Google Wave and marketing: The future of online communications?

If you haven't heard about Google Wave yet, you will soon.  Google announced this upcoming product a few months ago to a lot of fanfare.  A solid launch date hasn't been publicized yet.  If Google Wave is a success, it could change the game for digital marketing and open up a ton of new possibilities -- not to mention change or outdate many current practices.

First, what is Google Wave?  Google calls it "a new model for communication and collaboration on the web."  If you want the details, the Google Wave site features an 80-minute video that describes Wave and a few short pages that give you the basic idea quickly.  From what I've seen in the sneak peeks so far, it looks like a combination of a bunch of things you already know and use -- but all in one place.  Here's a short rundown of what it is (and isn't):

• It's like email, but it's not.  It's like an email in its push delivery, but it's much more collaborative than email.  However, if Google Wave is as successful as the company hopes, waves will become as ubiquitous as email, to the point where "email me about that" might be replaced with "start a wave about that."  Google Wave is the first format I've seen that I really see as supplanting email at some point in the future.  It could be 10 or 20 years from now, but if it catches on, Wave could be an email killer.

• It's like a private blog, but it's not.  For starters, blogs are public and waves have a more private nature.  But also note that blogs are a one-way communication device that allow feedback and comments to be posted below the entry.  The feedback never truly becomes an integral element of the conversation -- it's just an add-on.  But with a wave, anything written will end up being a collaboration.  Imagine if you could edit this blog post in real time, and have others see what you changed.  They'd still be able to see my original text if they wanted to, but now you'd have the ability to weigh in.

• It's like a wiki, but it's not.  A wiki allows collaboration, but it doesn't have a built-in distribution mechanism like email or an instant message does.  Crossing a wiki with an email might be a good way to think of a wave.

• It's like Google Docs, but it's not.  Google Docs has some of the tools for collaboration, like a way to see what each author changed, and to see edits from multiple authors in a convenient online tool.  But Google Docs is more like Microsoft Word put online with a few collaboration features built in.  Wave promises to be a true real-time conversation, where people can work together simultaneously with real-time visibility and instant notification of updates.

• It's like a conversation over a kitchen table, but it's not.  If you and I were talking face-to-face at a table, we could exchange ideas, comment, debate, and share things like photos and documents (provided they were printed out of course).  Google Wave gives you all of this functionality, but it gives you something that a kitchen table conversation doesn't -- the ability to time shift it.  For a kitchen table conversation, both people need to be there.  But with a wave, it can be held in real-time but it doesn't need to be.  In this way it's more like email, for its time-shifting abilities.

So why is Google Wave a potential game-changer for digital marketers?  It has the potential to make marketing in social media more highly engaged, more personalized, and more conversational.

• A software company could let the users of its products collaborate on ideas for new releases, bug fixes and updates.
  
  
• I'm installing a new floor in my kitchen right now, so the example of a flooring manufacturer comes to mind.  A flooring manufacturer could put their installation instructions and videos in a wave, then invite customers to the wave.  Customers can add their own tips, pictures and experiences installing their floor -- but in a real-time environment.
  
  
• It could also be huge for product development.  Any company can use waves internally to let their product development teams collaborate for new product updates and revisions.  Every company's intranet could be a series of waves.  Every project going on within a company could be a series of waves.

Can all of these tasks be accomplished without Google Wave?  Certainly.  But Google Wave might be the tool that can improve all these types of communication -- giving a new collaborative twist to the exchanging of ideas online.