Design, Coding, SEO and Social Media Marketing, WordPress & Facebook

People ask all the time, will we get tired of so much social? Social media, social networks, social business, social marketing…

I don’t really think that’s the right question, especially because sites like Facebook have shown us that people like social, even if they tend to be slow to the uptake at first. I would ask instead, in what manner will social become completely intertwined with all online activity?

With the launch of Google Buzz, I see a new wave in social media interactions. Google did something very different by launching a social network within an existing network of dedicated users: Gmail. With approx. 150 million users, Gmail offers Google two important components of a vibrant social network: users and information. Anyone with Gmail becomes a captive audience and a potential user. By tapping into our address books, chats, email conversations, bookmarks, blog readers and photo sharing applications, Google knows everything about us, and is offering to share it with the world. We all have seen what Facebook has done with user-data in terms of advertising…will Google follow suit? Will I start to see “Meet Christian Singles” ads on the right hand side of my email inbox? (Matt Hames talks about Facebook vs Google here.)

Google’s messaging plays up the simplicity of using this new social feature. “We already know everything about you!” is essentially what their campaign says. Plus, they are very quietly launching Buzz, letting users do all of the marketing for them (see Twitter’s trending topic for the week of Feb 8-12 and you will see how many people spread the word).

Wisely, Google is using very similar phrasing and images to Twitter and Facebook (read more here about how similar Buzz is to Twitter). Buzz encourages us to “share what you’re thinking” as well as photos, videos and links. Smart, because similar=familiar and that means easy for people to pick up and instantly start using.

Another thing I noticed today, was the influence of my new “social circle” on search engine results. I searched “umbrella” in Google images and at the bottom of the page, was startled to see a picture of my ex-boyfriend sitting on the beach under an umbrella! Yikes. Google calmly pointed out that this was simply a photo from my social circle! Well, um, not anymore, obviously. But apparently now we have to be careful what we ask Google for:

Then I tried a few other searches to see what sort of keywords pulled up images from my friends (and others):

My friend's mother in a dance show

Pictures of the HyperArts team!

Is this how social will become the norm? When searching and browsing websites we will start to see a trail of our past and present (and perhaps future) friends and colleagues. We will be able to read what they think, what they say to their friends, see what they look like and hear how they sound. They will offer advice and reviews, perhaps inadvertently, when we are shopping for products and services (this is the social web that Jeremiah Owyang talked about last year).

Google (pioneering as always) seems to be the first to introduce us to a whole new version of the social web. I’m not sure how I like it, and it’s getting a lot of criticism already. Why? Because it’s predatory rather than opt-in. Yes, Google asks before sticking Buzz into your inbox, but once you let them in, they automatically know everything about you, and you have to scramble to hide anything personal. And I certainly don’t remember telling Google to include my ex-boyfriend in search results…

The new social web does not make the distinction between personal vs private. We wanted social, we got it!