Google, Plus Your World

This is a guest post by Ray Hiltz (@NewRayCom)

On Tuesday, January 10th Google launched it’s latest weapon for world wide web domination, “Search, plus your World”. Apparently this came as a complete surprise resulting in many people getting their “knickers in a knot” over unfair bias and advantage for Google+.

Privacy watchdog, EPIC (Electronic Privacy Commission) cited Google's decision to include personal data, such as photos, posts, and contact details, gathered from Google+ in Google Search results in its complaint to the FTC: “Google’s business practices raise concerns related to both competition and the implementation of the Commission’s consent order.”

Hmmm…privacy concerns and social platforms, where have we heard that before?

The feature is still rolling out. I haven’t got it yet so it’s difficult to give you a first hand perspective so I’ll share with you a screenshot of what the page looks like with this Machiavellian feature attached. It comes from Francisco Rosales (@socialmouths)’ blog post: Google+ Brings Out the Big Guns

SocialMouths: Google+ Brings Out The Big Guns

Now, see the green arrow? The little guy icon means you want to use “Search plus the World” meaning you want to see Personal Results, Profiles in search and People and Pages. The other one, means just give me the public stuff.

Google's Announcement

In announcing Search Plus, Google says in its blog: "Google Search has always been about finding the best results for you. Sometimes that means results from the public web, but sometimes it means your personal content or things shared with you by people you care about."

"These wonderful people and this rich personal content is currently missing from your search experience. Search is still limited to a universe of web pages created publicly, mostly by people you’ve never met. Today, we’re changing that by bringing your world, rich with people and information, into search."

From the very onset, Google has made no secret about it's plan to integrate Google+ into every property on their web real estate. We see it on YouTube where you can even start a hangout and surf videos live with online friends. We see it in Gmail where we can circle contacts directly from the application. (As we can now do on Search Plus your World).

This increases the sociability of Google+ and as a G+ user, we have the option of sharing publicly or just to our circles regardless of what Google platform we’re connecting on. 

I think this is a smart move by Google. If Facebook and Twitter want to get in on it, then the three of them will have to work out a deal. But because they couldn’t, Google’s social network comes out on top in personal searches.

Mike Elgan (@MikeElgan) wrote a great post on the integration of social data and search: Why Twitter, Facebook and Google Need to be More Social. It’s his opinion that in a better world, every social network would be represented on every major search service in a way that would reflect each user’s connections on those social platforms.

Let’s say you wanted to stay at a certain hotel in New York and did a search to check it out. If you’ve opted for the Personal Search, not only would you see the usual Hotel listing, but may see a post in a friend’s circle detailing his experience there – with photos. As I’ve said repeatedly to my friends; I’m not on Google’s payroll and don’t consider myself a Google fan boy. But I do enjoy my experience with Google+ and believe that businesses will benefit a lot by participating on the platform. 

The whole idea of integrating all of the Google applications is genius. I love that I don’t have to log in and out every time I want to check my Google+ notifications. This is the future. The other platforms need open their wall gates a bit to to see the bigger world out there.

Do you see Google’s move to integrate Google+ Search as giving them an unfair advantage?

Guest post: Ray Hiltz (@NewRayCom) is a business consultant and founder of NewRayCom, a social media consultancy that specializes in the integration of social media within organizations.