Google's half-hearted attempt at selling eBooks

After much fanfare and many delays, Google finally opened its eBookstore in the UK earlier this month. When it was announced way back in 2009 that Google Editions was to be launched, many were expecting an Amazon killer; however in that time the Kindle has come and conquered and even the iBookstore has opened. So now that its been renamed and launched, what exactly does the eBookstore offer?

Well, nothing out of the ordinary really. It comes across as almost being half-hearted; something that's very difficult to level at Google normally.

The site itself is a very Google looking, clean and simple ecommerce store. There are some nice features, but nothing that would justify such a delay. This may suggest that it wasn't the store that held Google back but negotiations with publishers.

Let's take a closer look at how Google has gone about the business of selling eBooks.

The homepage is unmistakably Google. It carries the company's clean, unfussy and accessible approach to the web and this theme continues throughout the site. Above the fold is dominated by a central banner that advertises featured eBooks as well as the different ways that you can consume Google's eBooks.

The site is split into two main columns, the largest of which advertises new and notable eBooks in JavaScript carousels. The left hand column is the primary navigation with your personalised account block, a list of top-selling titles and then the primary list of eBook categories.

It's all pretty unremarkable really.

Google practically owns the web and so launching any new product, app or site will be a relatively painless affair for them. However Google Wave and Buzz are fresh enough in the memory to prove that this isn't enough to guarantee success. With Amazon dominating the eBook market I had expected Google's approach to its eBookstore be more, well, considered.

With many of Amazon's Kindle editions being cheaper, why should you buy from the eBookstore? There is no value proposition on the homepage or product pages and ultimately nothing to entice me away from Amazon. Compare this to Kobo, which is taking a more aggressive approach to its positioning. On its homepage you're greeted with:

Over 1 million FREE eBooks available. Search for your FREE read today!

Immediately there is at least one reason to choose Kobo over Google or Amazon.

This almost hubristic approach from Google is one reason why Wave and Buzz failed to take off. The only remarkable thing about these initiatives was just how unremarkable they were.

When Google+ launched, it was faced with staring down the behemoth that is Facebook and the company's approach changed accordingly. Circles and Hangouts were truly innovative and before Facebook retaliated, it gave users a genuine reason to sign up. It's a shame this attitude wasn't extended to its eBookstore.

The eBook pages continue this underwhelming theme, although there are some nice features. The layout is similar to Amazon's but includes much more information above the fold.

At Packt, we continually survey customers and website visitors to understand what it is they want from our product pages and what it is that convinces them to buy from us. The number one feature that users want is actually quite simple and obvious: a detailed product description. Google is obviously asking the same questions as this description sits right at the top of the page:

Compare this to Amazon's approach, which treats customers almost as if they've made the decision to purchase before reaching the product page:

The second most popular factor that our customers highlight as convincing them to buy is customer reviews and again, Google has made this a key feature of its page. These appear above the fold and are clearly an important factor in its conversion strategy. 

Interestingly, Google has positioned the +1 button underneath the star rating at the top of the page. This acts not only as Google's own rating system for users but perhaps reinforces its importance as a key element in search ranking. Note that there are no links or widgets for Twitter or Facebook anywhere on this page; how significant is that?

What I found frustrating about Google's product pages is the lack of navigation away from it. This tactic is often taken to focus conversion from that page, however I see this as a bit of an oversight. Amazon, and most ecommerce websites, enable users to view other categories from its product pages. Not Google though. While a related titles carousel enables users to view similar eBooks, the only links to a category are right at the bottom of the page; and that takes you to the categories the book is listed under, not a full listing. Google seems to have prioritised navigation among its other apps and websites over categories in its store. 

Let's take a look at some of the positives.

When users hover over an eBook in a carousel or category, a pop-up appears detailing all the important things customers look for when deciding whether or not to buy. Buy now buttons enable users to add to cart without visiting the product page.

One thing that Google could introduce to improve this, and their average order value, is to enable users to continue shopping in the store when the buy button has been clicked. Instead, the default behaviour is to take you straight to the cart. While this is standard on product pages, buying from a category page should give users an option. 

The absence of being able to buy from category pages or search results has long been one of my criticisms of Amazon's website, actually, perhaps my only criticism. I would expect to see this feature being added by Amazon before Christmas 2011 comes around. 

At the bottom of product pages is bibliographic information, which includes the aforementioned category links. To the right of this is a QR code and perhaps the first time I've seen this used on an ecommerce product page. I spent some time thinking through why Google would add this, especially when two thirds of consumers don't know what a QR code is. 

