Microsoft’s winning of the bid to buy 1.6% of Facebook for $240 Milion valued the privately owned company at $15 billion. Does it sound real that a private company, a social-networking utility, values such high. Incredible.
The number of registered Facebook users are rapidly increasing everyday and this deal which caught huge media coverages will certainly bring more. Microsoft’s main interest is to have more dominance in ads than its rival Google. MS is already supplying the banner ads in Facebook. Now certainly more advertisers will be interested in it because advertisers need more exposure. They sell their products or at least names. Interest is financial benefit.
Google is pioneer in this field as with Adsense advertisers can reach a bigger audience than any other ad sponsoring media. The no. 1 keyword-based search engine ‘King’ Google is still unbeatable. The lofty King has his own ‘flavor’. Not easy for anyone to snatch it away in any way. Google dominates and will continue dominating.
Even though the deal between MS and FB was a rumour for quite a long time, but it didn’t help MSN to keep holding its 2nd position in Alexa ranking. Alexa traffic rank is important indication of any sites popularity and usability. Google’s popularity and usability is on the progressive trend. Losing its position is not a good news for Microsoft.
Microsoft now has Facebook, one extending arm. But Google has YouTube, Myspace, Feedburner, Doubleclick. Google acquired these companies and made further developments. Improvements and more precisely towards Google’s main interest in ads kept these companies as a highly successful enterprise for Larry Page’s and Sergei Brin’s Google SpaceShip, more correctly ‘Search-and-Ads’ Ship.
Microsoft will do the same as well. Facebook will offer more and more applications and users functionality for its members. But will the members switch to Google if they have to search for something. If this is so, then Microsoft needs a new strategy to keep them within Facebook’s virtual world. Otherwise no leap forward. The horse will be standing at the same position in the yard.