Everyone Wants Readers Except Google Inc (GOOG)

Providing them with an endless feed of content they’re likely interested in is a good way to keep them in the Facebook ecosystem longer and open up new advertising opportunities. News apps, in general, generate the longest user sessions.

But Facebook will need a premium product and excellent marketing to attract a large audience to its new Reader app. The competition is fierce, and it’s not the first social network to venture into the territory. Twitter, by its very nature, is practically a news aggregator. LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD) entered the arena with its purchase of Pulse in April.

Pulse provides LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD) with a built-in user base of 30 million readers and a platform to keep its 200 million users engaged. LinkedIn Corp (NYSE:LNKD)’s users are far less engaged than Facebook’s, but the company has been making strides to change that. It redesigned its homepage and introduced the Influencers program to generate unique content.

As a result, average page views continue to climb, growing 63% in the first quarter. More page views leads to more advertising revenue from its Marketing Solutions service, which rose 56% year-over-year in the first quarter and has seen sequential growth for six of the last eight quarters.

Google’s loss

The likeliest winner of Google Reader’s lost users is some private company. Dozens are working on replacements or alternatives that will go head-to-head with Facebook, AOL, and Pulse.

But what’s interesting is that Google, with its sizable social network and its Google News service, didn’t try to integrate Reader more closely with those two products. Google, unlike the other companies mentioned in this article, isn’t concerned with engagement. By its very nature, it sends users away from its website.

Some other company will build a service that people love to use and get tens of millions of people using their platform. Maybe then Google will buy it, and we can have our Google Reader back.

Adam Levy has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool recommends Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn. The Motley Fool owns shares of Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn. Adam is a member of The Motley Fool Blog Network — entries represent the personal opinion of the blogger and are not formally edited.

The article Everyone Wants Readers Except Google originally appeared on Fool.com is written by Adam Levy.

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