Google - the Marketing Giant

Image via CrunchBase

Google have dropped/inspired another in a line of new innovative Hardware products, and with the Chrome OS and the series of Net-books being worked on, you might find yourself thinking that Google is trying to make a play for the hardware device market.

With the drop of Nexus One, Google appears to have pulled out all marketing stops.  Using services like YouTube to create Apple-like buzz around their new product.  Not to mention the Twitter buzz and Yahoo Buzz.  And the rumours dropped a few weeks ago by Techcrunch to start the hype was very Apple-ish.  It looks as though Google are quite serious about a move into the hardware device market.

Are we missing the point with Google?  We keep saying that their business is online search advertising and not hardware, but we seem to forget what Advertising really is.  Online advertising is one of the best ways to sell hardware.  Especially if that hardware happens to be pitched at the tech community.

The Open-Source Ecosystem

Apple's success in the mobile marketplace has been due to the ecosystem they have created around the iPhone with iTunes and the Apps store.  The ecosystem (and I guess a good product) is what has engaged consumers and is taking the smartphone market by storm.

Google started their Open-Source ecosystem some time ago with the Android smartphone OS, but we all brushed it off as just a company with a few bucks trying something different.  Even months after the Android launch and gaining a cult following, the Apple App Store with all its approval failings was still better stocked and growing.  Whereas the Android platform looked like it was fading away.

But regardless of Androids success, Google was really just building a ecosystem to support the great products that they were going to bring out.  Many in the industry were saying that 2009 was going to be the year for Android, with so many manufacturers tipped to support the platform.  But when only a couple phones came out, it looked like Google had dropped the ball, as on so many other occasions.  But maybe Google's timeline was just a little more patient than ours, and they prefer to do things their way rather than the Apple iPhone approach.

The Marketing Ecosystem

If you take a step back and look at Google as a whole, you see that they have being working on another ecosystem which may have snuck up on us a little bit.  That is the collection of trusted marketing tools that give them a edge in the tech market, and the mobile computing market.

First they have the name.  I have mentioned this before when commenting on Chrome OS, many would put Google up there with Microsoft and Apple.

Second is the knowledge.  If I am looking for the best way to sell and market online, I would love to get access to the information on the Google servers.

Third is the tools.  Many have seen, and used, the marketing potential of YouTube and other Google services but I don't think everyone understands what can happen when you have full control of this potential, as Google does.

In the End

I'm not saying that Google will begin a campaign of rigging their services to promote the new Google products, but they do have a marketing machine at their disposal that perfectly suits the audience they're pitching too.  Who but Google knows the real "influences", and probably has ad space on their blogs?  If only they owned a major retail outlet, the future would be assured.

If you do some searches, especially on Twitter, you'll find all the big names discussing Nexus One.  All the blogs are doing the compares, and interviews.  And there is one of the best looking (maybe Apple-like) YouTube pages I have seen.  Not to mention all the user generated content out there, and on it's way.

If Google can put the same marketing hype behind Chrome OS, Net-books, and other Android phones, then I can see a real power shift in the mobile device market.  Google already controls a fair chunk of the Internet and the things we use the Internet for.  Apple's tablet better be good, for a flood of cheap, easy to use and net-compatible devices may be on their way.

It may sound as though I'm a little anti-Google, but I am not.  I use as many, if not more of my fair share of Google services.  And we might be getting Nexus One in the future, so it is not that.  It just hit me as I was fed a stream of marketing info on Nexus One through most of my information sources all day, that Google had wrapped-up the marketing quickly and simply.  Then when @ginatrapani tweeted "best part about Google's Webstore? Not standing in line with a bunch of nerds for 2 days to buy a phone", the above started to make sense.

What do you think?

Jason Remnant

...if it ain't Broken, just wait a little while (we're just watching everyone else).