Yesterday, Google released a major update to its search engine and drew the collective ire of the Internet. Dubbed “Search, plus Your World,” the change personalizes search results for people who are signed into their Google accounts. According to Google,
“Search has always brought you information from across the web. Now, search gets better by including photos, posts, and more from you and your friends. When signed in with Google+, you’ll find personal results and profiles of people you know or follow. You can even expand your world by discovering people related to your search.”
Oh, the humanity! Critics have expressed hyperbolic alarm at the move, with many framing the release not only as an anti-competitive move with potential antitrust implications, but also as step towards aggravating non-techie, everyday users of Google’s search engine. Competitors such as Twitter even piled on with fake outrage, ostensibly in defense of individual privacy.
U.S. Mobile Apps vs. Web Consumption, Mins/Day
Yes, this is a big change, and Twitter (among others) has reason to fear the move (read: $$). But the bottom line is that Google desperately needs to counter the rise of social networks as competing destinations for ad spending. And don’t even mention Google’s paranoia regarding the likely release of a competing search product from Facebook.
So I ask, People of the Internet, with your brilliant strategic minds and obvious business acumen, what would you have Google do instead?
Would you have tried to make more money with traditional website display ads, relying on the good ol’ web to stave off the rise of mobile apps?
Oops. It seems like that wouldn’t be a good plan (Consult the chart from Flurry above).
Would you have advised Google to focus its efforts — and future profitability — on serving up ads within text-based mobile search results?
Oops. You mean you forgot about the imminent threat from Siri (And Kinect, and all inevitable clones of the two across all mobile platforms)?
OS Share of Smartphone Sales (click for source)
Would you have told Google to leverage the unchecked rise of Android?
Oops. You mean Android actually lost 13 percentage points of U.S. smartphone market share last month, while iOS gained 17%?
So go ahead, dear Brilliant Business Strategists of the Internet, who obviously have an amazing alternative strategic plan up your collective sleeve, lend us your keen insights and sage business advice.
I’ll wait here.
I’m taking a timeout from Uptick Sports. There. I said it.
Over the past two years, this personal side project of mine — an NFL fantasy football stock market — has totaled over 6.2 billion shares of stock traded. Trading volume increased by 188% in 2010 to 4.6 billion shares, up from 1.6 billion shares the prior year. What mattered more to me than the growth, however, was the fun that I had connecting with people who share my passion for fantasy football.
The Empire Badge will have to wait.
When the 2010 season ended, I felt energized, and I set about designing improvements to the stock market. I created a set of badges that traders could unlock through specific achievements, in order to add an additional game layer to the stock market experience. I also began work on an improved user interface, and collected bids for iPhone and Android apps in order to provide a more mobile-friendly trading platform.
But the NFL lockout that followed last season diverted my attention away from the process of making improvements to the Uptick Sports website. During that time, I also started a new role that I really love. I’m passionate about the digital strategy work that I do now, and I find that the line between personal and professional time is increasingly blurred. I simply enjoy spending my free time doing research and work related to my career instead of programming new stock market functionality and keeping track of NFL roster changes.
So, while it’s tough for me to come to the conclusion that a timeout is, in fact, necessary, I’m taking one. Uptick Sports will most likely make a comeback, however, in a form that provides a better user experience on mobile devices. It just won’t happen this year.
In the meantime, I’d like to thank the traders that have made managing Uptick Sports so enjoyable. It’s because of your insights — through both your trades and your interactions — that I’ve had more fun than usual with fantasy football over the past two years. Let’s stay connected! I’m always willing to join a new league, so hit me up with an invitation if you’re in need of an extra league manager. Just be forewarned that I may have to employ Zaarly to find someone to sit in on a live draft.
As some of you may know, I have recently moved into a new position. It’s a role that I’ve wanted for a long time, and I worked hard to land it.
So while I’m thrilled to be following my passion now, I’m learning that there are a lot of emotions that come with leading digital (and by extension social media) strategy for a large, resource-constrained organization. If your career path takes you in this direction, then you’ll probably experience these same feelings.
You’ll likely feel excitement (more than any other time in your career), anxiety (it’s natural to get butterflies when you start something new and care deeply about delivering value) and jubilation (over the opportunities in front of you).
What About… Solitude?
Probably so. You see, while there a number of very important and well-defined social media jobs, many organizations simply don’t have either the budget or the proof of value to fill these roles. They may not yet have a team dedicated to manning a social media listening center, for example, and it may be difficult to find enough budget to staff up with community managers, content planners, digital project managers, copywriters, etc.
Image credit: Thaliapap
As you can see, you might have to wear a lot of hats as a digital/social strategy leader. And if you’re the type of person who loves the social aspect as much as (or more than) the business aspect of digital strategy (Gasp!), then that can be a sobering prospect.
Getting Social… IRL
The good news is that if you look around, you’ll inevitably find incredibly smart and talented people who care deeply about driving successful business outcomes: talented designers, functional business leaders, technical experts, agency teammates… and so on. Your task will be to outline the value of an integrated digital strategy that spans social media, mobile technologies, websites and other digital pillars in order to rally these teammates around important initiatives.
Consequently, the path to success in your new leadership role, when resources are constrained, depends upon a few critical behaviors:
- Collaboration: After all, it’s called social media for a reason, right? Find the right partners in your organization — whether they’re peers, agency team members or executive leaders — and find out how you can enable mutual success via digital and social initiatives. You’ll be surprised at how quickly this will accelerate the traction of your digital strategy.
- Communication: Get out in front of stakeholders to communicate how digital technologies align with your organization’s business goals. Illustrate how all of your projects start out with business outcomes in mind — increased revenues, reduced costs, improved customer service — and the value of your work will be evident immediately.
- Education: It’s no coincidence that organizations such as Intel and Dell, which have mature, scalable organizational models for supporting social media and social marketing have formal learning programs in place to support these efforts. Developing a foundation similar in nature to Intel’s Digital IQ program will require you to form cross-functional partnerships and better understand how social media and other digital initiatives can deliver value across your organization.
There are more keys to success, of course. But the behaviors that I’ve noted above are critical in the early days of a new role leading digital (and/or social media) strategy, especially when you’ll need to engage a large number of stakeholders to build momentum for your efforts. They’re certainly working for me.
In Summary
You can’t do it alone, and even if you could, you shouldn’t try. So let me wrap up with a with a tune that is not going to become my theme song. It shouldn’t become yours either. Give it a spin and enjoy.
