Why Google is so successful:
What really sets Google apart from its competition, of which there are many? In this article we will discuss some of the factors that have made Google the international conglomerate and success story that it is today.
The web is changing, becoming more of a social environment where people share things as they find them and there is a lot of development and encouragement of this type of web browsing.
Google was created by Larry Page and Sergey Brin in 1997 to provide a search engine service. The name is derived from the word “googol”, the mathematical term for a 1 followed by 100 zeros.
Google’s philosophy revolves around providing the “best user experience possible.” His original idea was to index as much of the web as possible and provide the best possible results for search phrases. The founders firmly believed that if they focused solely on the user, everything else would follow. It is fair to say that this has been the case!
Google employees, a large proportion of whom are based in Silicon Valley, have a unique work environment, where they are actively encouraged to develop their own ideas for 20% of the time they work. As you can imagine, this is part of the lifestyle that has spawned the continuous new developments that Google continually makes.
It is estimated that Google’s search formula has changed more than 500 times a year, providing yet another demonstration of how flexible the business must be to deliver the best possible search engine results.
Google has introduced the term Page Rank, which is a complex algorithm that Google has developed to measure the importance of certain pages. There are supposedly more than 500 million variables and more than 2 billion terms. This goes some way to show the complexity of the business in which Google operates.
Google’s current business areas include search engines, Google Docs (an online version of Microsoft Office, which enables live document sharing), YouTube, Google’s video platform, Google Buzz, which is similar to a combination of Twitter and Facebook, Google has developed its own operating system for mobile phones, Andriod, Google Earth, which provides images of the earth, and a host of other amazing services.
Google’s main source of revenue is through its provision of advertising through AdWords. This is the relevant advertising service that shows ads every time you search on Google, and on a host of other websites as well. Basically, Google charges advertisers for each time their link is clicked (subject to certain terms). From an advertiser’s perspective, this means you can drive traffic from extremely relevant search terms. Google supposedly generates 97% of its revenue through AdWords, which shows how successful it has been.
If you’re thinking of advertising with Google AdWords, the more popular the keywords, the more expensive they will be, since you have to bid for the price you’re willing to pay for a particular click on a search phrase. If you’re considering this type of model, do some testing before committing to thousands of pounds or dollars worth of advertising, as it’s imperative that you make sure your website is converting efficiently.
Some of Google’s proposed services for the coming months and years apparently include the following:
Social searches will generate results from your social network. So when you search for a term your results will include those that have been generated from your social network.
There was a recent deal negotiated last year with Twitter that provides live updates from Twitter that are found within search engine results.
Google Googles, which is a service that provides search engine results based on the images you enter. The tests I’ve seen were a bit iffy, but I’m sure they’ll be honed to Google’s usual high standards.
So, in summary, the things that have made Google so successful is their adaptability, their work ethic, their philosophy, their aggressive stance in terms of acquiring businesses that they believe add value to their services, and what is most importantly, provide outstanding service to its users
