TRAACKR » google

Who Let the Gorillas Out??!?

pierreloic — Thu, 16 Jun 2011 20:18:05 +0000

Two very interesting acquisitions in the social media monitoring space took place recently:

1- SalesForce bought Radian6 for a mere $326M in March

2- Google acquired PostRank last month for an undisclosed amount

Up until now, acquisitions in this space had been small (20/30M) and focused on marketing/pr (like MarketWire buying Sysomos). What sets these 2 acquisitions apart is not just the size (at least for the Radian6 deal) but more importantly who the the buyers are: two of the biggest gorillas of the tech scene.

Google and SalesForce are sending a message loud and clear to the market: social data is not a hype and it’s not just a marketing play. Even if this is not new news to analysts and other people in the space who have been saying the same thing for some time now, the move remains significant as it’s backed up with serious investment and it is a sign of things to come. So what’s next?

First, social and enterprise data will become more integrated. Though the rational by Google and SalesForce behind each of their acquisitions is probably quite different, the 10,000 foot view is the same: integrate social data and intelligence with other data types already tracked by each company (CRM/sales data for SalesForce, web analytics for Google) in order to increase the value to users of the combined data set – for more on this, Brian Solis of Altimeter wrote an insightful blog post on this right after the Radian6 acquisition by SalesForce. Google and SalesForce have made a business of being early movers and you can bet that it won’t be long before others follow suit in increasing the breadth and depth of social data integration and exploring synergies.

Then, and more importantly, these new found synergies will fundamentally change the way we do business by surfacing opportunities and exposing flaws in the way businesses had been looking at intelligence they can use, act on, and expose to their customers and partners. For example, what would a company do the day they discover through SalesForce social data that their best sales person actually doesn’t work for them but is a customer making referrals? What if another firm finds out their top subject matter experts are buried deep in the company org chart and tend to leave their job as a result? Traackr’s customers and partners remind us constantly of the seemingly limitless (for sure vastly untapped) opportunities of exploring the potential of influencer data – and we’re only one part of the social puzzle.

The result? The dichotomy between social and enterprise data will become obsolete (very much in the same way it did last decade between online and offline) and we’ll start treating all data and intelligence built on top the way we’re looking at social data. Charlene Li had it right when she said 2 years ago that social data will be like air (she actually said social networks – I’m generalizing her point) and 10 years from now, people won’t even remember what social data is, it will just be data (how else but social??). The impact of this cultural and economic shift is still very much ahead of us. The reason why I want to emphasize what just happened at Google and SalesForce is because it’s the sign that we’ve passed the time for experimentation and are now entering the era for transition.

So congratulations to all involved at SalesForce, Google, Radian6 and PostRank on being a part of what is likely to be an inflection point in the market transformation. For Traackr, we couldn’t be more thrilled to be in the thick of it all and play our part in making change happen. A lot of work and fun ahead.

Will Twitter be a major search player?

derek — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 04:54:37 +0000

We have been having a very interesting internal debate lately about Twitter’s eventual business model(s). There was an interesting post yesterday that spoke to the heart of our debate. This post talks about Twitter challenging Google as a major player in the next generation of search. Since I am the one writing this post, I get to offer my opinion first. There are others on the Traackr team who disagree (quite passionately), but they will have to offer their opinions in the comments section

My opinion is that this post is on the money. I have said for a while that from a user perspective, Twitter is a fun, social, communication platform. But from a business perspective, it’s a search platform. There are many people that are already using Search.Twitter.com as their main search tool for all kinds of information on products, services, places to eat, people to meet, etc. I haven’t gone completely to Twitter, yet, but I find myself searching Twitter about 10% of the time now. That’s pretty significant. One of the reasons I don’t use it more than that is that it isn’t that convenient. But once they integrate search into my main Twitter interface, it will be. And I’ll use it more and more. And I don’t think I’m alone.

From my view, Twitter’s main value is in its searchable data. And this is where they will eventually make their money (will they make enough to generate a $250MM valuation? time will tell on that).

So, note to Twitter — Don’t charge corporate users — they will go away (or not sign up) and you will lose valuable content…which will lead to more searches…which will lead to more $$. Maybe charge of API access — this will help you take advantage of the countless applications that are based on your content. Either way, understand that search is where it’s at for you.

Note to Microsoft — why in the world would you mess with Yahoo? Take a hard look at Twitter…

Now, I open the floor to the opposition…

OpenID or Facebook Connect? Who Cares!

pierreloic — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 21:55:54 +0000

Since yesterday’s announcements from Google and Facebook (a couple of hours apart) that they would both make their social ID standard available to all sites, the (micro)blogosphere has been quite active to look at the merits of each solution and try to predict who will emerge victorious.

Social data standards are paramount to TRAACKR and we’d like to chim in with our own point of view on the suject. So, Facebook or Google? WHO CARES??!?

No, seriously, who, outside of Facebook and Google, cares? We should just all be happy that this arm wrestling between the 2 giants is taking place because it means that standards are indeed converging, which is really all that matters.

Why should there even be 1 single standard? We tend to forget that the “winner takes all” approach to Web businesses doesn’t always hold true, far from it.

If OpenID and Facebook Connect are both adopted widely, it won’t be long before some small genius businesses (like yours truly) start building bridges between the major standards to unify them. I’d just be content if we’re left dealing with only 2!

