Contemporary Marketing: Case of Google - Essay Example

Introduction: Technology has grown to a very high extent and has impacted almost every sector of every industry. This paper aims at discussing the impact of technology on one of the giant companies, i.e. Google. The paper deals with three main areas i.e. Marketing Communication, New Product Development, and Brands and Brand development and aims at discussing how the advances in technology have affected the marketing attempts of Google. However before going on to the impact of technology, it is important to gain a brief overview into the company itself. Google: Google was started with a mission to organise all the information of the world in an effective manner and allow it to be useful and accessible across the globe. The company was formed in 1998, by two Stanford University students Larry Page and Sergey Brin (Hamen, 2011). The company has grown extensively over the years and has in many ways surpassed the basic objective of accumulating all information and providing easier accessibility across the globe. As explained in the website, “From offering search in a single language we now offer dozens of products and services—including various forms of advertising and web applications for all kinds of tasks—in scores of languages. And starting from two computer science students in a university dorm room, we now have thousands of employees and offices around the world” (Google, 2011). The company now has a wide range of products and services and several different options which help make it easier for the world to share the information. For instance the company has developed several applications like Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs and many others which help in better accessibility to data and information. The further sections will deal with the impact of technology on several aspects of marketing of Google (Hamen, 2011). Technology and Marketing Communication: Marketing communication is a major part of every business and in some ways can be considered to be a subset of marketing itself. The marketing of a company is based on the marketing mix (4 Ps in the case of products and 7 Ps in the case of services), and marketing communication is a means of promoting the marketing mix of a company. Technology and marketing go hand in hand and with the ever changing technology, the options for marketing communication have also increased to a great extent (Jobber, 2009). Marketing communication within a company needs to be integrated as it helps keep the customers aware of the brand name and image. Advancing technology is definitely not a trend and this has a number of benefits, like better knowledge based companies. The amazing technologies have proven to be useful and also impressive in terms of the decline of costs as well. Different authors have different views on the effectiveness of technology on marketing (Jobber, 2009). However the various advances in technology have clearly been found to have a positive impact on the marketing communication and these have been found to help companies reach out to a wider range of audiences and provide better and clearer picture of the various products and services of the company (Jobber, 2009). The next section focuses on the impact that the changing technology has had on Google and the overall performance of the company. Impact on Google: In the case of Google, technology has impacted the company to a great extent as well as vice versa. For companies like Google, which mainly focus only on the Internet, the World Wide Web provides the marketers with excellent options for interactive technologies. Here with the ever growing technology, the overall marketing communication of the company has grown and developed to a great extent (Girard, 2009). Technology has thrown open to Google several options to help improve the overall marketing of the company. Here the company now has much higher speeds to transfer any data, a possibility to develop systems like Google documents which allow users from world over to share their documents. With the technology leading to the medium being so dynamic, this allows the company to keep all information fresh and current (Merrill & Martin, 2010). Apart from this, Google uses the Japanese art of continuous improvements called ‘kaizan’ (The Google Legacy, 2011). Technology has helped the company gain a competitive advantage and to improve the overall marketing communication to a great extent by increasing the innovation of the company, easier and better adaptations. Google has clearly used technology to the best possible extent for the technical aspects of the business and has built a large system using the block by block approach. This in turn has impacted the overall ability of the company for marketing communications (Halligan, Shah, & Scott, 2009). An excellent example for this is when Google launched Gmail in 2004. The company opted to choose 1000 online formers who were required to test the service before it could go to the public. This led to almost three million users in just three months. It is here in this time of marketing where the customer allow the marketers to opening approach them with the one on one marketing offers, that the mass marketing is being challenged to a great extent (Dahlén, Lange, & Smith, 2010). With the extensive technology, Google did not need to communicate the Gmail service in the market to a great extent, and the company received a response among the highest in the history. It is hence evident that the online medium has opened up numerous offers and opening for companies and their marketing communication (Dahlén, Lange, & Smith, 2010). In the case of Google, it has been noted that Google not only uses the technology available but is also major contributor to the field of technology likewise. The company has used technology to its benefit and has improved the overall marketing communication methods to a great extent with several of its products and services like Gmail, Google Analytics, Google search and many more (Dahlén, Lange, & Smith, 2010). It is also important to note here that companies like Google do not sell their search results but earn their income using the Ad words and other such application. This can clearly be understood by the marketing communication and this has been found to have improved with the improving technology (Marketing Science, 2004). Hence it can be concluded that the marketing communication for Google and the advances in technology are directly proportionate to each other and Google has been known for