To accompany this article a series of interviews were recorded with such business leaders as Google: the leader in general search
For many people, ‘search’ and ‘Google’ are almost synonymous. How did this come to be? Is it good for consumers? And is it likely to change?
Dominant – but not overwhelming
In the view of Robin Goad, Google’s dominance is impressive – but not total: “In the UK, Google is a dominant player for traditional search. It has around 80% market share.
“But when you look into it more deeply, Google lags behind Microsoft and Yahoo!, in a couple of related areas. For example, in online e-mail, it lags behind Hotmail. And when you look at the news service, it lags behind Yahoo!.”
For Robin, Google’s pre-eminence in general search has two clear benefits: “As a marketer, the good thing about having one primary platform is that you can focus only on that platform.
“In addition, those with the less dominant share are forced to innovate more. For example, Microsoft lets you have adverts that can be shown at particular times of day or targeted to particular demographics.”
Stephen Taylor l Listen to the podcast
Right place, right time, right product
Stephen Taylor, formerly a senior manager with Yahoo! understands Google’s success: “The originators of the industry, like Alta Vista and Yahoo!, broadened out. Google came in when people were getting increasingly confused and hit the market with a very pure, quite brilliant approach that really got under the skin of what people were looking for. Without going into details of their algorithmic approach, it was fundamentally different to anything that had gone before.”
Although Stephen applauds Google’s introduction, he doesn’t view the subsequent period as a time of visible innovation: “At the consumer front-end, you haven't seen that much innovation from Google, Yahoo! or Microsoft in the core search experience.
“Underneath the bonnet, phenomenally clever innovations are being developed. But the big engines are paranoid about putting much of that live on their core product, because they – and the Wall Street analysts – measure every last pixel on the page, and the revenue for search. And almost anything radical you do at the consumer level will probably disrupt advertising revenues, at least in the short term.”
The unexpected threat
In Stephen Taylor’s view, “I believe very strongly that Google isn't going to be beaten or heavily challenged by the other big players. Any shift from Google isn't going to take place because a slightly better algorithm comes along.
“The shift, if there is one, will come through some of the other trends that we see. The growth of social utilities, such as Facebook, and other trends that start to make it less likely that I make a search engine decision. It’s a big possibility but we're a long way from seeing the demise of Google just yet.”
Matt Brittin l Listen to the podcast
Google: Rapid, relevant results
In under ten years, Google has grown from a start-up into a listed business earning more than €7bn ($10bn) annual revenue. Matt Brittin, formerly director of strategy and digital at newspaper group Trinity Mirror, joined Google in January 2007 as its UK Country Director.
“Google's one of the few websites in the world that actually tries to get you to leave as quickly as possible. We're focused on very rapid, highly relevant results that allow you to find what you want.
“Our business model is built on the ability of an advertiser to reach a very large audience, in a highly-targeted way – to advertise against particular terms typed into Google, and only pay when the user clicks on their ad and goes to a relevant page.
“Our approach to ‘stickiness’ is not about getting people to spend lots of time on the core site, but getting people to feel that this is a great tool and come back to us to use it to find more and different things.
“If you asked the founders of Google what competition they're most concerned about, they would probably say two guys in a garage. In fact, I've heard them say that. It's a smart answer, because this is a world in which innovation comes out of nowhere, and the established way is overturned by a completely different perspective, cost base and economic model.
“That’s what keeps our leadership team feeling the need to innovate. Consumers can easily choose an alternative search engine, so we have to work hard all the time to keep up with consumer behaviour, innovate even better, and deliver even more relevant results.”