Facebook is NOT the Future of Search

Facebook

Nice post this morning by Ed Gubbins at GigaOM (link below) about the recent polarization of discussions about the future of discovery on the web. As Ed put it:

"Discussions about search and social networks are becoming overly polarized, with misleading statements like "The Future is Social, Not Search" that promote false absolutes. The future is social and search."

I couldn't agree more. The future is social AND search.

I posted related thoughts last week when some analysis was published showing Facebook now being 25% of Internet pageviews in the U.S.. I saw a lot of the businesses that we talk to over-reacting and felt compelled to write about what Facebook's growth does and does NOT mean for businesses.

As I said in that post about what Facebook growth does NOT mean:

Facebook's growth does NOT mean that Google is shrinking. If you look past the data in the Facebook analysis, you will see that Google is growing amidst all this, and that this is not a "zero sum game". Overall Internet use is continuing to grow and social networking has emerged as a massive incremental time expenditure that augments rather than replaces search as a key way that consumers find information. Businesses need to have a strategy in place that enables them to be discovered in BOTH search engines AS WELL AS social media.
Facebook's growth does NOT mean that businesses can simply put up a Facebook Page as the center of their social media strategy. Facebook is super important, but it is still just one of the mechanisms that customers will use to find and interact with businesses that they buy from. Businesses must be prepared to be found and engage with their customers whereever they are and across whatever medium those customers prefer. Businesses need to have a "hub" at the center of this that is solely about them (without ads and distractions a click away) and can be the foundation for deep interactions with their most engaged customers.

I wrote further recommendation in my post, but businesses need to take heed and have a strategy in place that helps them to be discovered in BOTH search and social media.

Alex Hawkinson