Are we nearing the end of the ‘Google Era’?
Where is good to go for lunch? Google it!
What should we watch on TV tonight? Google it!
How do I fix this? Google it!
So omnipresent in our everyday lives, Google has become more than just a search engine, it’s a verb most of us will use on a daily basis.
But for the younger generation, the idea of ‘googling it’ may be becoming a thing of the past…
‘TikTok it’ might not have quite the same ring, but it’s where many Gen Zers are turning for their search needs.
With around 40% of Gen Z now opting for TikTok or Instagram over Google for search queries, the ‘search’ landscape is on the verge of its first major shift after almost two decades of Google dominance.
TikTok is very much leaning into this trend to capitalise on it, with its focus on search now extending to the recent launch of a widget on iPhones, similar to that of Google, giving users the ability to search on the app without even opening it.
So why are Gen Z turning to social media over Google?
First and foremost, these users want answers quickly, and watching a 15 second video rather than scrolling through several blogs to get that answer is a compelling option. These platforms also have a deeper understanding of what the user likes, so will tailor search results to appeal to those interests.
Google may still have the upper hand on delivering cold, hard facts, but when it comes to more of a ‘recommendation’ based search, these platforms know exactly the type of content their users want to see.
This trend hasn’t gone unnoticed by Google either. It’s hit back with the recent announcement that they will be moving to capture creator-based results, which will include the use of portrait videos (such as TikToks), appearing for queries that can’t easily be answered by their traditional results page format.
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But what if your brand isn’t targeting Gen Z? Does this matter to you?
Marketers wanting to target audiences that don’t yet use social platforms for search, using the right keywords could still have a significant impact on your performance.
Indeed, with Apple’s iOS14 updates a few years ago, that resulted in apps like Facebook being unable to track user’s activity on other apps and therefore collect less data about them, Meta’s algorithm has already started putting a greater focus on keywords within content to dictate performance.
All this means is that SEO is no longer a practise purely for websites.
But before you rush to cancel all your Google ads and bin your existing SEO strategy, the focus should be less on changing your SEO strategy for Google, and instead, extending that strategy into your social content as well.
Marketers who integrate their SEO and social strategies, will start to see both their reach and traffic increase across both disciplines, whilst those that don’t may start to see their numbers decline.
A clear understanding of which keywords you are targeting, where the opportunities lie, and where the search landscape is too saturated to make an impact - and then optimising all your social and website content accordingly - will give your brand a better opportunity to be successful across all platforms.
Google still has an 85% share of the search engine market, so we’re not quite ready to call the end of its era of dominance, but taking the lessons and insights you’ve learnt from that platform and applying them to your social media content may just give you a head start in the ‘social search era’.
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