Scanning this takes you to exactly the same page and this actually makes some sense. Google is selling eBooks, which are primarily read on mobile devices. Providing users with the opportunity to scan from their PC or laptop onto their mobile device, enabling them to download direct, is well thought out. 

Despite these features, on this evidence, I'm not convinced that the eBookstore will compete with Amazon any time soon. There are simply not enough reasons for consumers to switch right now. 

With Amazon stocking more eBooks and having locked Kindle users into buying direct, I can't see Google competing. This is why I'm surprised that Google isn't pushing its eBookstore more to Android users. Here they have a captive and locked-in audience and the ability to establish a market share more quickly. Maybe this is part two of its strategy and if that's the case, it needs to be rolled out sooner rather than later. 

Will Google block websites that host copyrighted material?

The FT is reporting that Google will being approached by the British Government and urged to block websites from its search results that host copyrighted material for free download.

The attention will focus on advertisers and credit card companies to take, what the Government call "reasonable steps" to make life more difficult for websites that flout copyright.

We intend to take measures to make it more and more difficult to access sites that deliberately facilitate infringement, misleading consumers and depriving creators of a fair reward for their creativity.

This is welcomed news for publishers, especially with the continued rise in eBook sales. But will it do any good?

For Packt, the majority, and if not all, of the websites that illegally host copies of our eBooks for free download, are based outside of the UK. So will the Government put pressure on Google to roll this out across all of its search engines and sites that profit from AdWords across all territories?

I hope that this announcement will act as the start of a movement towards an agreement with hosting companies and search engines that should apply to all domains, regardless of where they're hosted and what countries they serve.

Full article here.

Has Google search peaked?

The launch of Google+ has been reported as another attempt to grab a share of the social market and create another platform for its AdWords business. Whether or not it is successful is for another debate, I'm more interested in the reason for its launch.

With Facebook growing to 750m accounts and a newly announced partnership with Skype, any attempt to launch a competitor is a bold, bold move. I wonder whether it's because they don't see their long-term future in search?

Does Google see the web, and search with it, moving away from search engines? In fact, is it already moving this way? If they were standalone search engines, YouTube would be the second biggest in the world, with Facebook in third and also Amazon and eBay featuring in the top ten. Admittedly this highlights how Bing, Yahoo et al have failed to make a dent into Google’s dominance, however it also illustrates how people are visiting a circle of trusted sites and using them as their search engines.

So does this mean the web is getting smaller? We’re using YouTube to search for videos, Amazon for products and its Kindle for books, eBay for auctions, Facebook to search for people and even brands.  Has Google been marginalised as a website that provides answers to broad questions? And what does this mean for start up websites? How do they break into this group of trusted websites? Is niche, specific ecommerce or truly innovative unique websites the way forward?

Google's Panda update reduces traffic but raises its quality?

I've noticed this week that our daily visits to PacktPub.com have dropped by around 12%, which reverses the longer-term trend of growth. I've looked through Google Analytics to see why this could be and the only referrer of traffic that has had much change is search and in particular, Google.

It would appear that we've been affected by Google's roll out of its Panda Update in the UK this week, which has hit many content based websites and in particular, those that publish articles and information on technology related subjects. This update comes not long after it was revealed how Google's results were easily being spammed by sites such as JCPenney, with the perception that this was lowering its overall quality and variety. Google says that the update was designed to hit content farms the most, however it is also affecting legitimate websites. You can see the impact of this update quite vividly in this article.

Looking closer at the stats is interesting, however. The screenshot below is from Google Analytics and compares Sunday to Thursday this week with the same period last week. Note that Google's update was rolled out on April 11, which is when the gap starts to appear.

This suggests that visits from search are down by almost 21% on the previous week; quite a drop. However it also looks as though the traffic that is being directed from search has improved in quality. The number of pages viewed per visit has increased by 5% and the visitors referred by search are on the site for 12 seconds longer. Tellingly, the bounce rate, which measures the number of people who leave the site after viewing only one page is down.

So how is this affecting revenue from search? If we look at the ecommerce value of these search referrals, we've generated more revenue from fewer referrals. Revenue is up 22%, conversion up 25% and the value per visit from search is up over 50%.

Therefore it would appear that despite taking a hit from Google's update, it seems to have achieved what it intended: to help people find better search results. Our traffic, despite being lower, is bringing in more quality visits who are more likely to buy. It's still early days since Panda was launched and only time will tell if this trend will continue.