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Why Amazon Is Google's Real Competition
New submitter wreakyhavoc writes "Nicholas Carlson at Business Insider maintains that Amazon's reviews and One-Click ordering will undercut Google's shopping ad revenue, and that Google is 'terrified.' From the article: 'Google is a search company, but the searches that it actually makes money from are the searches people do before they are about to buy something online. These commercial searches make up about 20 percent of total Google searches. Those searches are where the ads are. What Googlers worry about in private is a growing trend among consumers to skip Google altogether, and to just go ahead and search for the product they would like to buy on Amazon.com, or, on mobile in an Amazon app. There's data to prove this trend is real. According to ComScore, Amazon search queries are up 73 percent in the last year. How could Google fight this possible threat? Perhaps they could expose the astroturfing of Amazon reviews. Of course, this could backfire, as it would also draw attention to the astroturfing, link farming, and SEO games in Google's search results."
I'm certainly guilty of searching for products directly on Amazon, but usually if I want something quickly. I'll typically trust that the price is reasonable and Prime means it's on my doorstep in one or two days.
That said, if I want something I know will be expensive, or something even faster I prefer to check first with Google's shopping tool to get price comparisons or to find out if an item is available locally the same day. That's something with plenty of potential for monetizing and is much harder for Amazon to compete with.
I have a prime membership, so why wouldn't Amazon be the first place to look? Free quick shipping is pretty compelling. I think that is a huge reason more and more people are turning to use Amazon as first search for products.
But also, Google totally tossed this away. I used to use Google first (even when I was a prime member), searching for *product name* buy. That used to yield a lot of great price comparisons. Google changed things so that product searches suck now, it pretty much never yields good comparison results.
What can Google do to get this traffic back? The only way, would be to become a better search engine...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I have seen it, when looking for laptops.
personally I dont bother with th 5 star reviews, I start with the 1 stars and decide which are simply faulty products or user error (you can find a lot of simple user error in 1 star reviews) Than I like to look at 3 and 4 stars to see what the people who took the effort to dig a little deeper rather than 5 stars cause its teh god! That Is my usual shopping research methods
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
that I don't think Google has much to worry about. It doesn't even attempt to take the join of the words you enter, and the results are returned in essentially random order, unrefinable and unsortable. It's not bugged. It's always been so minimally functional.
It *seems* to offer more at first glance, but it's only a false hope, and results rapidly go random again. The ONLY time a multi-word search actually works properly on Amazon is when the words match a product name exactly. All other uses are broken in varying degrees, and only occasionally return something moderately sensible.
A professional outfit couldn't possibly do search this badly by accident nor incompetence, so my guess is that Amazon has deliberately made it so primitive in the name of dumbing it down for the masses. This appears to have gone off the rails though, as there was no need to break effective search so completely just to make it accessible.
People will still have to type 'amazon.com' into google first, right?
An example of Astroturfing on Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/The-Twelfth-Cliburn-Piano-Competition/product-reviews/B000BZ8IA8/ref=cm_cr_pr_btm_link_4?ie=UTF8&filterBy=addFiveStar&pageNumber=4&showViewpoints=0
Of the 35 five star reviews, about 30 were posted in a 1 week period by people who have no other reviews. Of course, each of those reviewers carefully voted up all the previous other 5 star reviews to promote them in the review rankings (so
Google should skip the middleman, open their own nation wide store, deploy instant driverless VTOL drone drop box delivery right to your porch. Buyaah! All hail Google matrix. /s
The thing that annoys me about complaining about astroturfing on Amazon, is the concept that it would happen on Amazon with any more regularity than anywhere else that had reviews.
I feel like basically the sources with the most people providing input have the least to worry in that regard, as many other voices will drown out astroturfers.
As long as you read Amazon reviews with a critical eye, they are fine...
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The Van Cliburn Piano Competition? Really? How many people would even be on the fence about something like that. You either own all twelve or you wouldn't watch it if it was free. I mean maybe there was some turfing by all their friends or something. But anyone who would gush about The Van Cliburn Piano Competition very well could be sincere. It's not like it's an air freshener or a stick of RAM or something. The idea is that it's an artistic pinnacle reached by serious young musicians. I think Amazon gets a free pass on this one.
