5 Questions with Federated Media’s John Battelle

Image via Businessweek.com

A quick glance at John Battelle’s resume is evidence enough that the founder & chairman of Federated Media Publishing is somewhat of a modern-day renaissance man. In addition to leading FM – the publishing company behind many of the most prominent blogs, sites, social networks and brands – he’s also a respected businessman, journalist, author, professor, blogger and conference programmer.

John’s diverse repertoire of expertise allows him to provide valuable insights about emerging trends in the digital space. He regularly addresses a number of hot-button topics on his blog, Searchblog, which covers the fusion of search, technology and media.

At 360i, we’re interested in those same topics as they pertain to the work we do on behalf of our clients in all areas of digital marketing and advertising – and we are always looking for ways to share thought leadership and continue the conversations that will ultimately propel our industry forward in new and exciting directions. I spoke with John about a few of the most “now” trends in digital, as well some things to look out for in 2010. The interview follows below:

[David Berkowitz]: Social search has been a hot topic for years, but now Google is experimenting with integrating results from one’s social graph into search results. Do you expect this kind of social search to now go mainstream?

[John Battelle]: Absolutely. “Social” is now mainstream, and search cannot but reflect the habits and usage patterns of the mainstream. Recent announcements of the integration of Twitter and Facebook into Bing and Google are harbingers of this. The real question is whether we’ll even need search “portals” anymore as our habits shift to a more mobile, social and less destination-driven interface for search.

[DB]: What will the value of real-time search be for marketers?

[JB]: If there’s a brand marketer who doesn’t want to know “what people are saying about my brand, right now,” I haven’t met them. Particularly if those people happen to be customers, potential customers, or influentials to the brand. So, the first use case is customer insight. The second use case is response: after listening, now I can respond in real time, using the tools of real-time search. One way is to market (i.e. put my responses next to real time search results), but another is to join the conversations and influence them by having my own brand platforms that are part of a particular real time conversation, and in that way become part of real time organic search results. Given that the platforms to join the conversation through marketing have yet to be built (but are coming, trust me), I recommend that brands build those platforms now. Once the marketing services are available, you can use them to supercharge your brand platforms.

[DB]: Has Twitter changed how you blog?

[JB]: Yes – in that it’s given me a lot more to blog about! Also, I use it to notify readers of new posts. And sure, I might post a quick observation to Twitter that I otherwise might have written in longer form on my blog.

[DB]: While Bing is the most literal Google competitor right now for search and advertising, do you view Twitter and Facebook as Google competitors?

[JB]: Without question. So does Google, in my humble opinion.

[DB]: While you’ll undoubtedly be blogging about this, what’s one Web 2.0 prediction you want to make for 2010?

[JB]: Yes, we’ll see both how I did in my 2009 predictions and what my 2010 predictions are in about a month or so! For now, the one prediction I am happy to make is that there will be more mobile searches than there will be PC-based ones on a monthly basis by the end of the year.