Google Presents 10 Marketing Principles

Professor Larry Mueller is surrounded by international marketing students. Katchen Gerig is center back. (L to R) Valerie Sullivan; Erika Caron; Ashley Ford; Kristen Spinner; Kristen Howard

"It's been quite a ride for the past five years," Katchen Gerig told Nichols business students on December 3rd as part of a Fischer Institute business seminar series on opening global markets.

Gerig is senior manager of Google, Inc.'s international marketing for Asia and Latin American: "When I started five years ago, international consisted of United Kingdom, France, Italy, Germany, Australia and Japan. Now there are over 46 international Google offices, and we have teams of marketing professionals."

Gerig presented 10 principles by which the Internet giant evaluates its decisions for expansion and stays true to its core competencies. She stated that these principles, developed by Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, have provided a great structure on which they could rely. These principles are as follows:

1. Focus on the user and all else will follow.

Google's interface has changed little in the past 8 years. It remains simple to use and efficient in obtaining the best search results.

Google constantly checks in with its users to make sure it remains user friendly.

Growth has been organic, as Google has never been able to fully predict who will embrace the technology. For example, Orkut, Google's social networking service is very successful in Brazil.

 

 

 

 

2. Don't be evil.

Google is particularly careful of how it presents itself in advertising, making sure not to make fun of people. It wants to portray itself as a brand that does good things in the world, even if that hurts achieving short-term goals.

Google is careful to be respectful of local cultures, laws, and privacy issues. For example, Google does little outside solicitations.

3. Let others speak for you.

Google was built on "word of mouth." It lets others carry its message. "Nothing speakers better than someone else saying Google is a great product."

Google marketing has a huge bias for using testimonials and case studies and has found that small business, entreprenuerial testimonials are successful across markets.

Google's policy is to not distribute press releases, but have partners distribute press releases with Google quotes, which is much more believable and lends credibility.

4. Promote trial.

If you believe in your products, let people play with the product before they buy. To promote Google Adwords, Google inserted coupons for a free trial to grow its advertising business. Google also bundles with other products (e.g. gmail, Google instant messenger).

5. Data. Not hype.

Since Google was founded by engineers and mathematicians, it's not surprising that the founders want marketing to be about data: "Let the data speak for itself."

Many of Google's marketing materials have simple charts on search results or third party data points that appeal to intelligent customers.

Google Analytics was purchased to measure the effectiveness of adwords online, and it is now provide free to any user.

6. You're smart and your time matters.

Google does not talk down to its users. Marketing activities focus on educational seminars around the world.

Google also has partner forums on collaborating online and these have been quite successful.

7. We're serious...except when we're not.

Google likes to have fun with a "smile and a wink."

Google doodles have been used successfully in promotional activities around the globe, including "Doodle for Google" campaigns with school-age children, which create excitement in local communities.

8. Eat your own dog food.

It's very important to innovate and use your own products so that you can better speak to your customers.

Google partnered with British Airways to enable travelers to look at fares using Google Earth, Google Maps, and Google Analytics. All of Google's product marketing managers use Adwords and hold themselves to return-on-investment metrics.

9. Big ideas move us.

The Google brand's goal is to be internationally recognized. When Google launched in China, a big issue was that the Chinese pronunciation of "Google" sounds like "dog-dog." Therefore, Google created a new name, which means "valley of harvesting," and put that word under its logo.

10. Your country is different...but not that different.

It makes sense to pay attention to local cultures, but you also have to stay true to your core principles. Gerig gave an example of a tailored homepage which emphasized the sport of cricket in India.