors. So relying on them to affect search engine results was always going to be difficult to maintain.
I’m sure that with Plus, Google will know more about individuals preferences, social circles, likes and dislikes, and therefore provide a more appropriate (and individual) set of search results. This can only be a good thing, right?
For me, its success is going to require two things. Uptake (a healthy user base that makes an extremely basic site like Twitter worth hundreds of millions of dollars), and value through search.
In people’s minds, Google is search. To ask these people to think Google is about organising your night out, sharing photos or a tool to tell people what you had for breakfast, is a big leap. Personally, I don’t think the world needs another social network, but I can definitely see how Google understanding more about me can deliver a better service through its main search offering.
I say to Google not to be scared to announce that this is where the real value to people lives. Join and use our network, and we’ll make searching for a book, that perfect present for your mother or best restaurant is Islington a whole lot more valuable – and personalised to your tastes.