When thinking about SEO, do you only take into consideration Google or are you still looking at Bing?
Most people still regard Google as the only place to keyword research, the only search engine to worry about but Bing is closing in. There is a vast amount of traffic available and arguably its easier to compete for the high net worth search terms at bing. Then after all this is said and done…. how do you use Facebook? Surely these guys are going to make a play for search traffic.
What has Bing (Microsoft) done to compete with Google?
Bing is proping up the facebook listings
Bing (Microsoft) seems to be getting tighter with Facebook, if you perform a search inside facebook you will see the usual. Names, Posts, Groups and now you will also see search results from Bing. A smart move for Bing surely. Facebook is the *current* undisputed king of the social space, it is the *current* powerplayer holding most of the cards. With great power come great responsibility a wise arachnid uncle once said. It was probably inevitable with Googles launch of “plus” that facebook and bing have almost been forced in to a relationship. It will be interesting to see how deep this relationship will go….
Cue Skype…. Microsoft practically own the internet telephony giant now and facebook have been promising some skype style integration for a very long time. So has Skype become a love child of the two giants? Or is it a love triangle that will eventually end up tears.
Back on topic…..
Bing has declared that it is reworking its search algo’s to integrate with the data available at facebook. In a statement released by Microsoft they said the following -
“The best decisions are not just fuelled by facts, they require the opinions and emotions of your friends. Search is now more than a fact finder – [In this update] marrying fact-based search results with your friends’ street smarts to combine the best data on the Web with the opinions of the people you trust the most and the collective IQ of the Web.”
So what might we see in the future:
- The “Likes”, you will see realtime search results showing sites appropriate to your keyword. Friends that also have “Liked” a search result with tell you they liked it. Thinking about myself really, if one of my friends has effectively endorsed the proposed result in bing I am more likely to click it. Google have also installed a similar feature with the “Plus 1″ or “+1″ depending on how you like it.
- Results tailored by your hobbies, your interests, your friends.
- You will see latest news, special offers etc. from compainies facebook pages. For example if you search for “DVD Player” you may get a result in the list from “Sony”, then next to it you might have the latest information available from its “page” at facebook.
So we see the social, we hear the skype, what else is happening?
It pretty much common knowledge that Google has made a lot of its fortune from selling advertisements. Microsoft just last year teamed up with Yahoo to deliver an advertisement rich “search alliance”. Early signs are encouraging for this joint venture. Yahoo has a very large partner network and Microsoft have all of the dollars needed to bring its platform “AdCenter” upto scratch (it has a very long way to go before its anywhere close to AdWords from Google, however Microsoft is a software superhouse less we forget).
In conclusion, what does the future hold?
Well one thing is for sure, we are going to see all out internet war. Corporate giants taking swipes, Megatron Vs Optimus. Who do I back? You can never count google out, I actually think they will be the first company to have an office on the moon. I just think that the strategic partnerships of Yahoo, Microsoft, Skype and Facebook may well be too strong once it gets going. For this round at least.