Will google die????

tomED

There is a sense of dismay in the only marketing world because of Google. It's current dance (updating of its index) has gone on for nearly two months now. Google have publicly annoced that they had problems with they tried to implement their new alog and admit that they can't see these problems being rectified until mid/end of june.

What I have noticed though... its not only Search Engine optimisers that are feelin this.... it seems to have filtered through to ordinary search users who are finding it increasingly hard to find good results when searching in google. In fact I hear that people are starting to turn away from google and opt for www.alltheweb.com

I personally believe once google have sorted out this mess it will be better than before, but what does everyone else think?

Seth Brundle

still seems to work fine for me

fisty

no problems here.
Google is still my baby.

jmcc

Originally posted by tomED

I personally believe once google have sorted out this mess it will be better than before, but what does everyone else think?

Yes Google will eventually die. It will take some time but I think that its recent pattern of acquisitions shows that it is trying to become more than just a search engine. It is also positioning itself for the big battle between itself, Microsoft and Yahoo.

And there is always the probability that someone is working on a Googlekiller application.

Regards...jmcc

tomED

Fair point - type of response I was looking for !!!

I think people have forgotten that last year Yahoo was still the most used search engine!

2 years ago google was only really starting to catch on.

any other thoughts?

PS just before everyone tells me google has been around for years... I mean to a global and general public audience!

dahamsta

The only people I've seen complaining about Google of late are optimisers, who I don't care about anyway. Sure, their index is a little off the last month or so, but it's hardly making the baby jesus cry.

As JMCC said, yes, Google will die some day. Everything dies.

adam

tomED

LOL.

optimisers are complaingin a hell of a lot!! I find it soo funny, I love when a search engine changes its alog, means I can have fun trying to find out a new way of getting better reults, keeps me interested in the job! (how sad am i?)

Floating around different boards and listening to my clients is where I got the feedback questioning about google and people saying they have heard of this site and that site thats better.

Im not saying that there is a mass exodus from google, its just that I am starting to see it affect joe soaps and it just reminds me of the demise of Yahoo. That started like this too!

PAPILLION

Not wanting to call it a yahoo beater but go back 5 years and yahoo would be the default search homepage. but now every1 googles it. I stand to be corrected but as far as i've seen, it has succeeded where the likes of ask jeeves and altavista have not.

getting back to the point, I have found a lack of quality in some serches but it is still my search engine of choice.

Perhaps it is going to try and expand to much, stick to being the best search engine, I don't think people will flock from yahoo or hotmail for example (having said that i am getting annoyed with hotmail, for example it's lack of space and quick to terminate accounts kind of attitude, compared to the likes of online.ie, i know however they have more accounts to deal with so are justified.)

so trying to have email and various other thingas might spell a turn for the worst.

peterd

Onestats last report gives figures to prove that google useage is still on the increase. Nothing can/will change overnight, so google will be no.1 for a while to come. It'll be interesting to see who will topple them though.

I personally love to try alltheweb now and then, but it's not well known, and is not a popular search engine by a long shot.

TBH, it doesn't affect joe soaps. They will use whatever has been sitting on their home page for the last 3 years. Whether it be google, yahoo, msn, or ... eircom.net

tomED

Originally posted by peterd
[BTBH, it doesn't affect joe soaps. They will use whatever has been sitting on their home page for the last 3 years. Whether it be google, yahoo, msn, or ... eircom.net [/B]

Thats a bit of a flippant statement - then how has google risen to its current status?

Are you saying that joe soaps hasnt affected its rise to the top at all?

I think you are under estimating the skills of the ordinary user. Once people hear of a better way to search for something they will go and find out where it is

jmcc

Originally posted by peterd
Onestats last report gives figures to prove that google useage is still on the increase.

One of the big reasons for this market share is Google's feed to other search engines.

TBH, it doesn't affect joe soaps. They will use whatever has been sitting on their home page for the last 3 years. Whether it be google, yahoo, msn, or ... eircom.net

What the more cynical among us would call the 'click and drool' interface. Though the default page on the branded browser is the sole reason for traffic on a lot of the ISP index pages.

Regards...jmcc

jmcc

Originally posted by tomED
I think you are under estimating the skills of the ordinary user. Once people hear of a better way to search for something they will go and find out where it is

Google's marketing is very effective. Though as in the book 'The Tipping Point', the whole maven-connector-salesman chain is very apparent. The mavens are effectively the search engine experts. The connectors are the people who know other people (eg the people who get it noticed in magazines and usergroups, and forums) and the salesmen - isn't that one obvious? )

Regards...jmcc

tomED

ah cmon - not everything is as black and white as that.

