Search 2.0 - Find the information that matters

We're living in the Information Overload Era.

Let's face it: there's no way you can keep up with the rate of new information that knocks on your door every day.
New e-mail messages, new RSS feeds, new podcasts, new blog posts, new Twitter messages, new Digg submissions, new LinkedIn updates, new Flickr photos... you name it!

Being able to find the real interesting stuff is the real challenge.

Search engines, like the almighty Google, have definitely provided answers to this problem.

However I believe that today we have resources to enhance the quality of our search results.

Enter Search 2.0.


The real interesting information in the world spreads like a virus.

It works like this: You've found a cool site and you tell 5 friends about it. Each friend talks about the site to another 5 friends. And it goes on and on.

In Marketing, this behavior is called Viral Marketing.



The Dark Knight Marketing Campaign has used this technique to promote the movie. So has Cloverfield.

So the point is: the cool and interesting information travels from people like you to people like me, and vice-versa.

How can you leverage this?

Today there's so many social networks where people trade photos, links, experiences... One of the most popular social networks is called Twitter.

Image via CrunchBase

Because every message that you sent via Twitter is public: you can search all conversations via twitter to find the real cool interesting information!

Just go to http://search.twitter.com and start searching for the topic of your interest!

But I already got my list of RSS Feeds!

You have to free your mind! RSS feeds are cool! I also have a list of RSS feed of my favorite authors. However, there's a lot more going on in the web besides your favorite author's articles.

You can't imagine the list of great articles that I've discovered using search queries like http://search.twitter.com/search?q=business+model.

And guess what: you can subscribe to your search queries via RSS and get notified every time a new result appears. Top that!

Why should you care?

If you're an entrepreneur:
- Time is a critical resource. Find the cool interesting stuff as soon as it is found!

If you're a company:
- Monitor what customers/fans say about your brand
- Check what the competition is doing

If you're in the marketing business:
- Be notified every time someone searches for a product or service that your company sells and make the call to action.
For example: Monitor search queries for management software and reply directly to your potential customer. This way you will instantly find yourself talking to an interested customer.

Guy Kawasaki has written a great article about how you can use Twitter as a tool and has online magazine rack” of popular topics called AllTop.com.

How are you using the Search 2.0 to find new cool stuff?