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Google to use Gmail to challenge Facebook Google will today announce some big changes to its social media strategy. It is believed these will include changes to Gmail that will allow users to post messages in a similar way to Twitter or Facebook.
That social media sites Facebook and Twitter have a huge potential for advertising in the future will not have gone unnoticed at Mountain View, CA.
Google recently announced that its only social success to date; YouTube, has started to make a profit. Google bought the already successful but loss making YouTube in 2006, and has steadily increased the amount of advertising on the site since.
Google has numerous products that have some form of social aspect to them. Reader, Calendar, Bookmarks and others all encourage sharing, there is a full social network site in Orkut, Google Profiles links in well with Wave the much maligned collaboration tool. Then let's not forget SideWiki which allows users to leave messages on any site via a browser add-on.
The problem that Google has had is that these products have been too disparate. There hasn't been a single combining element that has allowed all the best features to appear in one single interface in a way that could compete with Facebook. It sounds like Google is attempting to make up for lost time now.
Before a speculative guess at what Google may be announcing today, it is worth pointing out that both Microsoft and Yahoo! have already attempted to introduce social features to their mail services. Neither attempt has been particularly well thought out or successful.
Google is less likely to go down the same route as the other big payers, or at least if they do go down the same route, they'll go much further.
Linking up Gmail and Profiles is the obvious first step and adding additional social functionality to Profiles would be a simple second but in order to really make things work, it'll have to do something extra that Facebook or Twitter doesn't already do. That's the tricky part and one even Google doesn't always get right. See Google Wave as an example.
Expect something with status updates today, linking up two or three Google properties but don't expect too much functionality straight away. Google's normal modus operandi is to launch, test the water and add more as time goes on.
Alongside most industries, the advertising industry has been in a recession. However, industry experts are expecting it to come out of recession by the end of the third quarter in 2010, according to newly released figures from the Advertising Association and research company Warc.
According to the figures, advertising spend is expected to return to growth with spending expected to rise by around 2.8 per cent.
The advertising industry has been in recession since Q2 in 2008 and - if it returns to growth in Q3 of this year - it will have endured nine negative quarters.
Although the industry fell into a decline, two sectors saw growth during Q3 of last year, internet advertising and cinema advertising.
Internet advertising rose by 4.2 per cent year on year while spending on cinema advertising increased by a massive 10.2 per cent year on year.
Even though cinema spend rose, it wasn't all good news for the entertainment industries - TV advertising revenue fell by 12 per cent during the quarter, with radio following close behind.
However the sector to get hurt the most was press, with advertising spend falling by 21 per cent year on year. It is thought that the decline of the press is directly related to the growth of the internet, with more and more advertisers taking advantage of the expanding online advertising market.
Rufus Olins, chief executive of Warc, said, "There is clear evidence that the UK 's worst media recession in three decades was bottoming out by autumn 2009, and prospects for a return to growth in ad spend later this year are now good. However, as recent UK economic data has shown, the recovery is still fragile."
Facebook drives mobile web boost A new study has revealed that Facebook is leading the way when it comes to mobile web use, with the social networking site gathering more hits on the go than search king Google.
The GSMA Mobile Media Metrics report provides insight into mobile web use, and its first findings, released on Friday, revealed that Facebook was leading the way, with five million unique users accessing the site from mobile devices. Google was hot on its heels however, with 4.5 million users accessing its various sites.
According to the report, around 16 million people - more than 25 per cent of the UK's population - were using their phones to surf the web in December 2009. This increasing number could have something to do with the fact that one fifth of UK mobile subscribers are the proud owners of smartphones. However, the way in which the general public has chosen to put their high-powered pocket organisers to use may be a shock to some.
Facebook also topped the charts when it came to the number of minutes spent on the site:
The report was undertaken with comScore as well as operators O2, Vodafone, Orange, T-Mobile and 3UK. It was based on anonymised, census-level data for mobile Internet usage across a number of mobile networks. This was then augmented with demographic data that has been collected with the consent of a representative sample of mobile Internet users.
One thing is certainly clear from the results; Facebook has stolen the heart - and time - of the UK's mobile users. Maybe they're finding the answers to all of their questions on the social networking site? Or maybe making and keeping friends is more important than ever, now that the internet is ever-present.
Facebook signs new ad deal with Microsoft Social networking giant Facebook has signed a new advertising deal with Microsoft to regain control of its display ads and integrate Bing more fully into the site's search engine.
Smart Company reports that Microsoft will continue to sell text-based search ads on the social networking site, but the decision was made to replace Microsoft's banner ads with Facebook's own as these were felt to integrate better into the site's culture. Facebook's banner ads target users based on information in their personal profiles, and the company stated that this move will provide better value to its nearly 400 million users.
Facebook stated: "Ad formats that feature social actions perform better and provide a better user experience since they are more consistent with the look and feel of Facebook.
"This combination of targeting and social relevance is the primary driver behind the shift in strategy."
The original advertising deal between the companies lasted until 2011, but has been halted early and will see Microsoft's banner ads being taken down over the next month. Microsoft will instead re-focus its efforts on powering Facebook's search function with its Bing search engine.
Facebook explained: "Bing will continue to exclusively power the web search results on Facebook. This change will also enable Microsoft to continue its focus on driving strong performing campaigns across our own social media and communications tools, including Windows Live Messenger and Hotmail, and via rich content environments across MSN and Xbox Live."
No financial details of this changed partnership have been revealed, but analysts believe that some financial element will be included, as the social networking giant has recently put more emphasis on its internal figures. Microsoft became a Facebook shareholder in 2007 after paying $240 million (approx £154 million) for a 1.6 per cent stake.
Does Google's Super Bowl Ad raise awkward questions for YouTube? When the CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, used Twitter to suggest that "Hell has indeed frozen over", speculation began that Google was about to do something it's never done before - run an ad. In fact, Eric pointed our attention directly at the Super Bowl.
Sure enough; Google ran its first ever TV ad during the Super Bowl.
There's no doubt. It's a very Google ad. It's simple but effective and showcases the power of Google's Universal Search solution.
This morning, many popular blogs are displaying the ad as a video embed. The ability to let bloggers display YouTube videos was one of the keys to the video sharing site's success. It's great social media.
But what about search? This morning this writer fired up YouTube and started searching for the video. Search terms like "Google super bowl ad" turned up nothing. In fact, Google's chosen to title the 52-second long video ad "Parisian Love" rather than something more topical.
Now, just a few hours later, the same search produces parodies and copies but does not point to the original.
The problem is not that YouTube's own search function can be slow and awkward at times. The problem is that users don't always search for videos using keywords the advertiser/video producer expected - although, surely, in this case Google might well have thought to use "This was Google's Super Bowl ad" in the video's description.
One of the likely reasons the phrase does not appear in Parisian Love's description is that the video was originally uploaded to YouTube on the 19th of November in 2009.
YouTube didn't really give Google an easy way to reinforce the old video's very important and very real time connection to the Super Bowl ad. In today's advertising world, where ad buyers are increasingly looking at ways to use YouTube to maximise value from video productions, this is a problem.
Does Google's Super Bowl Ad raise awkward questions for YouTube?
A new study has revealed that Facebook is leading the way when it comes to mobile web use, with the social networking site gathering more hits on the go than search king 
Social networking giant Facebook has signed a new advertising deal with Microsoft to regain control of its display ads and integrate Bing more fully into the site's 
