4 ms·

The error is in believing that people are "trying to get to your site". Be real. What people are trying to do is "get their shipping status". If you want to

by cxr 6y ago

The error is in believing that people are "trying to get to your site". Be real. What people are trying to do is "get their shipping status". If you want to say that eliminating steps and allowing people to get what they want without having to go through your site means that you lose the opportunity to push other sales on them or something, then okay, fine, make that argument. But be honest about it, and don't try to frame things as if your foremost concern is for what the people want, instead of what it really is—which is trying to optimize for conditions that are best for you, the party that the people are otherwise made to deal with.

tyingq 6y ago
Yes, they want shipping status. I don't dispute that. But maybe I have adjacent info that's helpful, like return instructions, or what to do if there's damage, shipping status for other active orders, or "how to configure" info, etc. And Google will take it farther and shift future potential sales to places that they can monetize. Taking away all of the customer interactions from businesses affects their revenue and ability to deliver good service. Google is choking off small businesses. The asymmetric relationship isn't sustainable. Google benefits a lot from scraping all this info and returns little.
elliottinvent 6y ago
I think the danger is that it's "control creep", Google collect so much information that no one needs your website. Then Google offer a way for people to buy your products simply. Then they prioritise your competitors that use Google's offering because it's simpler for the user. Then you have to use Google to sell your products too. Then the price goes up or you get removed from the listings for some arbritary reason with no support.
ardy42 6y ago
>> Yes. This seems very transparently a way for google to hijack customers trying to get to your site for shipping status. > If you want to say that eliminating steps and allowing people to get what they want without having to go through your site means that you lose the opportunity to push other sales on them or something, then okay, fine, make that argument. But be honest about it, and don't try to frame things as if your foremost concern is for what the people want, instead of what it really is—which is trying to optimize for conditions that are best for you, the party that the people are otherwise made to deal with. If we're going to be honest, we have to frame this as Google trying to grab an opportunity to push other sales on users, not as a them trying to get people what they want faster. And while we're being honest, we also have to acknowledge that Google is already extraordinarily powerful (as shown by the assumption that "eliminating steps" means "eliminating non-Google interactions"), and giving them this kind of data only makes them more so.

by cxr 6y ago

tyingq 6y ago

Yes, they want shipping status. I don't dispute that. But maybe I have adjacent info that's helpful, like return instructions, or what to do if there's damage, shipping status for other active orders, or "how to configure" info, etc. And Google will take it farther and shift future potential sales to places that they can monetize. Taking away all of the customer interactions from businesses affects their revenue and ability to deliver good service. Google is choking off small businesses. The asymmetric relationship isn't sustainable. Google benefits a lot from scraping all this info and returns little.

elliottinvent 6y ago

I think the danger is that it's "control creep", Google collect so much information that no one needs your website. Then Google offer a way for people to buy your products simply. Then they prioritise your competitors that use Google's offering because it's simpler for the user. Then you have to use Google to sell your products too. Then the price goes up or you get removed from the listings for some arbritary reason with no support.

ardy42 6y ago

>> Yes. This seems very transparently a way for google to hijack customers trying to get to your site for shipping status. > If you want to say that eliminating steps and allowing people to get what they want without having to go through your site means that you lose the opportunity to push other sales on them or something, then okay, fine, make that argument. But be honest about it, and don't try to frame things as if your foremost concern is for what the people want, instead of what it really is—which is trying to optimize for conditions that are best for you, the party that the people are otherwise made to deal with. If we're going to be honest, we have to frame this as Google trying to grab an opportunity to push other sales on users, not as a them trying to get people what they want faster. And while we're being honest, we also have to acknowledge that Google is already extraordinarily powerful (as shown by the assumption that "eliminating steps" means "eliminating non-Google interactions"), and giving them this kind of data only makes them more so.