It has bothered me for the past several years now that it seems both Google and the mainstream media treat Google's main revenue driver, main product and service in such an underrepresented manner. I see media and Google talk about almost everything Google, outside of core search topics.
So when John Mueller of Google brought it up in this most recent podcast, I figured I'd write about it. John at around the 42 second mark into the podcast brought it up in terms of why Google Search in general is underrepresented at Google I/O. I wonder the same thing. I also wonder why if Google makes a tweak to let's say how Google Assistant works, it gets so much more play from the media than if Google makes a change to how core Search works. I mean, yes, Google Assistant is important, but people use core Search way more than Assistant.
John said:
One of the things I always notice at I/O is-- or I don't know, not always, but every now and then notice-- is that Search seems to be more of like a side topic there. And I think that kind of makes sense because there's just so many things around developers that happen around at Google that Search is, well, just like one small part of everything around Google. But it's-- I don't know-- it feels like something where maybe we should have a little bit more presence, or what do you think, Martin, Gary, should Search be more visible at I/O?
Gary quickly joked "I don't think." But Martin Splitt made a good point that Google I/O is mostly developer focused, not consumer focused. Google Search, at its core, is consumer focused. Yes, there are developer related aspects, and often Google will have sessions on that at I/O. But things like Google Cloud, Tensor Flow, etc get more of the attention at I/O because those are developer focused.
Then as a funny jab at I/O, John said he tried to do some searches to find content presented at I/O but since the I/O site was not search friendly, not much came up. :)
But I always wonder why big media will cover every little blip from Google on topics not search related but when Google releases a big, let's say core update and confirms it, no one covers it. These core updates impact businesses and change what people see in search. Searchers are impacted, although they do not realize. Business that are impacted can be hit in a huge way. I am surprised big media doesn't cover core search changes and feature changes more, because it touches on most of the world (everyone uses Google to search) and it has huge impacts on online businesses. Heck, even big corporations can see their rankings drop, and then their online sales drop as a result, which then may impact their earnings report next quarter.
Again, it surprises me that big media doesn't give this space more attention. Maybe our niche search blogs got it covered well enough?
Here is the video where this conversation happened, it starts pretty much right away, 45 seconds in:
Forum discussion at Twitter.
