It’s not Pacquiao vs Mayweather, but its the still the fight everyone is begging to see.

For being the most dominant web heavyweight over the past ten years, few companies have as many resounding failures as Google.  With every success the company’s experimentation friendly environment (many engineers are given one day out of the work week to dedicate to individual development projects) has created have come equally brutal misfires.  This is the very reason behind the cautious skepticism regarding the explosive rumors that Google is once again making a push into social media..  But this time, allegedly, they mean it.  Rather than simply developing a social media side project a la Orkut of Buzz, word is that “Google Me” (a name that will surely change once Google actually acknowledges the project) is receiving engineering priority.

The hype for this struggle writes itself: One a grizzled veteran with title belts but its fair share of defeats.  The other a much hyped star coming off a improbable string of victories, and lately showing signs of weakness. But now that Google is apparently getting serious about this street fight with Facebook where will they draw the battle lines, and what can those outside of social media learn about positioning themselves on the web?  Will any holds be barred?

The immediate obstacle, one Google must be painfully aware of, is that people don’t just move social networks for quips and giggles.  Facebook is for your personal life.  LinkedIn for your professional.  Twitter is for trends and networking.  MySpace is for, in theory, Music and Movies.  Where exactly is Google expecting to fit in?  If we look at the decline of social media platforms past the reason for each exodus were pretty obvious.  Friendster: didn’t allow for the voyeurism/creeping anonymity people needed to really invest their time on other people’s profiles.  When users know who is viewing their page, shame leads to users that are less likely to explore others.  MySpace: users were given too much freedom regarding the layout of their pages leading to rampant lacks of continuity, site instability, and a generally seedy experience.  The MySpace experience quickly turned into the equivalent of clubbing in Tijuana during Spring Break. Although Facebook has a history of making seemingly unpopular updates to their policies and UI they seem to have in retrospect gone on a long streak of making all the right calls.  They have done this by both staying nimble to users needs while also knowing when to listen to their users needs.

If Facebook has a weakness right now it is obviously user privacy.  Nasty letters from the ACLU don’t usually make it on to most people’s refrigerators.  That said, privacy is probably the issue that Google is least trusted to deliver.  The issue of mobility between networks though is another area that Google could exploit. As Wired’s Ryan Singel suggested an approach that would allow users to “weave” their social network activity and data through open standards may be their gateway.  Think of HootSuite on steroids, lots of steroids.  The approach makes a lot of sense; rather than trying to approach from their weakness, they’d in theory approach from their strengths: integration.

One of the keys to Facebook’s early success was its use of previously existing, very strong networks as part of its launch.  By using universities they were able to immediately grab a very large body of computer using, young, upwardly mobile members.  Google will not have that advantage.  What they will have though is a large body of user information and a general web population who are familiar with what social media is.  For Google they have the tools to know where the networks exist, but will have to pool them together in a manner that feels as organic as possible.

The web has been absolutely abuzz with recommendations for Google Me.  Some have called for a near exact replication of Facebook. Others have warned against throwing all of Google’s others tools into the interface (Wave, Docs, etc…).  What may be the most difficult, yet also most important, operative goal is to just keep it simple.  Google’s recent projects have become so complex that they are difficult to even describe what they offer.  Its about time that Google got in touch with its inner start-up, to that simplicity that makes projects attractive to VCs.  If Google Me’s launch comes with a flurry of long winded and vague explanation videos it will surely fail. If it can be described clearly and succinctly in 30 seconds or less, it may just be a success.

With Hitwise releasing a report that social media in the UK now receives more traffic than search, and SWX Advanced’s session on “Ultimate Social Media-Tools,” generated a significant level of dialog regarding shifts in SEO and social media.   Although Hitwise’s reporting methods have generated some levels of controversy (the classification of YouTube as a social media outlet) their recent analysis does bring strong data to the long standing discourse regarding browsing behavior.  For many this shift has been regarded as a “when” rather than a “if.”  As such it is no surprise that we have recently encountered two interesting start-ups, still very much in the beta version, attempting to capitalize on the commercial implications of social media becoming the dominant portal for users on the web.

One of TechCrunch Disrupt’s Battlefield finalists, CompassLabs aims to provide that ever illusive element of social media: buyer intent.  CompassLabs’ algorithms crawl Tweets and Discussion Boards to find strings which signify that a user is looking to make a purchase.  Users who make posts with a high probability of purchasing intent then receive targeted ads directly from participating vendors.  While the success of the company will ultimately rely on the willingness of social media outlets to share user data (CompassLabs’ future with Twitter is in question, and the Golden Calf- Facebook- is still illusive) the concept alone is enough to generate some excitement.

