MMA, MSN, Yahoo and SEM…some observations from an armchair quarterback
Friday, July 31st, 2009It was everywhere this week - Yahoo and MSN/Live/Bing have joined forces to try to take a bite out of Google. The net was aflutter with buzz. Me? I yawned and kept on with my activities. You see, I’m a bit of an MMA fan, and the events of the last week in the world of mixed martial arts is strangely similar to what I see happening in search so it all feels a bit dated to me.
A quick rundown for those of you who don’t follow the sport - you’ve probably heard of UFC, the unquestioned market leader. If I say MMA, my mother won’t know what it is, but she’ll know UFC. To the casual observer, two guys fighting each other in a cage is now known as UFC. In essence, it’s the Kleenex of the mixed martial arts world. Much the same, people don’t “search” anymore, they “Google” something. I’ve heard people say they “Googled” something on Yahoo…I’m sure the brass at Yahoo love that.
Anyhow, due to the success of the 800 lb. gorillas that are UFC and Google, everyone’s trying to get a piece of the pie, but almost no one is succeeding (I’m looking at you Cuil). UFC has been challenged recently by rival promotions Strikeforce and Affliction. Affliction paid major dollars to bring in some serious star power (similar to renaming, rebranding and running a gazillion dollar ad campaign with a search engine), including the undisputed best heavyweight fighter in the world Fedor Emelianenko and the number three heavyweight in the world Josh Barnett. Obviously, these guys were spending serious money on talent and promotion, with pay per views lined up and expected to reach six figures for this coming weekend’s event. As it happened, the wheels fell off. Barnett tested positive for steroids, the company didn’t have money or depth in the roster to replace him on short notice, the event was canceled and the entire promotion folded in the span of three days. The slightly better run Strikeforce promotion (with a TV deal on Showtime) will likely absorb some of the fighters and press on, struggling to make a buck living in UFC’s ever larger shadow.
Being the best fighter in the world outside the UFC must be like being the best search expert in the world working for Ask.com. Photo courtesy of Sherdog.com.
The lesson here is that the war is over. UFC has already won. Sure, there will be pockets of turmoil, but things are firmly under control when it comes right down to it. You’ll notice the NFL’s rival leagues over the years (the USFL for example) never went anywhere, and the leagues that had any success as upstarts (the AFL and ABA) only managed a few successful franchises that eventually got engulfed by the undisputed leader.
What Yahoo and Microsoft fail to realize is that they’re fighting for scraps and it will never amount to more. They’re not reinventing the wheel here. People like Google, it works well and that’s that. I doubt they’ll pull an Affliction and fold in three days (hooray for diversification!) but the search game is one they can’t win without TRULY trying something different. Putting two guys in a cage, or giving me a search bar that returns results is just allowing me to watch UFC and Google something with a different label on it (and historically of lesser quality).
Either change the way the game is played, or go niche. Some examples:
- The WEC is a sister fight promotion to UFC that’s gotten popular with fight purists by having lighter weight classes which makes for more fast paced fights, but fewer explosive knockouts.
- Spock is a search engine focusing on finding people, and does a fine job of it. It helped me contact an old friend that I hadn’t been able to track down in five years - take that Google!
It’s not that there isn’t money to be made, it’s just that companies trying to beat products and services in a game where the established leader sets the standards and makes the rules is just foolhardy. You’re not going to take their market share away without changing expectations or some serious creative destruction in the market. Since the creative destruction does not appear to be coming, let’s wisen up a little bit, shall we?
