Replies

#1, yes it was beta and folks knew where it was, I used it months ago... and as I said, when something "killer" comes out on the net and its publicly available it doesn't need marketing.. word of mouth makes it get its own attention.. if it offers something better.

Google never MARKETED their search with superbowl ads, they put out a search engine that kicked ass, and word of mouth grew the business.

A killer net application like SEARCH doesn't need super bowl ads to get traffic.. if it offers serious improvement over the competitors folks find it! Happened with Altavista (hell that was a skunk works project, and happened with Google).

If MSN had a silver bullet the word of mouth alone would have built up traffic to their search... it hasn't because its just "more of the same".

Search is a fundamental action of the net, if you have the better mousetrap, you get the users.. just try and keep something secret if its killer and publicly available.

Trust me, I know the search industry, what MSN is offering is nothing that has or will excite the masses.

"yes it was beta and folks knew where it was, I used it months ago"

Most folks did not have any idea where it was.
You couldn't even easily find it on Microsoft's own web site.
When I mentioned msn search beta to some ladies at my office, they hadn't even heard of it.
You knew and I knew. That doesn't mean lost men in the street knew.
This is precisely why Microsoft is launching a huge marketing campaign to make the man in the street familiar with Microsoft's superb new search engine.

"and as I said, when something "killer" comes out on the net and its publicly available it doesn't need marketing.. word of mouth makes it get its own attention.. if it offers something better."

How long do these "killer" thingys last for?

ICQ used to dominate chat, now yahoo does.
Alta vista used dominate search, now google does.

Will Microsoft's marketing (and superb search technologies)take share away from Google by a year's time? I'll bet that on that.

"A killer net application like SEARCH doesn't need super bowl ads to get traffic"

I'll bet you right here, that Microsoft search traffic has a big spike when its advertised on the Super Bowl.
How much you wanna bet? (money will be given to charity of course)

"If MSN had a silver bullet the word of mouth alone would have built up traffic to their search... it hasn't because its just "more of the same"

The new MSN search just went live yesterday.
Again I'll bet you that msn search will have a bigger share a year from now than it does today.
How about that?

"Trust me, I know the search industry, what MSN is offering is nothing that has or will excite the masses."

Wouldn't trust you even if my enemy's life depended on it. :)

Even he deserves better than that.