I wouldnt just tell someone about google because i saw it posted on a board.

I would only recommend something if it was good. Yes I would have had to heard from it somewhere before that obviuosly - but word of mouth is a more powerful tool than any form of marketing.

googles success is entirely down to its service - not its marketing.

Capt'n Midnight

I've moved away from other search engines 'cos there is too much marketing disguised as search results....

Marketing is what pays for search engines and by highlighting the adds - it makes both google and the companies advertising reputable - unlike most other serach engines...

jmcc

Originally posted by tomED
ah cmon - not everything is as black and white as that. %<snip>%

but word of mouth is a more powerful tool than any form of marketing.

googles success is entirely down to its service - not its marketing.

<cynical editor mode>
Word of mouth is the most effective form of marketing. The trick is in convincing the punter that he has free will while leading him by the nose.
</cynical editor mode>

Regards...jmcc

davej

Interesting article here, ironically on a blog.

PageRank is Dead.

http://jeremy.zawodny.com/blog/archives/000751.html

davej

tomED

thats a good read....

manonthemoon

Interesting post

INHO,

Google will remain the KING. Ordinary users will in the main not recognise the upheavels in Google as the vast majority of rankings remain pretty much the same.

Word has it that by Mid June all will be resolved. Rumours include that spammy results are being downgraded, but at present these are not being shown.

Another rumour is putting singular and plural results together. I wouldnt understand that one though.

My only problem is that at this time Google does not seam to be updating recent changes to my sites. Hey, but what are ye gonna do.

Just have to wait. I forsee, that Google will be as strong as ever. Remember that Google has regulations on how it ranks the relevancy of certain websites to search terms. It wouldnt make sense to change their regulations.

The great search engine war may be about to begin.

Google is merely gathering its forces together for the great battle against the evil forces of Yahoo! & Inktomi

May the algorithim be with you!

tomED

Originally posted by manonthemoon
My only problem is that at this time Google does not seam to be updating recent changes to my sites.

This is because when google attempted to implement their new alog last weeek, they had major problems. They seem to have lost all their backlink data and are running of old backups. Once your backlinks have been restored your website will be crawled again. This is what they say will be all fixed by mid/end june.

Another rumour is putting singular and plural results together. I wouldnt understand that one though.

WOW - I hadn't heard that one!!! That will knock huge amounts of sites from the index!!! Do you have any links of where you heard this?

Thanks!

manonthemoon

The milkman told me, but he is full of s***!

tomED

LOL

mneylon

Maybe Google will not remain King, but it is certainly going to maintain a top position.
If you compare it to the competitors you can see it's strengths:
1. It loads fast regardless of your connection speed
2. It does not return pages of repeated results alla Altavista
3. Even smaller companies etc. can be listed, so you get a better choice while searching - unlike Yahoo's main directory
4. It's minimalist interface gives you direct access without confusing you

If you want to get other types of information you can always use other portals such as Yahoo, but if it's pure information you need then Google remains the best option

Back in '94 -'95 things were very different and Google didn't exist. Search engines like Altavista worked well and directories like Yahoo were relevant
Nearly a decade later the scenery has changed quite dramatically. No longer is text driven content the King - other document types are more and more prevalent (Do you remember Gopherspace?).
Maybe Joe Soap might find some search results unhelpful, but the same Joe Soap probably doesn't know how to wrench the full power from their current software and may not have even upgraded the browser yet.
In many situations I would advise people to never underestimate the punter, but when it comes to certain areas I find the converse to be true.

tomED

wow theres a blast from the past....... Gopherspace

Wouldn't it be great if the discovery channel covered things like this and spectrum 48k's etc lol.....

maybe they do............... or maybe even the mention of such a thing shows how geeky i am.... ah well...... i enjoy it

JJSolutions

Another search engine I use is http://www.teoma.com/

it seems to be more accurate than google (sometimes:) but i guess if ya give it a few years its index will get messed up too


any one else using it?

Capt'n Midnight

yeah right..

Put in the word "price" told it to only look in EUROPE
Most of the results were US... full of $'s

I want a search engine where I can put in one or more currency symbols with a + or - (Yeah I told it +€ -$ , no difference)

Anyone know one ?

Am just so sick of sifting through US commercial sites when just looking for information or local prices. (and portals are not that good at non-commerical stuff)

tomED

There's a lot of talk of this other new one....

www.turbo10.com

But im not a keen on it - but some people may be!