Google+ vs Facebook – fast forward a year.
Will the men have left Facebook in their droves and set up a new Lord of the Flies style existence on island Google+?
Short answer, no.
The real question is how soon before businesses turn from Facebook and move more into Google?
That’s the only yard stick to judge the success of this new social channel.
Google+ has circles allowing you to selectively choose who sees your updates, while still allowing you to accept friend requests from people you may not want on Facebook. Suddenly you have the “work” friends group, the “real” friends group etc etc. In short, Granny no longer needs to see pics of you throwing up at the weekend, but can see that lovely pic of you holding a puppy at the church fete.
Woo Hoo! Everyone’s a winner.
It’s worth remembering that Plus is still in beta. Once the fully fledged product is released, expect to see a huge influx of men and women signing up.
So who is going to win?
To answer that you have to be able to answer the following -
(1) Will Google create a product attractive enough to get people to jump ship from Facebook? In my opinion, they have done. Expect to see “Google+ like” circles / groups in Facebook real soon.
Google+ is also better looking & less application heavy (at the moment) than Facebook. The whole Google interface is cleaner and slicker than FB.
(2) Whoever has the best app for smart phones will win – I rarely check my FB account on anything but my phone / ipad. The iPhone FB app is good but they have yet to release an iPad version and currently the iPhone one is buggy as hell in iOS 5. A Google+ app is already working it’s way through the App store as we speak.
Verdict – Facebook’s shot itself in the foot with the horrendous privacy rules & the lax control over applications leads to a overall amateurish look and feel. Added to that their slow updates and total lack of support for the iPad means that they’ve left the door wide open for someone to come in and steal their crown. Facebook have become complacent while Google+ on the other hand, is the new kid on the block with cool trainers and slick banter.
Nobody is going to be able to call this one at the moment, but I will go out on a limb and say, to quite Highlander – THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE!
For one very simple reason – Will you run two social media accounts with effectively the exact same content?
No, thought not…