its ability and commitment and the focus of using all possible resources to provide an excellent end product to the customers (Crow, 2001). Technology and New Product Development: New product development involves a high amount of research and development. With the growing technology, one of the many benefits that have been found is the ease of research and development, which assists in better product development. With the increase in technology and the increased and improved available options for companies, it has been found that these lead t pure research, applied research and also has proven to be beneficial in the case of products where there is an acceptable risk (Mayer, 2007). The improvements and developments in technology has also helped in finding the use of technology by other companies and helps in better development of new products as it helps not only understand the customers but also the competition (Girard, 2009). New products development and marketing is always successful where the marketing of these products are effective and these clearly depend on the technology and the advancements in technology. Technology plays a major role in the overall planning and development and also managing of the new product development (The Google Legacy, 2011). Here it is crucial to note that the success rate of a new product is based on the overall technological levels to a great extent as it helps in better understanding of the customers. As explained by Crow, (2001), “Quality function deployment (QFD) is a powerful tool to plan products, define their requirements or technical characteristics and plan subsequent details to achieve the product. We have also used QFD to plan technology development and help with R&D management. QFD provides a mechanism to assure that appropriate technology is investigated that can support customer needs for new products” (Crow, 2001). Hence it is clear that technology helps in understanding better customer needs as well as helps in identifying what product will work with the customers (Conner, 2008). Here this hence helps in the success or failure of the new product development to a great extent. Impact on Google: In the case of Google, the company has always used technology to a great extent. Here in the case of new product developments as well, the company provides its people with the best technology (Mayer, 2007). The company has an area referred to as Googleplex, which is similar to a toy box for the experts, programmers and engineers. Here the company provides them with the best and most sophisticated tools and the aim here is to make Google the best and brightest talent in the world (Halligan, Shah, & Scott, 2009). Google allows and to a great extent also follows a culture where all the employees of the company are expected to spare 20% of their overall work time on innovative ideas and on developing new products or services. Here the company provides the employees with the best of technology and focuses more so on the innovation (Merrill & Martin, 2010). Hence with the increase in technology and advancements in technology, there will clearly be an improvement in the overall new product development as well. An excellent example of this is the development of the social networking site by Google, i.e. Orkut. Here the company had provided the employees with the best technology and the time to be innovative and develop anything. An employee in the company using the 20% free time developed the social networking site (The Google Legacy, 2011). The site now has around 52 million active users and 51% of these come from Brazil. It is also important to note here that the company offers the Googler an option to use the best technology to develop the product to the best possible extent and to also grow and develop the product (Marketing Science, 2004). Technology plays a major role here as it has helped face its competition with other major social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. Google is focused on innovation and new product development, hence with the increase and advancements in technology, the company is able to be more innovative and is able to increase the number of new product development after complete knowledge of the customer needs and the resources within the company (Hamen, 2011). Excellent examples of these include, the Google Documents, Gmail, Orkut and many other applications that have been developed by Google. Another excellent example here is that of the company’s page ranks (Conner, 2008). The company has used the technology to a great extent to develop strong software for page ranking of the websites and this innovation to a great extent is among one of the major criteria to analyse how good or bad a website actually is. The company is directly impacted by technology and there is a direct relationship between the technology and the new product development in Google. On the whole, here again Google uses technology to the maximum to ensure all the products are well developed and meet the needs of the customers, and in some ways the company contributes to the advancements in technology as well (Hamen, 2011). Hence these have a positive correlation and impact each other to a great extent. Technology and Branding and Brand Development: Brand and brand development is a major part of every business. Technology has created a fluid and fast changing environment where companies are expected to develop themselves and the brands with utmost care and attention. The main factors that impact brands are leadership and innovation. As explained by Yuri Radzievsky, “Today's market space demands that your marketing teams vigorously embrace technology. Your role is not only to encourage use but also to nurture an environment that rewards experimentation” (Radzievsky, 2006). It is evident that technology is not only useful in building brands but is also a major role in building brand communities. The advancements in technology is increasing the levels of transparency and these to a great extent help in the development of brands and brand image. Impact on Google: Within a decade of its opening, Google has been able to surpass the top brands of the world and be recognised to be the top brand across the globe. The company has been found to be one of the fastest growing companies and considering how the company was started, in a college dorm, this company has surpassed almost all expectations. Mr Middleton, explains, “The speed of growth of some of these companies in the Internet world is certainly a lot quicker than in the past,” he also explains, “But the