OK, so that might not technically be true, but that's the gist of this New York Times article on Google. Among the tidbits:
- Analysts expect Google will sell over $6 billion (not a type, that's "billion") in ads this year. That surpasses any print publisher or television network. That could grow to almost $10 billion in 2006.
- Google says because of their sophisticated ad targeting users click on their ads 50 to 100% more than they do ads on Yahoo!.
- Ads incorporating graphics are definitely on the horizon.
- The boys are seriously looking at applying the same cold-hard look at ads to television, saying if increased relevance means more revenue for everyone, then why not.
- Google Base will be a "frontal assault" on all online classfieds providers.
Beyond the interesting points of discussion the article also contains a pretty good look into the history and philosophy of both Google and those who use it as an advertising medium. Staci at PaidContent has a great commentary on the article the potential implications of moves into other media.
1. As far as Google TV ads, you need to take the long view of this, which surely seems what Google is doing with most of its new endeavors, just check out how they have bulked up their brain trust in the last year adding people like Vint Cerf, codeveloper of TCP/IP, Kai-Fu Lee, lately head of Microsoft’s Natural Interactive division (think voice recognition) etc. So let’s engage in a little futurism ourselves, imagine this: TV ads that are contextually driven by editorial content beyond deliberate tie ins, ADWords for video. The technology exists to databank the ads and dinamically serve them just in time, even modify them, change taglines, change content. The news mentions that gas is going up once again and the top of the next ad pod is automagically commandeered by an ad for Toyota’s Prius hybrid. Now let’s go further, imagine the disruption to the status quo brought by Google allowing the ad time to be sold up to the last minute. Let that sink in for a second. Bye bye upfront, ads are now bought by Google and whomever else comes into the space to compete with them, in bulk. Demographic spread would still be important but advertisers would be able to mix their media buy with more precise targeting and more timely targeting. Makegoods may become a thing of the past because Google could dynamically change rates on the basis of actual delivered demographics. The time would also could be bought and sold dinamically up to the last moment. Anybody remember the Ad Market in the Max Headroom series? ...
Posted at 1:06PM on Oct 31st 2005 by Jorge Abellas