Money may not buy you love, but when a campaign outspends its rival 25:1 and still falls behind, wasting money certainly will buy you anger and confusion.  No greater example of this can be found than in South Carolina’s recent Democratic Senate primary. Over a week after a stunning upset of Vic Rawl by the previously unknown Alvin Greene, political pundits are still attempting to understand how a man with over 20 years of public service experience lost to a unemployed man living in his father’s basement.  The numbers go against all logic.  Vic Rawl’s campaign had a budget of $250,000 to Alvin Greene’s ballot minimum of $10,400.  Rawl had a campaign team of 12 that employed almost every campaign device in the book.  Greene had himself and zero campaign expenditures outside of the cost of getting himself on the ballot.  Yet considering all of these factors, Greene captured 59% of the vote.  Obviously many have cried foul, hypothesizing conspiracies and deviant schemes.  Someone outside of the race has to be to blame for such an epic campaign failure, right?  Well, maybe not necessarily.  Regardless of the legitimacy of Alvin Greene’s campaign there are some incredibly useful marketing lessons to be learned by his improbable success.

Names Still Matter
An election results theory that was first cast off as a joke now stunningly seems to be gaining validity.  On Monday the first of perhaps many Greene voters publiclyadmitted that she voted for Greene simply because of how closely his name resembled soul singer Al Green.  Perhaps Vic Rawl would have fared better if his first name was Lou (a la jazz singer Lou Rawls) but instead his name appears much closer to “Sick Raw”, far from an appetizing candidate.  All things equal, people are going to make the choice with the most name recognition, relevant to the subject matter or not.  Selecting the right name for your business is a branding fundamental; if your name does not direct leads to a specific narrative they will supply the narrative for you, to your benefit or detriment.  It’s an element so many of us take for granted until events like the South Carolina primary suddenly remind us of their power.

Placement Still Matters
Although Greene was victorious by a massive 18 point margin, studies show that at least 2.3 of those percentage points can be directly attributed to the fact that his name was first on the ballot.  Case studies show that this differential increases when less money is involved with the campaign. It’s an element to the decision making process that seems so juvenile yet holds significant weight- preference goes to whoever the eye sees first.  It’s the very core behind launching an SEO campaign.  If anything the curious case of Alvin Greene shows the importance of aggressive SEO campaigns in very competitive markets.

So What?
Moving forward theories explaining the results of this election are bound to continue, but the marketing lessons to be learned from it are very simple.  When we consider that less than 30% of registered Democrats voted in the South Carolina primary, and the seemingly curious nature of the results, it is easy to see a very basic lack of engagement in the voting process.  In turn this should cause the business owner to ask if their marketing practices are actively engaging their potential customers.  Do we inspire our customers to care about the services we offer?  Are we then sufficiently fulfilling their needs?  Is our brand important enough to customers that they are willing to look for us even if we aren’t at the top of a list?  Are we inspiring our customers to be active consumers of our business, or are they engaged with us passively?  Without cogent and honest answers to these questions it is still very possible to lose, even if you are outspending the competition 25:1.

Looking for more on the mysterious Alvin Greene?  Check out this video

It has been almost two months since Steve Jobs first introduced Apple’s intentions of entering the mobile advertising market with the iPhone 4’s iAds application feature.  While at first viewed as part of the multi-pronged reaction to Google’s acquisition of AdMob (an acquisition the FTC explicitly says they recently approved based on Apple’s reactionary acquisition of Quattro), this should not be viewed as just another intriguing chapter in the once incestuous, now openly combative relationship between Google and Apple.  Jobs’ performance at Monday morning’s WWDC points to intriguing philosophy shifts in mobile advertising.  Shifts, yes, but not the dramatic, “game changing” shifts that Apple has built their brand on.

In declaring that “search on mobile isn’t happening” Jobs’ illustrates what many have observed: that mobile users essentially micro-search through the use of apps rather than using the traditional engines popularized by desktop and notebook users.  This clearly explains how Jobs was able to announce that iOS4 will offer Microsoft’s Bing as a search option not just comfortably, but with condescending praise.  That said, niche-based search found through apps clearly complicates most mobile SEO strategies, in particular when professionals lazily attempt to replicate standard web strategies on mobile platforms.

With apps becoming the strongest way to reach the mobile consumer–Jobs’ boasts the ability of iAds to reach 1 billion daily impressions–the seamless integration of ad and app is natural.  There is certainly much to be excited about iAd’s goal of providing the interactive and emotive elements of the ad space seamlessly within the application (”an application with the application”), rather than simply linking to an outside website.  But, any time we come across something announced as *new* it becomes important to consider what exactly is new about it.  Ironically, when considering descriptions of iAds they sound curiously familiar to many expandable java ads that allow users to experience the ad while staying within the website it is embedded in.

Are iAds “game changing” in and of themselves?  No, but the posturing of Apple and Google leading up to and after its July 1st release certainly will be.  Apple’s current $60 million in ad campaign commitments is still dwarfed by Google’s ad empire, but the often tangled relationship between these giants will naturally cause this to change moving forward.  That said, Jobs’ goal to create platforms to deliver ads with “emotion” and interactivity magnifies an element that many unsuccessful campaigns fail to properly employ: the need to weave a coherent and effective advertising narrative– something that does not inherently need “game changing” or “revolutionary” platform developments.

This week’s theme is: Juicy Sausage

That’s right; delicious links.  What makes a good link?  It has to taste exactly as you thought it would (relevant), have a flush casing (anchor text), and get those nice brown char marks on the grill (follow).

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SEO Strategy – Taking SEO Beyond the Typical Audit
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