TechCrunch just published a story today saying how they believe that Faceook.com will be bigger than Google in 5 years.
“What do I mean by bigger? Facebook already has more page views
than Google. People already spend more time spent on Facebook than Google. I’m referring to the life blood of any business: revenues.”
“Google’s 2010 revenues will be $28 billion, give or take a billion. The goal of this writeup is to illustrate the ways that Facebook’s annual revenues could grow from $2 billion to more than $30 billion in five years a diverse set of revenue streams that have one thing in common: people.”
Its an Interesting article with a lot of facts and figures.
For domainers what happens to search and ad dollars will effect out bottom line and Facebook is going to be a big factor on how this all flushes out in the years to come.
Sorry about all the Facebook posts this week but that’s just the way it worked out.
“I’m referring to the life blood of any business: revenues.”
===
I’m referring to the life blood of any (domain) business: TRAFFIC & revenues.
TRAFFIC, TRAFFIC, TRAFFIC
eyeballs, eyeballs, eyeballs
Church leaders have known that for years…
…pass the collection plate…
assuming FB wants to sell the site… Apple OR Google OR Microsoft MUST LOSE ALL THE CASH THEY HAVE to buy it
so, NO ONE of them can buy FB today… and that will become every day harder
.
“What do I mean by bigger?”
maybe… have more profits?
.
“Facebook’s annual revenues could grow from $2 billion to more than $30 billion in five years”
true, but, ONLY if FB develop its own “Google Instant” SE and a (very much better than now) online ads service
.
Like google facebook cannot discount the kid next door working in his garage or dormroom. Countless stories out there of companies who could, but not much of “where are they now”.
“cannot discount the kid next door working in his garage or dormroom…”
===
What if new users never see FB, Twit, Goog, etc. ?
DIDJ users start young – they now have a web cam on their “toy”
They will never catch Google or even get close unless they themselves become a Google like search engine.
They have the eyeballs but the eyeballs at FB are looking for something different than the eyeballs that go to Google.
from Slashdot…
“Twitter is already selling sponsored Tweets for $100K or more. …Will that be the same as Google selling top position in SERP?’ and ‘I wonder when Facebook will start to sell friends.’ Advertisers will be allowed to purchase placement in lists of ‘who to follow’ recommendations targeted to users with particular interests on Twitter.””
I sincerely doubt it. I visit Facebook nearly everyday and contribute to those number of eyeballs they’re counting, but I have never once clicked an advertisement and I’ve been visiting the site for over a year. Simply put, I visit Facebook to communicate with friends. Nothing more. Viewing an advertisement on that site is the equivalent of having a beer with some friends at a bar while a car salesman sits down next to you and tries to chat you up.
Google works because their ads directly correspond to your search and adds to your experience. On the other hand, Facebook keeps attempting to divert my attention with “relevant” ads while I’m communicating with a friend in Boynton Beach, Florida.
Simply put, Google’s strategy is non-invasive and Facebook’s is intrusive. Google wins.
“Google’s strategy is non-invasive and Facebook’s is intrusive. Google wins.”
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Both systems are rather primitive if compared to a 3D Holographic Walk-Around experience… where you chat with and SEE friends…. and that car salesman who drives up in your virtual cyberspace City.Scape and offers you and your “special
friend” a free weekend at a spa resort… blah blah blah…
…and the weekend is free… if you can invite 30 paying “friends”…
@AVE4
I wouldn’t care if he was in 3D Holographic Walk-Around and making his “special offer” while singing Pavarotti – he’s still uninvited, I’d have zero interest and I’d tell him to beat it 🙂
“and making his “special offer” while singing Pavarotti…”
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Great Idea !!!
and he could be wearing a Sandwich-Board with Domains FOR SALE 🙂
and have a monkey with him
@AVE4
If he brings the monkey I’m in.
“If he brings the monkey I’m in.”
