The Changing Face of Search and Social Media

It used to be so simple. Once Google took over the world, marginalising Yahoo, Microsoft, Alta Vista and the like in the process, we only really had one aim. So many searches was carried out on Google that to think of promoting our sites anywhere else seemed like a waste of time and energy. Of course, nothing stands still and Google’s grip isn’t all encompassing anymore.

It’s not simply about the direct search market where Google is now receiving some viable challenges, notably from the ever present Yahoo and Microsoft’s new kid on the block, Bing, both eating up reasonable percentages of the market. It’s more fundamental than that, it’s about the way we search, and the platforms we use to search on.

In these networked days of social media sites and platforms we’ve got a lot more options open to us when we go looking for answers. If we’re looking for a good plumber the first stop could just as easily be our Facebook friends as our search engine. If we’re looking for some specialist advice, let’s say about writing for an appropriate example, we might think of our Hubpages friends before we think of our search engine.

To complicate matters further, we’re a becoming less likely to be even sat at our computers with the ever growing rise in popularity of smart phones. In that plumbing example I used earlier it might be considerably easier to pick up our smart phone with its handy “Emergency Plumbers in your area” app than boot up the old computer to find one.

So with the search market fracturing into multiple channels (e.g. direct search, social media sites, smart phones apps) you’d think companies were clambering all over each other to steal the march to be ahead of their competitors in these emerging channels. Well, you’d think so wouldn’t you? Incredibly, there’s no stampede just yet.

Companies are scared of social media. One of the inherent benefits of social media sites is what they fear most. They can’t control what people say about them, and this lack of control scares them into inaction. Unfortunately for them the market moves on regardless and as with the early days of search, the small businesses and individuals who genuinely embrace change are enjoying that small window of opportunity, cleaning up while the market catches up.

So, if you’re still plugging away at search and nothing else, maybe it’s time to lift your head out the trenches and have a fresh look at the social media channels. The key to search is being found, and if you want to be found nowadays search simply isn’t enough.