OPEN

The "father of usability", Jakob Nielsen has expressed concern about "search engines… sucking out too much of the Web’s value, acting as
leeches on companies that create the very source materials the search
engines index."

The comments were made on his site at the beginning of last month, but I didn’t catch them then. Thanks to MIT Advertising Lab for pointing to it…

He makes a case for building strong communications with customers once they arrive at a site in order to avoid having to rely on search engines to bring them back the next time require your content, products or services.

Among his recommendations are "stick your URL on any physical product" (old school), provide a mobile service to create a more direct communication with the customer, and RSS feeds.
Mr Nielsen says he is reserving judgement on the effectiveness of RSS feeds until his team at Nielsen Norman Group has completed its user research (which they should have done by now). He says they will presenting their findings at their forthcoming conferences (see here for dates).

I hope he publishes top-line findings form the research sooner. I’m sure there’ll be some useful insights…

Meanwhile, I think he may going a bit over the top on his response to search. He’s right that it’s foolish to be over-reliant on search as a source of customers, but he seems to be hinting at or even urging a dramatic shift away from search that I’m not sure is warranted or practical.