Online In Your Face

An organisation had a problem with google Search. In the first page of result there is one entry which reads , "XYZ Company is very Bad for you". Employees who hold the company dear to their hearts started bombarding the Leadership team with mails. Get it off, how can google search put a bad listing about us!!. And each of them clicked on the link multiple times to read it again and again as they could not believe their eyes. Passed it on to colleagues, past colleagues etc etc. More and more people went click, click, click listing rose till it became number two on the search listing.

Now Top Honcho`s woke up. Marketing! the scream rang out, get it off google NOW!

Marketing gave a bewildered look and said,"you can`t get it off".

Eyebrows reach non existent hairlines," why" comes out as a growl. Call Google and ask them to take it off. Legal! can we sue them.

This or similar scenarios may have been enacted not just in XYZ company but in many more organisations without any size/turnover limitations. Most organisations approach online media in the exact same manner as they would traditional media. This is the beginning of their end. Online is the exact opposite to traditional.

Traditional media is static Online is dynamic.
Content control rests with editors (with personal interests?), who put up stuff for others to read. Online Readers decide what is most popular absolute control rests with them.

Now lets look at what happens at XYZ.

Marketing gets back to a hassled CEO with the following points.

The said search listing points to a discussion group.
There were a total of three people in the ddiscussion, including the person who started the thread.
Total number of comments is three.
The last listing is over 450 days old, that is nearly 15 months old.

Smart CEO does the math and says, "hey! then it is not a popular site. But, doesnt google give you the most relevant and important sites. How come it is at rank 2. Take it off, please, call US, UK, Moon, Uranus wherever.

Appraisal time is near so marketing puts on oily sweet smile gulps excess saliva and starts....

Yes, Its not a popular site. No google doesn`t list the best sites, it lists as per search word/phrase relevance, number of people visiting the site. AND number of clicks which happen when people search for a particular string. Meaning when people search XYZ when the offending link comes up if more people click on said link, it rises up the listing.

CEO has become CEO coz he is smart and not just from Ancestral property. Bulb glows immediately, "you mean to say when each of our 1500 employees click on offending link, it goes up the listing. Google assumes that`s the most relevant result. How do we stop it".

Well, Its not just 1500 employees which has caused this. But, yes, they have contributed to it.

Online is what economists called free market, the dynamics are decided by the market forces, here the Online users. The users decide whom to read and what to say on what they read, influencing newer readers. No control works here but yes intelligence and understanding of the media will help.

Marketing rests case, leaves a pensive CEO and disapparates with out a crack!