I want a substitute for almost every Google tool I use, and have found a few.
I kind of agree, but it's still impossible to replace them for search. I try Bing every so often, a few weeks at a time... it's still just not as good.
Also Google docs, so many people use them for sharing docs now I'd say it's almost impossible to supplant them in that area.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
I always go to Amazon first for product searching, then turn to Google for reviews. Google shopping is simply pathetic -- sorry Newegg and Nextag, never used you never will -- and their listed vendors simply can not match Amazon's pricing and turnaround -- especially since I am a Prime Subscriber.
Recently however, I've largely stopped even using Google for searching for reviews and comparative products since I've found Amazon's reviews to be more than adequate and with plenty of competitive products listed on their site.
Honestly, I think Google should reconsider their misguided foray into shopping -- it's just a ham-fisted ploy to capture data on the shopping preferences of their "user-commodities" and just doesn't stack up because it's a half-assed attempt at entering a market that they really don't understand and isn't core to their company.
Besides, they don't take paypal. ;)
It's a feature.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
That's really smart.
And there's a whole lot of gaming that goes on in Amazon's books and music reviews. I met someone who works for one of the "New Media Strategies" companies. He's an out-of-work post-doc and is getting paid (poorly, I might add) to corrupt social media and online reviews in order to try to gain some perceived advantage for their clients big and small.
It gets worse: even little niche-y online communities like Slashdot are targeted by these companies for their clients. Insurance companies, politicians, big-name media companies, even sports franchises are using sock puppets to promote everything from candidates to soap to software. People can rely less and less that the entities encountered in social media are actually human beings posting their thoughts in good faith.
This could break bad for google and amazon alike, as people start to see online information as noise. Their seeming inviolability could disappear in a big hurry.
People are already starting to see that the bottom could fall out of a lot of big name dot.com businesses with not a lot of warning, and not just because of uncertainties about the economy as a whole.
It wouldn't take a whole lot to have Google and Amazon become dinosaurs real quick. I just think it's a mistake to believe that five years from now these companies are going to have the same kind of fundamental strength that the big manufacturing companies had in the post-WWII world. There are a lot of companies built on perception and that are very vulnerable to shifting habits.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Not getting rid of the spam results and in many cases catering to the spammers.
Pulling all reviews of everything and putting it on Gminus. I'm glad I'd deleted all of my review data.
Making 'shopping' pay to place. Again I'm glad I'd pulled every review they could try and make money off of.
Changing the way their system worked when it did well for the user. That more than anything was a slap in the face and showed that they do not care for their users, they care for their customers.
Amazon's search is superior for products. Ebay's is weak and pathetic in many cases.
I'd go on a Vegan diet but the delivery time from Vega is too long. --brownkitty
Duck duck go
not affiliated other than having a duck problem, too.
Since Google removed items related to firearms from their shopping results, I have simply made it a habit to use another search service. Why should I get used to using two different search services for shopping when one will do?
When looking for non-firearm items, I am more likely to just skip Google now whether I start with Amazon or not.
It wouldn't take a whole lot to have Google and Amazon become dinosaurs real quick. I just think it's a mistake to believe that five years from now these companies are going to have the same kind of fundamental strength that the big manufacturing companies had in the post-WWII world. There are a lot of companies built on perception and that are very vulnerable to shifting habits.
Really? Both of these companies have massive, massive investments in infrastructure. These aren't some mom-and-pop, dot com, one trick pony shows. Hell, Government is starting (if not already) to rely on Google. Amazon is investing in same day delivery and is one of the biggest players online. It would take quite a bit IMHO for these two companies to become dinosaurs. This isn't 1999.
Or you could just...look at what the person wrote? I have written several 5 star reviews on Amazon but anybody reading them will see that I am quick to point out what is good and what is not, just because a product gets 5 stars doesn't mean its perfect, just that it does what it is supposed to do well.
