Cross-posted from the Adfero Group blog
With the quick popularity of Google+ (G+), many social media gurus are proclaiming the slow but sure downfall of Facebook. To that, I say one thing: not going to happen. Here’s why:
1. Too little, too late
In a very rare and embarrassing moment (and for what feels like the first time), Google made a really big deal about a really bad product. Google Buzz was a complete failure on multiple fronts. From privacy lawsuits to simply bad aesthetics, Google’s seemingly invincible persona suffered a breach in its armor with a subpar product that was clearly a reactive idea in contrast to their usual forward-thinking, proactive approach – and people noticed. The best team in the league showed a weakness, other teams capitalized on it, and now they’re playing catch up, with Facebook remaining the “face” (pun intended) and authority on social networking.
2. Live by minimal, die by minimal
One of the biggest praises for G+ so far has been its clean, minimal design. On the flip side of that, Google plans to continue to add features, bells, whistles, and widgets. Yet for some reason, the public seems to think that they can request more functionality without any impact to the layout. Facebook has suffered from the same symptoms with the addition of chat windows, friend lists, and important vs. unimportant news feed posts. The difference is users, myself included, have already established Facebook as a part of our everyday lives. So even when new features were added that we don’t like, we were stuck. With Google+, users have absolutely no reason to defect from Facebook when the difference between the two isn’t all that drastic.
3. It’s not how the real world works
Google+ is about circles. You put your going-out buddies in a circle so you can share embarassing drinking snapshots. You put your coworkers in a separate circle so they can’t see anything but industry-related sharing. All your circles are comprised of people you know, and the people you don’t know get their own circle… with whom you never share… ever. There’s only one problem with this social architecture: the world is one BIG circle.
One of my biggest praises of Facebook is the way it sparks conversations. Let’s say a girl you went to college with posts a status saying “I need a new allergy medicine…” and you comment with a suggestion. Shortly after, another girl whom you’ve never met or heard of before, leaves a comment informing you that she used to used that medicine but there was a news story about it not being safe. Now there’s an informational dialogue going on between you and someone you’ve never met. Next week, you both end up commenting on that mutual friend’s status again. And again. At this point, you might as well friend her, right? A few months later, your new Facebook friend is visiting your mutual friend for the weekend and suggests you all go out for drinks. A new thread has been added to your social network similarly to the way it would have if the same conversation came up in a bar.
The way Google+ presents itself will make it very hard to expand social networks. Sooner or later, that will get old and they will have to think of something else. However, that “something else” will take away from the heavily praised white space, generating more criticism. That, along with us assuming, of course, that Facebook hasn’t already implemented it renders G+, again, as a follower – not a leader.
