Google researcher Paul Adams explains in the slide show created for Google execs below, that those considering a product are more apt to trust their friends than strangers – or search ads.
Do you think Facebook or Google is more trustworthy when it comes to buying a new pair of shoes? Toaster? Golf clubs? Clothes? How about your next car?
This is VERY important in the context of a Google Me launch sometime soon.
Also with the coming The Social Network movie possibly portraying Mark Zuckerberg very negatively, how will this impact Facebook.
Still, we think this is instructive for people wondering why Google wants to get in the social network business.
Watch the slide show in Full Screen or you can’t read the captions, it’s on the left under menu below.
Here is where the supposed Facebook friend recommendation model does not work for me.
- I ask my friends for product recommendations.
- Then I use Google to find the nearest location and best price.
That is where the whole thing starts to fall apart. Paul, it is nothing new that we ask our friends for quality recommendations on products. But Facebook drops the ball because I DO NOT want to use Bing as Facebook’s search provider.
So, no matter where I get the recommendations, at happy hour or on Facebook, I am off to Google for a local search or a best price search on the web. Your theory is sound Paul, but Facebook lacks search and Google lacks a Facebook style wall site.
Not to mention Facebook does not offer contextual ads, but Bing does, so we could well see them soon on Facebook.
Who ever puts all three of these pieces together first, conversations, ads for products in those conversations and context ads for those same products, could well win this social war of Facebook VS Google.
What do you think? Tell us in the comments below!





