Last week’s WSJ article, Google Sees Amazon, Facebook, Kayak as Competitors, highlights what Google considers to be their competitors based on their Annual Report. For the first time, Google is not just considering Microsoft and Yahoo competitors, but has added a host of companies in the ecommerce space, such as eBay, Kayak, Amazon, and even social networks.
Looking at it from their point of view, I guess I understand. But as I’ve been thinking about Google from a retail perspective, I’ve seen them as a larger threat to the eCommerce platform and service providers – not the marketplaces or social networks.
Amazon and eBay are two of Google’s largest search customers. So if I were Google, I’d think of those entities as partners versus the competition. Just a thought…
