Facebook vs Google | Social vs Search

Following on from my blog post on 11^th July 2010 Bing vs. Google I touched on the forces of Facebook to take on the mighty Google. Therefore I wanted to revisit this and look into whether this was a reality and what factors we need to be aware of as industry leaders.

Firstly we need to address what the competitive factors are between Google and Facebook. Yes Facebook now has more overall web traffic than Google in the UK but people use the 2 platforms for different activities.

People use Google to search for information, products, news, services, addresses, images, videos and more. Where as Facebook is a social networking platform used to communicate and engage with friends, family and communities who share your interests.

Therefore how can we start to compare Google to Facebook and suggest that Facebook have stolen Google’s top spot?

We need to understand what this means? A more pertinent question on this for me is that Facebook are becoming, if they are not already, a bigger brand than Google? With this comes power within the market and they are able to influence advertisers and users to engage with them over and above other platforms.

Facebook currently has 59% of the social network market in the UK (StatCounter)

In regards to search Google has 92% share (according to StatCounter) and completely dominates the UK market.

These figures clearly show the domination of the Facebook and Google within Search and Social media and both have different offerings however as advertisers we are looking for the online platforms which will allow us to generate the best results. Google offers tools and reporting which are far superior currently to the Facebook reporting, but Facebook in comparison is in its infancy. There are more and more examples of how Facebook can generate ROI and cost effective results for business so maybe this is where Google needs to be cautious. Can Facebook start to win bigger budgets and steal some of Google’s ad revenue?

Once the likes of Twitter and Facebook have a more established advertising platform for agencies and advertisers to manage and report on they could defiantly become a threat. Something I am sure Google has a close eye on.