We only wish for this battle for standards to expand in scope and start including more social data types than basic social network info. It’s undoubtely the way it is going and the fact that both Google and Facebook are leading the charge will only accelerate this trend.

So our opinion on this? Keep on the good fight!

Microsoft live search cashback – am I missing something?

pierreloic — Wed, 21 May 2008 20:35:08 +0000

I was reading last night about the launch of Microsoft’s live search cashback, described in Sillicon Valley Insider as a “disruptive development”. Intrigued, I signed up this morning to try it. Painless process except that I had to remember my Hotmail password – not easy as I usually only use this account for spam…

After browsing and searching for products for 15mn, I’m still struggling to understand the value proposition. What’s the difference with Google Checkout that will celebrate its 2-year anniversary in 2 weeks?

How is the “cashback” of any interest to buyers? I know that the font is red and all to emphasize it’s important (see screenshot below), but really, who is going to look at anything else than the bottom line price of what they buy??? Ask airlines, they have been struggling with this for some time now…

Online shopping aggregators have made tremendous strives towards price transparency that has become the norm for online buying, so what’s the point of cashback? People will always look at the bottom line (price + tax if applicable – discounts/cashback + delivery) when they make decisions on a purchase.

If the idea is to be able to show exclusive deals for Live Search with cashback in the form of a discount, it only works as long as competing online retailers don’t align their prices, which they will undoubtedly do.

The only disruption I have found so far with Live Search Cashback is in the logic. What am I missing?

First shot fired in the battle for social data standards

pierreloic — Fri, 16 May 2008 19:17:15 +0000

Last week, we announced the battle for standards for social data among Google, Yahoo! and Facebook (btw, let’s shed a tear for Microsoft, absent from this short list. They’ll probably come up with their own standards in 6 months, stay tuned).

Yesterday, the first shots were fired in this battle with Facebook announcing they will block Google’s Friend Connect, in the name of protecting their users privacy against Friend Connect substandard privacy policy.

In their words, ” At Facebook, we always look out for the privacy of our users”. Really? Charles, I have one word for you: beacon.

Anyways, no reason to elaborate on this as this move by Facebook lacked all subtlety and there is barely a need to read between the lines to understand why they did what they did. Little scared of Google, aren’t we?

Just like in any battles for standards, we can expect more fighting before things settle down. The good news for all of us is that once this is all in motion, the momentum is very hard to stop and standards will undoubtedly start converging.

Is OpenSocial a joke? And other questions from the Woogle frontier

admin — Wed, 14 May 2008 19:34:15 +0000

Last night I had a nightmare. I sat at my computer, and my Vista morphed into a Web app called Woogle, which included a productivity suite, a default search page, alerts, news, a Web analytics page, and all my social networking stuff in one place (and much, much more, all for fwee). I turned around and saw Bill Gates gagged and tied to a nice Aeron chair. Sergei Brin was looking over my shoulder, wearing a photovoltaic-cell powered propeller cap and holding a Subway Veggie Patty footlong.

Seriously, if I had this kind of nightmare, I’d need to get my head checked; but it’s a nice way to start a rant about OpenSocial. On the surface it looks good: Facebook and LinkedIn are the bad guys, because they won’t do open social standards. Google gets a bunch of cool Web 2.0 players on the Friend Connect band wagon, liberates us from social networking tyranny, et voila.

Except it feels like world domination and Microsoft all over again (Woogle = World Google). This way, we’re going to end up with the Internet Explorer of social platforms.

And to quote Dave Winer, one of the hyperbright bulbs behind RSS and SOAP: “Standards devised by one tech company whose main purpose is to undermine another tech company, usually don’t work. In this case it’s Google trying to undermine Facebook. And I don’t think it’s going to work.” This was said a few months ago. OpenAlliance now has 26 members, so at least from a popularity standpoint, it’s working; but I agree with the sentiment, and the long-term lack of viability.

I’m not having conniptions over Woogle. Who cares in the end about who owns the mall, as long as you can shop there. But this increasingly feels like the mall’s security guards are keeping my wallet and hand it over to me every time I go shopping.

The only way to make sure you and I own our data is to have real open standards backed by companies, gov agencies, and the public – not the oxymoron that brings together the words “Open” and “Google”.

The battle for social data standards has started

pierreloic — Sat, 10 May 2008 18:00:52 +0000

Traackr has been on the forefront of advocating for the standardization of users’ social data – see our article from a few weeks ago about this.

The calls for standardization have gotten a lot of traction this week, starting with MySpace announcing on Thursday they will join the DataPortability project and partner with eBay, Yahoo, and Twitter to share user social data. The next day, Facebook and Digg announce a partnership of their own. Monday, Google will launch of “Friends connect”.

The battle for social data standards has started and the Traackr team couldn’t be happier. Whether Google, Facebook or MySpace manage to impose their standard, or even if we are left with 3 different standards (compared to no standards today), the real winner of this battle has already emerged: the user.

As for Traackr, we have been spending too much time up to this point to collect data in any way shape or form it was made available by the provider, and to normalize the data. As soon as some of these standards become real, we’ll be able to focus more time and attention where it is needed: give the data meaning for our users.

So kudos to Facebook, Twitter, Digg, MySpace, eBay, and Google. Keep on the good fight!

Special note to our friends at LinkedIn: were you serious when you asked us to mail (with a stamp and all) you a request to participate in your Private Beta API? Read this post: the train is leaving the station and you’re not on it…