Coop's Corner

Adweek is hyperventilating about the results of a new Forrester Research report, leading with the headline, "There's Still Room for Google Killers, study says."

Actually, it says no such thing. If you don't believe me, check with the analyst who wrote the report. (I did.)

"Yeah, I'm definitely not trying to say that the 'nascent search field is wide open,'" Shar VanBoskirk told me in an e-mail. "I do agree that the search field is young and still growing, but Google has a far, far lead over others, in terms of both consumer search use and search-advertising spend."

(Credit: Forrester Research)

The point of her research was to demonstrate to marketers that they should be advertising on more than just Google and that they can actually target specific users on different types of search engines, she added.

Fair enough, but that's a world removed from what Adweek reports.

Not surprisingly, Google is quite content with the impression being left on a too easily impressed press. Little wonder about that. The last thing the search giant wants is anything that fosters the impression of a so-called Google monoculture on the Internet. Last Saturday's malware glitch, however brief, only fed into the meme that Google's too big and pervasive.

Not that Google expects antitrust headaches. CEO Eric Schmidt, who informally counseled Barack Obama on tech policy, also was on the presidential transitional advisory board prior to Inauguration Day.

Besides, from a technology perspective, what's the cost of switching from one Internet browser to another? Google has also made it relatively painless to port data to rival services. But with a new administration looking for dragons to slay, who needs conspiracy theorists taking to the cyberbarricades, screaming about monopoly power? So it is that Google must have especially welcomed the Adweek (mis)report.

VanBoskirk's larger point about the fickleness of search loyalty is correct. Other sites may be better at finding certain things. However, she is not claiming that Google's domination of U.S. Internet search is in imminent trouble. Here's what she actually concluded:

• Consumers are still not loyal to a single engine. But Google still enjoys the most exclusivity--20 percent of all searchers use only Google on a weekly basis.
• Google's lead has grown from 41 percent three years ago to 59 percent.
• Twenty-one percent of consumers use Yahoo as their primary search engine. But consider this: while 53 percent of consumers who set Yahoo as their home page most frequently select Yahoo for search, 91 percent of consumers who set Google as their home page most frequently use Google for search.
• MSN remains a distant No. 3, with 3 percent of consumers using the service as their primary search engine.

Draw your own conclusion from the evidence. But "Google killers?" I don't think so.

If you're Eric Schmidt, you have to pray that Google is not going to need to hire an out-of-work comedian when it turns 30.

Happy birthday? You better believe it, pal.

Of course, Google has another couple of decades before reaching that milestone. By then, Schmidt will be kicking it in the Bahamas (or wherever it is that gazillionaires spend their golden, um, in this case, platinum years.)

It's been awhile, but I'm quite sure I did not write a piece marking the cosmic significance of Microsoft when it reached 10. (And I'm not going to bore you by writing about the metaphysical meaning of Google at 10, either. Here's the BBC report. )

Besides, there was a reason why Microsoft at 10 was hardly worthy of much note at the time. In 1988, you could have declared Microsoft to have been first among equals, though not much more than that. Yes, the company was growing fat and happy thanks to the incredible money machine that was DOS. And of course, each time a PC went out the door, Bill Gates and Co. received a royalty payment.

But Microsoft also had to contend with the likes of Lotus Development Corp., as well as WordPerfect, Borland, Ashton-Tate, Novell, and others. We know how the story ended. There were myriad reasons why history turned out the way it did--too many to recount in this space. But it's important to recall the way the computer industry's history actually unfolded. Microsoft's dominance wasn't guaranteed and the company had to claw its way to the top of the heap.

Schmidt knows this narrative through first-hand experience. He also knows that Google at 10 occupies a stronger position than did Microsoft at a similar point in its history. Neither Microsoft nor Yahoo have found a way to upend the search business. So that leaves the economy and the likelihood of a Martian invasion as Google's two biggest potential challenges. Can't do anything about the economy, though one has to believe (hope?) that the current meltdown eventually stops. As for the Martians, not to worry: California can call Schwarzenegger.

As for Google at 10, who cares? The better story is Google at 20. If past is prologue, that's going to be something to behold.

Michael Arrington has an interesting post today on TechCrunch in which he predicts that Microsoft Live Search Cashback will have a material impact on Microsoft's share of the search market. It's worth a read but Microsoft will still have to scale a few mountains before this becomes a smash success.

I suppose Microsoft will get some initial lift from the news, but the PR glow will ebb. Seriously, how many of you really plan to use Microsoft search in hopes of making a buck? At some point, the offering will be judged on its comprehensiveness and that's a comparison Google welcomes. I experienced much the same sense of frustration using the service as did SearchEngineLand's Danny Sullivan. His conclusion: "this is far from ready as the big game changer that Microsoft is hoping it will be."

