Ultimately, SBI’s success depends on the SEs… that’s the message in the sales literature. Social media is a recent thing; and still relatively unproven. Google has the majority of the SE market in many developed markets (not all).
Therefore, we can conclude that SBI’s success is dependent on Google’s favor. In other words, despite what we think, each SBI site whose majority traffic comes from Google has one customer, and one customer only: Google.
That’s okay when things are good. But now, it’s winter in the search engine world; and the plants, flowers & trees are withering. Some will survive, many will not. But right now, there is not much planting for websites. New sites may not get the traffic to survive from Google, and the rankings have clearly shifted in favor of commercial brands. This is unlikely to change.
And there are so many new sites started in the past few years that are struggling with traffic. My own site has seen traffic up & down 50%, now down by that much. With no solution in sight yet, many pre-mature site owners are simply walking or running to the exit. The income doesn’t pay for the site, the site doesn’t bring traffic … ergo why bother.
The glue that kept people engaged and working was the forums. Everyone is a member who owns a site. But the forums are now quieter than ever, much of the real talent & experience is either too busy, has given up caring or has left already. With lots of newbies asking already answered questions, there isn’t much sense of joining a community now as there used to be. That community is what used to act as a glue that helped stop people quitting early on. And it is vital. Building a website the SBI is a labor-intensive, time-intensive & $-intensive process, it really is.
However, the Panda report, the Penguin report, and now the … Report have all so far failed to find a successful formula that can bring back semi-dead sites. And sites are being sold, closed, transferred & dumped any old how. It’s not quite a flood… but that’s coming, I think. Once the snow starts to melt. Ironically.
Now we can quibble whether the sites should have been transferred to BB2 for us, we can quibble whether BB2 took too long to launch… whatever. Not really important now. It’s not just that BB2/SBI is the best of breed or not, it’s just been made irrelevant by the changes in Google results; the changes in expectations of users; and the march of technology.
What are you really paying for? Once you strip it away… what?
- A top notch course: yes.
- Keyword Research tool: yes.
- Basic Site Builder with a few frills: yes.
- Site Design Tools: yes
- Analyze Tool: yes
- Rock solid hosting: yes
- Mailing: yes
- Mailing Lists, etc: yes.
- Stats: yes
The course is still pretty good, IMHO. The KW research tool is basic, and not very informative… and may even be irrelevant; BB2 is glitch-filled, lacks basic facilities, and may be drag&drop but try pushing it to do complex pages… and you’ll soon run into problems. It’s only suitable for straight forward pages with one or two features… Site Design just recently went mobile… years after the Iphone was launched… The Analyze Tool (see KW) is now largely irrelevant as it stands and due for a makeover; the hosting is supposed to never go down… well, we know that worked well; mailing is a joke now… the Mailing List manager is from 1999; and the Stats are crude attempts at rendering useful numbers from the server logs….
But most people who’re looking at the product don’t know this. These problems may not be apparent, but that doesn’t mean visitors to the site can’t see them. Icebergs pop up, and you can see the top part… but you know underneath is much bigger. And you try to keep away.
I think the sale doesn’t work because of what’s lurking underneath: a set of tools that is increasingly outdated, a fact that is actually only emphasized by all the hurrah about the new tools being launched. Most people are thinking "… and then… "
People now expect websites to be responsive, fast & mobile friendly; people expect to use modern tools to build pages, tools that are as easy as Tumblr, WordPress & Facebook are to use; I never did KW before I joined SBI… didn’t see the point, just as I learned about KW Google pulled the rug out; … and so it goes on. The product is old, and shouting about how good the new ‘features’ are acutely emphasizes how old the product is.
Should it be like this, I don’t know. Could it be different? Yes. In a heartbeat.
Time is now running out for SBI. Why? Because the snow is melting slowly but surely. In short, the mojo is gone. And I think Ken knows it, hence the changes in his team, the possible new products in the pipeline… etc. But I suspect the rate of site-closures is now accelerating, and will continue for the next 9-12 months.
So what plan should you have? In short, I believe that you should hope for the best outcome: a final resolution for the PPP-nightmares that actually works; and prepare for the worst: the potential closure or ending of SBI within that time scale. In reality, what will happen will be somewhere between those two extremes.
Cover your ass! Keep copies of anything important! Back up your site! And avoid putting all your eggs in this basket, at least until the chickens start laying again in Spring.
Don’t mistake me: Spring will come, it must. But you must hunker down to survive, in whatever fashion you think is appropriate for your business. And start planning for your website for Spring & Summer.