Bubble S1E3: Why Google+ Failed

Google+ was supposed to be what Instagram is today. It was designed to be a social media platform where users could share everything: emails, tweets, photos, videos, whatever you can think of. That's quite different from other social media platforms.

Instagram and TikTok are optimized for images and video.

Twitter is best for sharing short-form content.

LinkedIn is ideal for professional, formal conversations.

Facebook, well, even I’m not so sure anymore.

Google+ was designed for all of that. It still failed. Why?

Google+ was an ambitious effort, but in hindsight, an unrealistic one.

About Google+

Google+ was actually Google’s fourth, and most industrious attempt at a social media platforms. It launched in 2011 and was designed to be the ultimate social platform.

Google+ users could post photos, update their status, and categorize connections in their network based on how they knew them (for example, as school friends, or colleagues) into “Circles”, which was a precursor to group chats.

You could text or video-call your connections on Google Hangouts, and edit and upload photos to your private cloud. Even Mark Zuckerberg was concerned. He led a company-wide “lockdown” to signal to employees that they were to dedicate their efforts into bringing Facebook’s features in line with Google+.

Within a month, Google+ had 25 million users. Two years later, that number grew to 540 million.

In April 2019, Google+ shut down for good.

Why Google+ Failed

Here’s an interesting stat: 80% of software products fail.

There are many reasons why. A bad team, bloated tech, poor sales and marketing, slow execution, late entry into a saturated market are some of the biggest ones.

Google+ had a fantastic team, the best tech, a bottomless sales and marketing budget and it wasn’t a late entrant. Why did it still fail?

Pretty simple reason. They didn’t understand what their users wanted. They tried to make a product for everyone. Google+ saw a gap in the market, but they didn’t consider whether there was a market in the gap.

You don’t need to be a designer to notice bad design. Google+ was riddled with a poor interface and user experience, and users found Google Circles confusing. Unlike Facebook, where “friends” have a two-way connection, this wasn’t the case with Google+. This meant that users could create their own Circles, but they wouldn’t always know the other users in that circle.

If that’s confusing, it’s because it is.

Google+ wasn’t late into the social media scene, but by the time it launched a mobile app, Facebook was unbeatable and developed many of the features on Google+, such as Facebook Groups, Marketplace, and Messenger.

Being first is sometimes the quickest way to finish last.

Google+ was a social media platform with a learning curve. Users didn't appreciate that.

What can we learn from Google+

Know your market

The main reason why Google+ failed is because it didn’t think about what its users wanted. They made a product that was designed to be something for everyone. The problem with such products is that nobody wants to use them.

Design is everything

The thing about great design is that you’ll never pay attention to it. When something is badly designed, you’ll never notice everything else that works. Google+ had great features, but user engagement plummeted because it was so hard to use.

Their problem > Your solution

Google+ failed because it didn’t fill a gap in the market or solve a problem their users faced. It was a solution that was a bit like (5-3=2) when (1+1=2) was already there.

Constraints breed creativity

Instagram and Twitter succeeded because of intelligent limitations. Limitations allow both apps and users to come up with creative ways to stay within and wander outside the lines. On the other hand, Facebook isn't as popular as it once was because they're making the Google+ mistake: becoming everything for everyone.

Takeaway

How do I turn my limitations into my unique advantage?

The riches are in the niches