Google Buzz launches: 5 first look tips for PR and marketing practitioners

This evening Google announced its newest social media service, called Google Buzz. 

The much talked about new system takes your Google email, address book and instant messenger and gives them social features such as those found in Twitter. On its blog post announcing the launch of Google Buzz, it is described as "a way to start conversations about the things you find interesting and share updates, photos, videos and more." 

Reactions from watchers have been varied. Some are saying it will be the Twitter/Facebook/Foursquare/Friendfeed killer. Others say it's Google's play on reorganising the world of email. Some say it will be bridge a gap to Googe Wave. 

I'm thinking some initial thoughts and key issues though for PR and marketing practitioners who may want to have a top line view on what this new launch means and how much time to invest in looking at how it should be treated. Here are five first takes from me whilst I devour the launch 'buzz' and have a play with the service myself: 

1. Google Buzz will integrate very nicely with mobile phones and maps. So this will further impact mobile social networking and online communities on the go. This could affect events PR and marketing quickly
2. It will be easy to use (where many say Twitter isn't). Google Buzz has already been described as something so simple 'your mother' would use it, according to one watcher I'm following
3. Search engines will find content much more easily than with content on Twitter. For brands this is a reputation management issue
4. For PR people, the address book has always been valuable. Whatever your current email address book is, exporting it into Gmail as well will create an instant social network
5. There will be an 'enterprise' version of Google Buzz coming soon. This will change the way internal communications works as well (and might thwn also create the Yammer.com killer)

Comments

[Richard Verbeek]

Great post Drew. It will be particulary interesting to see how Buzz will fit into the greater picture with Google Wave, as Wave is still confusing to a lot of people and Buzz may become an entry point for many people. Unfortunately I don't have access to Buzz yet myself but I am keen to get a play with it.

[Buck Lawrimore]

From a positioning standpoint, this is a "me too" product. I don't think it will have any negative impact on Facebook or Twitter, which are positioned as market leaders. It's more likely to be a "quiet alternative" like GoogleFriends turned out to be. Too little too late. Enterprise applications are another matter - it may find a niche there.

[Christine E-L]

My mother is already using Buzz - scary.

[Darlene Fiske]

I'll be looking forward to trying it out too. I hope it lets me import addresses from Entourage. Otherwise, I know 2 people with gmail addresses... I don't know how it could be easier to use than Twitter? There is always a learning curve, and to me Twitter is pretty straightforward. I always feel a little overwhelmed when I log in to gmail because Google is trying to do everything for everyone. To be continued....

[Chris Norton]

Interesting stuff Drew. I don't really use GMAIL that much I tend to have it push emails into my Outlook and I know they are looking at ways to do this too. I am not sure this is going to be as huge as many think it is but I will certainly be watching it with interest. I still find GMAIL to be a bit cumbersome although it does have some good features.