Microsoft Chasing Google. Here We Go Again

August 31, 2009

I have to give credit to Microsoft. The company is persistent. The New York Times is dancing on froth in my opinion in its “A Hired Gun for Microsoft, in Dogged Pursuit of Google”. As the search engine optimization pundits and the azure chip consultants pile on board, the gutsy Microsoft will get another shot at search publicity. The addled goose has a different view. First, Microsoft is paying for traffic. Second, Microsoft has been making runs at Google for several years. Third, the Google Microsoft is chasing is no longer a search system. Microsoft has to do more than get eyeballs for its Bing.com service. The challenge is to adapt to the competitive threat that Google now poses in three core sectors of Microsoft’s business model:

  • Stopping * any * revenue attrition from Google’s push into the enterprise
  • Responding to Google’s increasing array of mobile services, including the tie up with Microsoft’s enemy Sony
  • Leapfrogging Google’s push into back office services in sectors ranging from finance to publishing to video production.

The New York Times and most Google analysts simplify the Google challenge and Microsoft response to a one front war. Wrong. Google is fighting Microsoft with street fighting tactics in multiple sectors. Traditional armies are ill equipped to deal with this type of threat, attack, retreat, threat, attack, retreat method. See the Google trilogy for more on the Google tactics.

Stephen Arnold, August 31, 2009

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