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Wednesday, November 25, 2009
 Google has always prided itself on its "unmarketing".
Release products in beta, quietly. Don't buy mass advertising. Let people discover your offerings organically, through online discovery, word of mouth, and a little bit of presence at the key trade shows.
But things seem to have changed. Has Google stepped up the urgency of their outbound effort, at a time when they seem to have reached unprecedented profitability anyway? What if 1,000 Googlers quietly doing their jobs all hit you (quietly) over the head at once? Does it feel like a relentless onslaught of Google this, and Google that? When is it too much?
Recently I was struck to notice Google's presence rivaling that of companies like global financial institutions... they had purchased a whole row of big billboards in the airport, to promote their enterprise software division (www.google.com/gogoogle).
They also have a major presence in a lot of airports right now because they're sponsoring the free wi-fi.
When you get back to your desk, you notice that a house ad on Google Finance is promoting the Google Chrome browser.
Entering my GMail account today, I got an offer sent to me as a CafePress shopkeeper. (This was positioned just below the ad in GMail encouraging me to use Google AdWords, as you can see from the attached screen shot.) A coupon for use in a new Google AdWords account.
I have a pile of unused, similar coupons sitting on my desk, sent to past tenants at my office building.
Does 1,000 earnest voices quietly whispering "Google" add up to a shout? Not quite, but it's an eerie sound, isn't it?Labels: goog
Posted by
Andrew Goodman
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D'oh!
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