Bing Will Get Twitter Rev Share First (True or False?)
For quite some time now, we’ve entertained the possibility of one of the big boys (Facebook, Google, Microsoft, or Yahoo) buying Twitter. That was until Twitter’s stifling 1 Billion dollar valuation earlier this month.
Twitter astronomic valuation, combined with mainstream media’s crush on the service, means that Twitter isn’t going to roll up into an acquisition any time soon. It might even take several years, but I would be willing to bet their new exit strategy was focused on going public.
Assuming a Twitter acquisition is off the table for everyone but Google, what is still in play?
Twitter Search, and significant licensing deal at that.
Twitter Search is the most useful technology being underutilized by mainstream audiences, and you can expect Google, Yahoo, Facebook, or Microsoft (Bing) to try and change that.
Twitter needs to get their search data in the hands of everyone, not just early adopters. If you ask someone that doesn’t follow Mashable or Techcrunch about Twitter Search, they probably won’t be able to tell you how to get there. However, if relevant Tweets were dispersed through channels the mainstream audience already uses (such as Google), Twitter could reach new heights of relevance and popularity.
Bing, Microsoft’s newsiest search engine has been the most aggressive at integrating Twitter using their API. They have started to display Tweets in their search results, and they have even created BingTweets.com.
If I were to guess who is going to complete the first meaningful integration of Twitter Search and share in the revenue, I’d have to say Bing.
The others will try, but I doubt they will have a chance:
* Google wants Twitter because it plans to incorporate social engagement in it’s ranking algorithm. Google is also making a big play into real time search, but is limited by the Twitter API.
* Yahoo wants Twitter, but will probably have to sit this one out. They don’t have the cash, resources, or community support to pull this one off.
* Facebook has already went to the alter with Twitter and got jilted. I doubt they will be at the bargaining table for Twitter Search, especially since they bought FriendFeed instead. Expect them to just copy Twitter features (only not nearly as effective, and 6 months too late).
So, the winner of Twitter Search data will be awarded to Bing. They have the willingness, resources, and resolve to make something like this happen. I also expect them to secure this deal because they are the least competitive to Twitter (with exception to Yahoo). Bing does not want to compete with a ‘Google-Twitter’ mash, and I can’t blame them.
Bing has been very aggressive lately, demonstrated by their deal to take over the Yahoo search results. Could you imagine if Bing gets the first Twitter Search rev-share deal?
I expect this to end in a royal rumble between Microsoft (Bing) and Google, and the winner will get the rights to Twitter Search, if only for 12-24 months. Shortly thereafter, the serious IPO talks will emerge. This is reminiscent of what happen with Google search in the early days. Here we go again. What do you think is going to happen?
5 Responses to “Bing Will Get Twitter Rev Share First (True or False?)”
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“Twitter Search is the most useful technology being underutilized by mainstream audiences, and you can expect Google, Yahoo, Facebook, or Microsoft (Bing) to try and change that.”
I couldn’t agree more. It’s gonna cost some serious $ to make that happen though.
[Blog Post] Bing Will Get Twitter Search Rights/Rev Share Deal First (True or False?) http://bit.ly/3Soj30 #fb
Bing Makes use of Tweets as I predicted here: http://bit.ly/3Soj30 RT: @ev: http://bing.com/twitter/ Huzzah!
i have been using the BING search engine for a couple of weeks. it seems to be as good as Google but for some reason i would still want to stick with Google search engine.
i am using both Bing and Google and i think both search engines give relevant search results. i would still prefer Google though, because it gives a little bit more relevant search results than Bing.