Take the review I made on a bass multieffect pedal. i was quick to point out there were a couple of effects that weren't useful for day to day (as it is in ALL multieffects) and that with all multiunits there is a bit of a learning curve, but the sound is clear, it has both user defined and a ROM with the original effects so you can tweak all day without losing a favorite sound, and most of the effects were obvious written by bass players as they didn't drown the bass in effect and made for useful stage and recording sounds. So don't judge a 5 star as an automatic shill, those are easy enough to spot if you read the review. For many of us if it does what it says on the tin and does it reliably it deserves 5 stars because we got exactly what we paid for. If it doesn't do as advertised I'll be the first to give it low reviews but what I've seen is most of the 1 star reviews got a bad unit and didn't even try to resolve it, just bitched.
As for TFA? Google frankly needs to be scared because that is what I and many of my friends have been doing for awhile. If its sold there I usually go straight to Amazon or at least pop it up along with Newegg and Tiger and compare and for me its worked great. Why use a middleman if you don't need one?
ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
I know Google is a search company
I know Google's main income source is advertising
But that does not mean Google can not implement something that let users to rate the services/products they received via the vendors they have used - through Google, of course
I believe Google still have enough talents to implement such feature - that is, if Google wants users to participate more in their income generation
Muchas Gracias, Señor Edward Snowden !
But they're so convincing! "FAR SURPASSES SPIELBERG, KUBRICK, OR EVEN HITCHCOCK! Films such as Citizen Kane, The Godfather, and Schindlers List pale in comparison to this staggering, luminescent, wondrous cinematic masterpiece. Again, this is an understatement."
Happens there too. The one the cheeses me off the most: Tangier Dream (http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/tangier-dream/id342411025). Stellar ratings and reviews, dotted with occasional "it's crap". Nothing unusual there. But check out the OTHER reviews by those reviewer -- non-existent, or telling the reader to check out "Buddy Mix" or some other piece of crap. The way the scam works is to pick something popular and write a fake review on it, adding a sentence noting that the reviewer's _other_ favorite right now is Tangier Dream, or Buddy Mix, or whatever. "Karen Rosa" on Bruce Springsteen's Wrecking Ball: "...Speaking of cool rock tracks I just heard a great song I think everyone should check out 'Show Me A Little Leg' by Buddy Mix."...
"Karen Rosa" on Tangier Dream: "Wow...Wow...Wow!!! I think that says it all."
"Emily Love" on Kitaro's Digital Box Set: "I heard a new artist that has some asian feel to his music but also reminds me of Jarre and TD. The artist name is Eric Walker and his CD is Tangier Dream".
"Emily Love" on Tangier Dream: "Soothing and beautiful music..."
"Kristin Chan" on Digitalism's I Love You, Dude: "Also while I was looking for new music to hear I found Eric Walker and his cd Tangier Dream".
The turf war winner is "Ryan FarishFan", who has written six reviews on iTunes for a variety of albums. Each references Tangier Dream or Buddy Mix (on the same label).
Ick. I do see that at least a few of the reviews I bitched about to iTunes staff are gone now.
There's a simple solution. "Certified owner" badge next to the review. Dealextreme does it so why shouldn't others?
Do you know how all these right wing political books from Regnery press and Eagle Publishing make it onto the New York Times list? Because when the book ships, all these think tanks and every right-wing radio show and megachurch and Family Research Council-type outfit buys up book club copies to give away. They each count as sales. This has been going on forever. You'll even see a tiny little mark (not on the website, but if you look at the list in the Sunday book supplement) showing bulk sales. Eagle Publishing is famous for buying their own books to boost sales figures.
How many reviews appear with even the most popular books? You don't think it would be worthwhile to seed those with "Certified Owners" in order to get a higher rating?
Face it, when the Internet became the world's shopping mall, we should have realized it would turn into an extension of the marketing regime.
You are welcome on my lawn.
So did Studebaker.
I'm not saying they'd disappear, but they'd become something very different from what they are.
You are welcome on my lawn.
no this is the best example of astroturfing ;-)
http://www.amazon.com/Very-Best-David-Hasselhoff/dp/B00005Q8UG/