potential vulnerability of these is also much higher” (Impact Lab, 2007). The main cause for the company to be able to grow and develop its brand image to this extent has been the use of technology. Ms Campbell explains, “Google is a technology brand that – until recently – was almost universally loved” (Impact Lab, 2007). As has clearly been noted in the report by Impact Lab, “Millward Brown Optimor defines brand value as the sum of all profits a brand is expected to generate. The calculation applies a multiple of brand growth potential to an estimate of how much of a company’s intangible profit comes from the brand” (Impact Lab, 2007). Hence it is evident that Google has been able to grow and develop its brand based on technology. Hence with advancement of technology, the company will clearly have an increase and improvement in the overall brand as well. Technology allows the brand to expand and integrate all branding attempts both offline as well as online and helps develop an integrated marketing communication. An excellent example of the brand building here is the use of several different applications and solutions that Google has developed or bought over the years. Of these YouTube is one of the best ways that the company can expand its brand and brand image (YouTube, 2008). Technology and advancements in technology are clearly important factors here and YouTube is clearly a major factor that helps in building the Google brand. The company has hence clearly been impacted by technology and has been able to achieve the image of the most valuable brand based on the accurate use of technology and also the application of technology in improvement of its products, services and image as a whole. Conclusions: In conclusion, it is evident that technology has had a major impact on several different aspects of businesses across the world. Google on one hand has used all the technology available to help with improving itself and in turn improving the overall marketing efforts of the company. It is important to state here that although technology has had a major impact on most businesses, in the case of Google; Google has had a major impact on technology (Hamen, 2011). The company has developed numerous services which has to a great extent contributed to the overall technology to a great extent and has also helped in better use of the Internet and the World Wide Web. The openness of Google and the constant need to improve itself has led the company to make complete use of technology and the changes and developments to a great extent. Here it is also crucial to note that Google has used technology more so on the technical aspects and the development of new products than much on the marketing end of the company. Here this has to a great extent been extremely beneficial for the company as it allows the company to focus on improving the products and services and to gain the brand name and image based on the effectiveness of the products. Google is among one of the few companies whose name can be referred to be synonyms with the term technology (Jarvis, 2009). Both Google and technology go hand in hand and to a great extent they support each other for the betterment of the world. They have a positive correlation and with each of them help in the growth and development of the other. Hence it is evident that technology plays a major role in the success of Google, and Google contributes a great extent to the development of technology as well. Google is focused on using technology in a positive manner and is focused on making technology that improves people lives (YouTube, 2008). It is evident that this is a positive correlation here and Google uses technology as a leverage to improve not only itself but also the world. The company focuses on developing the products as a means to improve the overall life for people across the world. Google effectively uses technology to meet the main mission of the company, i.e. to organise all the information of the world in an effective manner and allow it to be useful and accessible across the globe. Hence it can be concluded that technology plays a major role in the overall working of Google and also impacts the three activity areas of marketing communication, branding and brand development and new product development to a great extent. References Conner, N. (2008). Google Apps: The Missing Manual. Pogue Press. Crow, K. (2001). Aliging Technology development with Customer needs. Retrieved February 28, 2011, from DRM Assosiates: http://www.npd-solutions.com/tpm.html Dahlén, M., Lange, F., & Smith, T. (2010). Marketing Communications: A Brand Narrative Approach. John Wiley and Sons. Girard, B. (2009). The Google Way: How One Company Is Revolutionizing Management as We Know It. No Starch Press. Google. (2011). About Us. Retrieved February 22, 2011, from Corporate Information: http://www.google.com/corporate/ Halligan, B., Shah, D., & Scott, D. M. (2009). Inbound Marketing: Get Found Using Google, Social Media, and Blogs. Wiley. Hamen, S. E. (2011). Google: The Company and Its Founders (Tchnology pioneers). Essential Library. Impact Lab. (2007, April 24). Google Names World’s Most Valuable Brand. Retrieved March 1, 2011, from Impact Lab - Science & Technology News: http://www.impactlab.net/2007/04/24/google-names-worlds-most-valuable-brand/ Jarvis, J. (2009). What Would Google Do? . HarperBusiness. Jobber, D. (2009). Principles and Practice of Marketing. McGraw Hill Higher Education. Marketing Science. (2004, September 22). The impact of advancing technology on marketing and academic research. Retrieved February 28, 2011, from Goliath Business Knowledge on Demand: http://goliath.ecnext.com/coms2/gi_0199-4717187/The-impact-of-advancing-technology.html Mayer, M. (2007, August 12). Google on Innovation. Retrieved February 14, 2011, from http://www.think-differently.org/2007/08/google-on-innovation.html Merrill, D., & Martin, J. A. (2010). Getting Organized in the Google Era: How to Get Stuff out of Your Head, Find It When You Need It, and Get It Done Right. Crown Business. Radzievsky, Y. (2006, September). Technology's impact on branding: in a tech-driven customer world, CEOs need to stay on top of brand building. Retrieved Februrary 28, 2011, from BNEt: http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m4070/is_220/ai_n16808827/pg_2/?tag=content;col1 The Google Legacy. (2011). Google Technology. Retrieved February 28, 2011, from http://www.infonortics.com/publications/google/technology.pdf YouTube (Director). (2008). Google most valuable brand [Motion Picture]. Read More