Some people surely will accept a more limited selection in return for a few dollars in their pockets. Still, you don't find many examples where companies made out by paying customers to use their products. It's been tried. For example, Buy.com once purposely lost money on what it sold through what the company termed a "zero product margin" strategy. The idea was to sell advertising to compensate for any lost revenue. Needless to say, that's not how the company operates any longer--and for good reason. (By the way, Henry Blodget did a back-of-the-envelope analysis and concluded that Microsoft "generates no revenue from cashback." I know Bill Gates is big on philanthropy, but Microsoft shareholders are pursuing a decidedly different agenda.)

If any of this created a tidal wave of interest, Microsoft obviously would try to devise ways to monetize the offer. But first users are going to need to master the unnaturally geeky approach Microsoft adopted in building the "Live" franchise. I'm not bashing the products. Truth be told, I think Microsoft's done a good job with the individual properties. I'm just puzzled by the pastiche of forgettable and confusing URLs it's collected around the Live brand.

Last month, Microsoft tweaked things slightly--again--so that users can now access their Live.com personalized page by signing in with a Windows Live ID. Fine, but it's still a marketing nightmare. When I'm in a hurry, it's just a lot easier remembering Google.com.

So the news is leaking out fast: Microsoft plans to lure users by dangling cash rebates to people who buy stuff using the company's search. Will it work? At this point, I suppose it can't hurt--though no doubt Microsoft is leaving itself open to being ridiculed as a Delancey Street hondler.

Arnold Zafra over at Search Engine Journal wrote that he "cringed" when he heard about the news. Ouch.

A couple of thoughts:

This isn't the first time that Microsoft has tried something like this. As CNET News.com's Ina Fried noted Wednesday:

It has run a number of programs including its Live Search Club that offer rewards for those that use its search. The Live Search Club effort briefly boosted Microsoft's search market share last year, but the gains have proved short lived. Microsoft has been losing ground since then and has returned to a single digit share of the market.

But truth be told, it's not the worst idea. What's the harm in giving it a shot? In a recession--or whatever you want to call the current economic malaise in the United States--consumers are open to bribes (oh, I forgot: rebates). So why not see if this strikes the people's fancy? But this is only a holding action. The reason more people use Google's search is the user experience. It works better, so they keep returning. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer knows this. That's why he still thinks making a move for some of Yahoo's assets makes sense. He's anxious about staying pat with Microsoft's current search hand and wants to fix things, either through developing technology internally or buying it on the open market.

No way this is the final word.

Over the years, Microsoft has taken different approaches to offering online support. Some of you may remember Microsoft Bob, a bizarre software desktop replacement whose personal guides were supposed to offer personalized help.

Unfortunately for Microsoft, the product went nowhere and is now better-known as the answer to the trivia question, "What was Melinda French's claim to product fame?" (Of course, Melinda French later went on to fame and fortune as Mrs. Melinda Gates.)

Most computer users are more familiar with the Clippy, the office assistant Microsoft put into Office 97 that offered advice to user queries. The feature was subsequently panned by Smithsonian magazine as "one of the worst software design blunders in the annals of computing."

(Credit: Microsoft)

But Microsoft is now about to take another stab by rolling out an updated natural language search tool it acquired when it bought Colloquis in 2006. The company this week is giving private demonstrations of Automated Service Agent, or ASA, a hosted online customer service technology, which makes its official debut next month.

Microsoft envisions ASA as a tool companies will deploy to help reduce costs associated with call centers or internal help desks. The way it would work, a user engages in a chat-type session asking questions in conversational English. The system then would tap into a knowledge base to find the most fitting answer.

"We see this as offering a lot of advantages over FAQs or keyword searches," said Clinton Dickey, director of Microsoft's Automated Service Agents. "When you have an FAQ, a customer still has to go through the a long list of possibilities to get the answer--if they get it at all. We see this as driving self-service on the Web where ASA can provide very particular answers. The beauty of ASA is that it can ask questions in natural ways and will link answers from a knowledge base that expands over time."

Among other things, Microsoft asserts that:

• ASA will offer direct answers to even the most technical questions.
• The service will be available 24/7.
• Microsoft's Knowledge Modules will include terms and phrases germane to different industry niches.
• ASAs can serve as a training tool for new employees or for retraining existing staff.

At this point--and for the foreseeable future--Dickey said Microsoft does not intend to use ASA's technology in a consumer search application. That's likely the smart move. Routine in-house questions that go unanswered waste time and money. Any technology provider that can reduce costs at call centers or other internal support centers will find no shortage of takers among the corporate set.