Make Money Online- the baby steps part 33

In this guide of “Make Money Online- the baby steps part 33″ we will try to predict some fo the future trends for the internet and look to unveil useful information and opportunities. A lot has changed on the internet during the last couple of years and yet a lot remains the same. Some of it is about the Google Panda update. And a whole lot of it is about Google. But there are other gems to take into account as well. Let´s take a look at the list for things to watch out for during the remainder of 2012 and probably into 2013 as well.

1. The Google Intelligence Central. Google has tweaked it ever so slightly. But the writing is on the wall. While a lot of people have been focusing on Facebook integrity issues, the true powerhous of personal information has gone largely undetected for some time. But new policies as of lately are shgifting the tide. Google now has a new policy which allows them to share and integrate information on you across platforms. What this means in layman terms is that Google will know a whole lot more about you than you would probably want them to.

To some extent this is the price we pay in order to be able to use “free” Google products and services. But we need to be aware of the fact that your search history, your Google toolbar, your profiles, your chrome, your Google+, and your Youtube accounts are giving away a far more detailed story about yourself than you might be aware of. That information will enable Google to provide you more personalized content. Thus when two people search for the same keyword, they might end up with different search results, based on the pool of information that Google has about them.

2. Facebook peaks. While there is little to support this item on the list we added it anyways. With a market share of some 65% of the social networking pie Facebook is as big as they come. The IPO is coming up any day now, and Google+ has been safely tucked away under the 1% mark (market share). Things just couldn´t look brighter for Zuckerberg and company. In some way we feel the same way about Facebook today that we did about Barack Obama as he took office. The honeymoon is rapidly approaching its end and popularity can´t really go much higher. The Facebook price tag also seems steep. Valued at $ 100 billion, the company is set to earn roughly $ 1.3 billion in the first year as a publicly traded stock. To put that into perspective, Google has a P/E of 20 and a healthy yearly profit of $ 10 billion.

While Facebook is likely to remain a social networking juggernaut we certainly feel this IPO is timed to perfection. Facebook still has things to prove when it comes to monetizing and while they certainly have the customer base for it, they may find it is a bit more difficult than Google made it seem. Facebook knows who you pretend to be. Google knows who you really are. Who do you think has a better chance of customizing their marketing strategy to your needs?

3. The Google middle-man. Google has moved more and more of the content to its own page, thus eliminating the need in many cases to actually click through to the website with the helpful content. There is a fine line to watch out for. Should they decide to pick up the pace even further we expect the copyright infringement cases to start stock-piling. While Google claims it is enhancing the user experience (and to some extent that is true), they are at the same time using content that others have created in order to keep people on their own platform, which incidentally maximizes profits for Google.

The concept is by no means new. Google has employed variations of it with great success on Google News, Google Books, Google Images, Google places, and YouTube (owned by Google). Obviously there is a tipping point where further cannibalism from Google will alienate the content providers too much. We feel that this issue, will regulate itself in the long run. Google might push it a bit too much in the coming years, and then they will probably be forced to give some of the ground back. Nevertheless, it´s an important trend to be aware of.

4. Growth of handheld traffic. The web trafic from handheld devices will continue to grow at an aggressive pace throughout 2012, and will likely spill over into the coming years as well. Mobile phones and tablet devices are gaining market shares both in terms of hardware as well as software and web traffic. Obviously, you need to pay attention to this strong trend when developing your website. You might also like to adapt your longer-term strategy to the fact that some 20 % of web searches will be operated on mobile devices in 2012, and that this market share will be even higher in the years to come.

