Google Wave fails to take flight This search engine leader is probably the biggest goldfish bowl when it comes to allowing public viewing of its developments still in [>>]]]> Even if you’re the coolest company in the world, you’re not immune to marketing failures or PR blunders. Take these examples from 2010’s three most-watched companies: Google, Apple, and Facebook.

Google Wave fails to take flight
This search engine leader is probably the biggest goldfish bowl when it comes to allowing public viewing of its developments still in their “lab” stage. Remember Google Wave, the real-time collaboration tool that Google unveiled in 2009? While many of us can only dream of getting such media buzz for a new project, Google only needs to put up a few slideshows and videos to get people clamoring. Bloggers fought to be one of the 100,000 invitees to test-drive Google Wave. Invites were being sold on eBay to the highest bidder.

Google Wave was going to revolutionize communication, enabling users to communicate instantaneously and simultaneously with a multitude of people. But it proved to be too revolutionary. “Nobody really understood what to do with Wave, and Google never gave any useful guidance to clarify it,” wrote PCWorld. The project was canned in August 2010. Two months later, the engineer behind it left Google for Facebook. He said its demise was because Google lost patience waiting for people to understand it.

The project has since resurfaced as an open source project called Wave in a Box.

Lesson learned: Google Wave wanted to be the main communications platform for its users, who wouldn’t need a separate IM account or a separate email. Users could chat with multiple people, with different people sharing and making additions to anything from photos to videos to calendars—all in real-time. From the demonstrations it all seemed very noisy. Imagine not only trying to focus on one conversation at a crowded party but multiple conversations.

Was the market ready for such a huge platform? Did the market need yet another social collaboration tool? Good marketers understand that people dislike change and they dislike something new that might replace their beloved email or IM clients, for example. So asking people to change their habits and learn a whole new way of communicating—particularly if there are many facets to the new software—is a huge challenge. Baby steps with Wave—perhaps unleashing one or two of the features at a time rather than everything at once—may have been the better way to go.

Apple’s feminine side
If you think having legions of fans and being a style icon make you immune to sniggers, think again. Apple drew scores  of feminine hygiene jokes when it announced “iPad” as the name of its tablet computer. “The term iTampon—a riff on the fact that the iPad can be taken to sound more like a maxipad than a slick new computer—was the third most-talked about trend on Twitter on Wednesday evening,” wrote CNN Tech.

Lesson learned: One of the most entertaining parts of product launches is naming the new product. Your marketing sense should remind you to check that your chosen name sounds good and that it doesn’t mean something totally different (or embarrassing) in another culture. Even colors have different meanings in different countries. So it’s surprising that Apple decided to name its tablet iPad. Didn’t the company ask its employees (which hopefully include women) what they thought of the name? Surely someone would have raised the red flag? Or saw the Mad TV skit (apparently from 2007) about “Apple IPad?”

Facebook privacy woes
The cost of an ad in The Washington Post is probably pretty steep, but Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg got free space for his very own op-ed. In May Zuckerberg tried to limit the damage caused by Facebook’s new privacy controls that had senators complaining. They said the changes exposed some user profiles to public display, allowed advertisers to store profile data forever, and allowed other websites access to a user’s friends list.

Zuckerberg’s op-ed did little to placate some bloggers. In Zuckerberg’s words, Facebook “… just missed the mark.” Tech.blorge commented: “‘Just’ just doesn’t come close to describing how Facebook failed on this one. Sorry is also a great word. But it’s one I doubt we’ll ever hear Zuckerberg utter.” Ouch!

Lesson learned: When your company deals with private data from customers and users, you need to take the responsibility seriously. It’s a tricky balancing act trying to make money while providing a service that’s free to users, especially if users are entrusting you with their private information. This fiasco demonstrated that it’s better to err on the side of more privacy rather than less, and it’s vital to give users the ability to opt in or out of sharing their info with third parties. The erosion of trust, especially for a social networking site, isn’t worth it.

What 2010 marketing blunders made your list?