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Mindless Google promoting drones
I was thinking about Matt Cutts April Fools Day Linkbait and how bloggers have become mindless Google promoting drones. I admit to blogging Google webmaster tools news. Whenever something new happens I rush to study, then report on the latest Google feature often linking out to the mothership (aka Google). Other more hyper search marketing news sites report minute by minute on the latest from the plex in a strange kind of “me first” way with little thought as to the whole point and purpose.
With all joking aside, have people become nothing more than free promotion for an already extremely intimidating Google?
You think it ends here? Let me give you a taste of Google’s vision with examples to not be misunderstood further.
A few days ago Michael Gray (who does not trust Google) made a post titled “I’m This Close to Dropping Google Reader“. If you know Michael he is all about traffic so his post was partially about generating traffic via linkbaiting and partially about a legitimate concern.
Matt Cutts was the first to comment just minutes later:
Matt Cutts Says:
March 29th, 2007 at 12:36 amWhat are some example feeds where you saw this? I believe that if a site owner republishes a post with a different url, Reader plays it safe and shows it to you again.
Matt sends an email (or however they communicate in the mothership) to the Google Reader Group and a team member responds quickly:
Mihai Parparita Says:
March 29th, 2007 at 7:16 pmWe think we have a fix for the session restore issue, and it should be getting pushed in the next few days. I’ll add another comment once it’s live.
Mihai Parparita
Google Reader Engineer
Result?
- Michael is happy
- Google avoided negative press
- Google improved it’s product (thanks to Michael)
What does the above have to do with being mindless Google drones?
It is Google’s vision to respond and service all complaints from those who have blogs to make their product more useful. Your criticizing of Google is something they actually encourage so if you blog about Google 24/7 expect immediate service when you have a concern.
Do remember that the borg needs you to build the machine that will help it grow legs. I guess this is fine but what is in it for you? A better Google Reader?
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April 2nd, 2007 at 6:54 pm
Aaron, this post is fascinating for me…I’m about halfway through Brand Hijack: marketing without marketing by Alex Wipperfürth. I recommend it for anyone as interested in branding.
The point of the book is basically
1. you don’t create your brand, you seed a few markets and let the tribal consumer define you.
2. traditional mass marketing is dead because consumer brand identity is defining culture today like passed-down stories and family fables used to.
Google’s blog cult is a free focus group.
April 2nd, 2007 at 7:28 pm
Corey - Exactly, you use those who are most critical of you to better your brand. Wish I had time for books.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
I do not understand why people would like to promote Google in the first place. It is not the best search engine, and it is the engine with the most spam, and trash results!
Ask!, and even Windows Live Search pulls up better results for most queries than Google!
April 11th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Anyone who is an affiliate for Text Link Ads can’t go talking about how crappy Google is.