5. The app bonanza. The app market is continuing its growth. Gartner has estimated the app market at some $ 29.5 billion in 2013. And there is still plenty of room for underlying user growth. The western markets are far from saturated and in emerging markets the race hasn´t even begun yet. Are we moving towards a post-PC era or is this just a short-term trend that will run out of steam eventually? Will tablets replace PC:s or simply complement them when it comes to lesser tasks like surfing the web? Regardless of the answers to these questions we believe there is still plenty of opportunity in the app market. The wild west environment of the app market is where the web was some 10 years ago. Full of controlled chaos and directionless growth, we feel the mouthwatering opportunities for this market are simply too promising to overlook for internet entrepreneurs. First-mover advantage is still there to some extent and there are air pockets of unmet demand to cater to. And the beauty of it all is that the risk/reward is assymetrical in nature. It will set you back a little more than a website, depending on whether you go for an IOS or an Android app, or both. On the other hand, these are the customers you want to reach. All reports show that the average Ipad user has a much higher median income and an increased level of discretionary income. On top of that, Ipad owners are much more likely to shop than people using other devices. A complelling market indeed.

6. Google changes the SEO game. SEO remain important, but less so than before. Content-rich sites like news-sites are better of with the Panda update. Rcent posts will be given higher priority. Links are losing value. At least the low-quality (or bought) ones. Page ranks is out of style. Basically, it comes down to fresh, regular, great content- not too heavy on the advertising and no creative link-cheating. Follow these simple mini-trends and you should be in good shape for some time to come.

7. E-books. With tablet and reader devices shooting through the roof, e-book sales are now beginning to seriously affect our reading habits. The massive drops in paperback and hardcover titles has been accompanied by what must be viewed as the breakthrough of digital books. There are several key factors playing a role. The biggest one is most definitely the big jump in gadget ownership during the last couple of years. But there are some benefits to e-books. What we like most is that it takes under a minute to start reading. Gone is the transportation costs, the waiting and the physical storage. Going away on a weekend, but not sure what book to take along? Bring your whole library. Want to stay up late and read? No problem, you are covered. We still see some advantages that physical books have, the main one being that you are more likely to be able to lay on a sandy beach and read a book than a tablet. And some tablets don´t really offer a good read in daylight. We feel that theese are issues that will soon be in our past. Not only are e-books here to stay. They are likely to take over as THE medium of choice for book afficionados during the next decade or so, and there are great opportunities in this market. Also, we feel that the first-mover advantage is still there for the crafty businessman. Publishing hurdles are lower, self-promotion is less complicated and the pricing structure can represent a real opportunity. We strongly feel that this is certainly the time to jump on the bandwagon.

8. Flash goes HTML 5. Adobe will finish the HTML5 implementation of flash and the cirle, thus, will be complete. HTML5 is likely to begin to gain a more permanent foothold. We are also very interested in what this will mean longer-term for the mega-trending app market.

9. The cloud. We feel more mobile than ever. To a large extent that has to do with a number of fantastic apps and software that are utilizing the power of the cloud. Whether you are using it as a storage resource (e g Dropbox) or you are utilizing the synchronization capabilities it offers to simplify you planning (e g Evernote), the cloud is what´s operating unde the hood making it all possible. We are expecting an everincreasing amont of content migration to the cloud. More and more applications will utilize its power and we stronly believe that we ain´t seen nothing yet. We are only in the infancy of the revolution that the cloud represents, and we are sure that we will see a number of exciting twists and turns during the next couple of years.

10. SOPA. The SOPA  (Stop Online Piracy Act) has been condemned on the internet throughout the world, yet we believe that Washington politicians will be unable to hold of the lobbyists for too long. While the government claims it is only an attempt to come to terms with online piracy, critical voices condemn the bill claiming that it represents a way of censourship of the internet. We believe that a bill of this kind will pass sooner rather than later. We do not believe that it will effect some of the giant social networking sites as many critics fear. We do however feel that it is likely that the outcome will have a highly negative effect on smaller website operators and the internet as a whole. Oh, and as far as internet censourship is concerned we believe that any bill that is passed in the future will contain elements that can and will be used as censourship means, yet labeled as something else. After all, they are politicians.

That sums up some of the key trends of 2012 and probably also 2013 that we feel are important. We have focused somewhat on trends that we feel represent moneymaking opportunities or threats to existing online businesses. Somebody else would make a completely different list, and that´s ok. We do not pretend to know it all. We have made guesses based on our experience, and we will be quite interested in how some of our guesses turn out. But let´s leave it at that and turn our focus to the next part of our guide. “Make Money Online- the baby steps part 34″.