…but you only get ONE Free Domain…
The Price.Is.Right with FREE Domains
Door #1
Monkey.Massage
www. wimp. com/monkeymassage
Door #2
Monkey.MAN
www. wimp. com/monkeyman
Door #3
Human.Society
www. wimp. com/humansociety
“Viewing an advertisement on that site is the equivalent of having a beer with some friends at a bar while a car salesman sits down next to you and tries to chat you up.”
Wrong. It’s like saying you like and are thinking about buying a Lexus and the next guy in the next chair says, hey, I sell Lexus cars.
FB knows a lot about you
@einstein
He’d still get his ass kicked for interrupting our conversation.
@einstein
“thinking about buying a Lexus…FB knows a lot about you”
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Can you imagine how much the mobile phone company knows about you ?
GPS location
digital voice to text conversion
voice call and web access correlations
and with Google in the phone business with wishbone callbacks, they could
listen and break into the call with that Lexus ad and sales guy (with the monkey)
Facebook is just another piece of time- waster BS website.
Someone will come up with something better— another BS site.
jn the future… everything we are talking about now will be in the past.
people who think facebook is “the next google” are showing their ignorance. facebook is a website, a project that has collected lots of email addresses and other personal info. the info is valuable, sure, but people can move their info to other places. facebook does not own the data! websites that rely on user-generated content like that on facebook usually don’t stay popular forever… and history has given us many examples, as others have pointed out elsewhere on this blog. (*domains*, otoh, i.e., words and phrases, can stay popular for many, many years, maybe forever). google is not a just a website offering user-generated content (personal profiles). it’s a database offering an index and a cache that users generally cannot compile themselves. and they are very, very good at manging this. google is not writing spaghetti code and churning out useless new gimmicks by the month. google’s gimmicks (i.e. their acquisitions) are generally quite useful. google code is streamlined. google is fast (cf. alternatives). they have some of the best minds in IT.
i think some of these people who write about facebook overtaking google are just envious of how well google does what they do. that’s the vibe i get. google is an statistically-informed web index and cache, not some kid’s computerised attempt at a social experiment.
there are many ways to commnicate with your friends via the internet. only a fraction of the protocols in existence are actually being used. the internet offers seemingly infinite means to communicate and move bits. no one “needs” to use facebook. they have no superior technology or implementation. it’s a fad.
google, however, is arguably “essential”. users need an index. how else are you going to find stuff? and, simply put, google has the best index.
maybe it’s not facebook (the site) that’s so amazing, maybe what’s amazing is the growth of the number of internet users, the power of word of mouth and the ability to connect that the internet provides- we’re all now in touch with nearly everyone we’ve ever known from our past. amazing. but to think that facebook will be the “one” website that people will converge on for very long is utterly ridiculous. internet users are always looking for a new, trendy site… there will be plenty more. and along with word of mouth, *google* will help you find them.
i think sites like digg and reddit (and other slashdot-like clones) are more likely to remain popular long term. even before the “www”, people wanted to pass on news items to others, and discuss them, and they found ways to do it. this desire for news and discussion (and of course porn) fueled the birth of the “ISP”, that was uunet.
It is just fantasy, lack of articles to write.. this is something impossible to forecast, specially on this industry.
I can see this happening. ALl it takes is a new game, app, etc – then have the word spread like wildfire – throw some ads in there, get much more traffic and bam – revenue has increased.
Very deceiving title. The title says that you expect Facebook to be bigger than Google in 5 years. And then the article talks about Facebook growing over the next 5 years to exceed where Google is at now. Surely you expect Google to grow at least somewhat over the next 5 years. So what do you mean? Do you really mean that in 5 years, Facebook will have more revenues than Google? Or do you mean that in 5 years, they will have more revenues than Google does now – because that is what your article is really saying.
And let’s say that Facebook has more revenues than Google. The odds are that Google would be dramatically more profitable than Facebook because of the different nature of the sites – as David Castello points out. In 5 years, it would be very unlikely that Facebook would be worth as much as Google, or anywhere near as much.
And the lifeblood of a company isn’t revenues. It’s profits. My company could easily generate 10x the revenue that it does today. But it won’t do me a damn bit of good if the costs of acquiring the revenues are more than the revenues themselves.